The Development of Hindu Iconography c16.72.3

c16.72.3

they, like the two Nāga chiefs, Nanda and Upānanda, of the Buddhist mythology connected with the Great Miracle of Śrāvastī, are supporting, as it were, the lotus on which the goddess is seated.² Another beautiful figure of Gaja-Lakṣmī of the mediaeval period is to be found at Khitching (Mayurbhanj, Orissa). The goddess is shown inside a decorated square frame seated gracefully in lalitākṣepa on a *viśvapadma*; there are the usual elephants bathing her with upturned jars; her right hand placed on the right knee is shown in the *varada* pose, the left hand holding a full-blossomed lotus (Pl. XVIII. Fig. 2). It will be of interest here to take note of two stone and one bronze sculptures all in the collection of the Madras Museum. The stone ones hail from Kāveripakkam (North Arcot District, Madras), and the tiny bronze figure was unearthed from the village of Enadi (Arantangi Taluq, Tanjore District, Madras). The first of the two stone figures and the tiny bronze (Pl. XIX, Figs. 1 & 3) are really symbol-cum-image of the goddess Śrī; for the outline of the auspicious symbol described as śrīvatsa (for my remarks on it and its illustration, see supra, p. 190, and Pl. II, Figs. 11 & 12) can be distinctly recognised in them. In the former the bathing elephants, the lighted lamps (auspicious signs themselves) and the śaṅkha- and padma-nidhis can be faintly recognised;