The Development of Hindu Iconography c19.s3.2

c19.s3.2

It will be of interest now to study the development of the Garuḍa motif in early Indian art, before its iconographic descriptions in the mediaeval texts are noted, and some mediaeval Garuḍa images are described. In the earliest period he is represented as a huge parrot-like bird with emphasis on some of his physical features. One such extant figure of Garuḍa is carved on the inner side of the middle architrave of the eastern gateway of Sanchi. The entire relief composition here shows the animal world paying homage to Buddha symbolised by the Bodhidruma with Vajrāsana beneath it. It contains, along with animal figures in their natural form, such hybrid figures as lions with the heads of a dog or a bird (griffin). In its right corner is carved a big parrot-like bird with ear-rings and a bushy tuft by the side of a five-headed snake. Grünwedel correctly recognised in these two motifs, Garuḍa and Nāga, and remarked, ‘The native parrot type on the one hand and the west Asian griffin on the other, are the bases upon which modern iconography developed its Garuḍa.’¹ In the Hellenistic art of Gandhāra, Garuḍa appears as a huge eagle decked with the same ear-ornaments, but the wings are treated more naturalistically. He is often depicted as carrying up to the sky a Nāga and a Nāginī either with his long beak, or his big talons. Early Buddhist texts contain stories which are connected with this exploit of Garuḍa (*cf.* the Bauddha drama of Nāgānanda ascribed to king Śrī Harṣa).² The intermediate stage in the evolution of the hybrid Garuḍa figure of mediaeval Indian art from these early forms can be traced with the help of Gupta coins. On most of the gold coins of the imperial Guptas, Garuḍa invariably appears in the form of a plump bird with beautiful wings, as the capital piece of a column (Garuḍadhvaja). Vincent Smith suggested that the Garuḍa of the standard was copied from the Roman eagle; but Allan has rightly observed that there is no reason for this suggestion, and the resemblance is quite a coincidence, and Garuḍadhvajas were common objects in India.¹ On the reverse side of Chandragupta II’s silver coins Garuḍa stands facing with outspread wings as a full-fledged bird, but on some varieties of his copper coins, he is endowed with novel features. Thus on the *Chatra* type (Type No. II) of this Gupta king’s copper issues, he is shown with outspread wings and long human arms adorned with bracelets; on Types V, VI and VII of the same issues, he is figured with outstretched wings, though without human arms, holding a snake in his mouth (*cf.* his epithet *pannagāśana*).² The hybridity in the representation of Garuḍa marked by Type No. II (copper coins) noted above was not emphasised in the other silver and copper coins of this Gupta monarch and his successors, and it was left for the regular iconographers of Brahmanical art to develop the type in the late Gupta and the mediaeval periods. An inscribed terracotta seal of Kumāragupta I found at Nalanda and now in the collection of the Indian Museum, Calcutta, emphasises in a very striking manner the hybridity of the motif. The plump bird stands facing on a sort of pedestal, but it has the face of a man (Pl. XXVIII, Fig. 1).