Elements of Hindu Iconography v1.c7.80

v1.c7.80

The first cause that brought about a change in this natural and progressive state of Indian art was the entrance of *Tāntric* ideas into the worship of the Hindus as well as the Buddhists. The various aspects of a divine being thus came to be represented by various heads, and its various attributes by its various hands. The sculpturing of such complicated conceptions in the form of extraordinary human beings with several heads and hands was always attended with a certain amount of unavoidable unnaturalness and clumsiness. Like all art, the Indian iconoplastic art also has to be judged from the standpoint of its motive. To those, who cannot appreciate this motive, the very ideal of the art remains hidden and inexplicable. The consequence is that such critics can pronounce their opinions only on the technical details of the artist's workmanship, but can never grasp the soul of his art. The mediæval period of Indian art is not wanting in really noble and strikingly artistic pieces of sculpture in spite of many of these having more arms and more heads than ordinary man has. It is well known that even in Europe the old