Maurya and Shunga Art c12.6.1

c12.6.1

A most characteristic formal quality of Śuṅga art is its flowing linear rhythm that binds all isolated objects in one continuous stream of life as it were. Look at any coping stone and you will find a huge stout lotus stalk flowing in rhythmical waves from form to form, not only binding each isolated item in one whole but permeating each isolated object itself, including the limbs of human beings, the animals and the trees with the same flowing linear rhythm. A most perfect example of this flowing linear rhythm is furnished by the representation of a griffin on a half-medallion on a railing post of the Sanchi Stūpa no. 2. But this is equally evident in the majority of the panelled reliefs and in the bolder and frameless large-size human figures on the upright posts. Even in the round and half round panels there is a slow but ceaseless flow of free rhythmical movement. The figures may be loosely dispersed on the reliefs, singly and in an isolated manner, but each one even in their isolation has to feel the touch of that rhythm and be swayed and permeated by it, whether it is on the reliefs of the Sanchi Stūpa no. 2 or on those of Barhut. Wherever luxuriant vegetation finds a place its radiating and continuous linear movements dominate the composition and all the figures irrespective of action and status become equal and integral parts of the whole.