Elements of Hindu Iconography v1.c7.118

v1.c7.118

the neighbourhood, bestow prosperity and progress. It is thus required that the outline of the faces and features and the details of clothing and ornamentation should be made to vary from place to place according to local usage. In other respects no variation was allowed or encouraged. It cannot be seen that there has been in any part of India any new canon of art other than the rules prescribed in the *Āgamas* and the *Tantras*. From the uniformity observable everywhere throughout India in the arrangement, say, of the individual figures belonging to a subject, it is clear that the rules laid down in the *Āgamas* and *Tantras* have had a very general application. The same rules having been obeyed everywhere in the matter of making images, it is no wonder that the same results have been produced by artists belonging to all parts of the country in so far as the art is apt to be bound down by rules.