Indian Sculpture c4.s1.12

c4.s1.12

Another way of making the human figure appear superhuman consists in a multiple of heads or limbs¹³ (see also four-armed human pictographs of Indus script). These, however, are not a number of different heads or limbs, but they represent stages of one movement and have to be understood dynamically¹⁴ (see also figures radiating from one centre) as indicative of the potency of the superhuman being in the simultaneousness of their presence. Multiplicity of the parts of the body for ever remained an outstanding feature of Indian divinities; it is full-fledged in the art of the Indus valley, but anticipated in the palæolithic period, where parts of the animal’s body were reiterated, indicative of various stages of movement.¹⁵