South-Indian Images of Gods and Goddesses c10.s2.38

c10.s2.38

Durgā is a very popular deity. The name is indifferently DURGĀ applied to all goddesses with a terrible appearance and in a fighting attitude. The general description of Durgā given in the *Kāsyapa-Silpa* represents her as having four arms, two eyes, high hips, high breasts, and all ornaments. She holds the conch and the discus in her upper hands,¹ while her right lower hand presents the *abhaya* posture and the left lower rests on the waist. She stands on a lotus-pedestal and has a breast-band of serpents and a red petticoat. According to the *Silparatna*, Mūla-Durgā holds in her lower hands the bow MŪLA- and the arrow. From Mahābalipuram comes the figure of a DURGĀ. Durgā (fig. 124) who stands on the buffalo’s head. She has eight arms, in the uppermost of which are found the discus and the conch. The other weapons held are the sword and the bell on the right side and the bow and shield on the left. The lowest of the right hands holds evidently a *sriphala* or the *bēl*-fruit and the corresponding left has a parrot perching on it and rests freely on the waist of the goddess. The necklace, breast-band and the garment hanging in folds down to her feet deserve to be noticed. The absence of finger rings on the eight hands of the goddess is peculiar. The illustration shows also other figures surrounding the goddess, viz., two male devotees with peculiar head dress kneeling at her feet, two female attendants on either side holding the sword and the bow, two demi-gods one of whom is carrying a *chauri*, and a lion and a deer. In another *mandapa* at Mahābalipuram is a sculpture evidently of the same goddess with the lion and the deer, pairs of demi-gods on the sides and devotees at the feet, one of whom is in the act of either cutting off his hair or his neck. The goddess has only four arms and stands on an ordinary pedestal but not on the buffalo’s head (fig. 125). At Srī-mushnam in the South Arcot district is an image of Durgā with eight arms showing almost the same symbols as those of the figure at Mahābalipuram described above, the only exception being that instead of the bell in one of the right hands she is holding, perhaps more correctly, the arrow. The figure stands on the head of a buffalo without any other accompanying attendants and has an umbrella overhead (fig. 126). Images of Durgā with four or more arms standing on the head of a buffalo are generally found placed in a niche on the north wall of the central shrine of Siva temples in Southern India (fig. 127). Occasionally, however, they may stand on ordinary pedestals without the buffalo’s head, as at Tiruvottiyūr near Madras. In the Vishnu temple at Tirumalisai, Chingleput district, is a similar image (fig. 128) placed in a niche on the north wall of the central shrine. It is said to be Lakshmī but perhaps represents Durgā without the buffalo’s head. The Mayamata, describing the figure of Kātyāyanī with four arms, says that she holds the conch and the discus in the upper hands and exhibits the abhaya and the varada postures with the lower. With eight arms and a parrot, this same figure is stated to receive the name of Durgā. The description of the sculptures from Mahābalipuram and Srīmushnam agrees with what has been said of Kātyāyanī in the Mayamata.