The Development of Hindu Iconography c15.2.5

c15.2.5

It is needless to state that in the latter class of sculptures also, the artists followed certain canons of proportions, according to the tradition of their respective schools. I have stated in the first chapter of this book that secular images used also to be made in ancient and mediæval India. A. N. Tagore thinks that the canons of proportions which are incorporated in ancient and mediæval Indian *Śilpaśāstras* were only applicable in the case of images intended for worship and the artist was ‘free in all other cases, to follow his own art instinct.’¹ Such might or might not have been the case; but it is more probable that in their secular images also, the Indian artists, like the Greek and Egyptian ones, followed some recognised rules of proportions.