A History of Fine Art in India and Ceylon, from the Earliest Times to the Present Day c16: Chapter X. Hindu Minor Arts

A History of Fine Art in India and Ceylon, from the Earliest Times to the Present Day c16

Language: English

c16.s1 Section I. Coinage — 6 parts
c16.s2 Section II. Gems, Seals, and Jade — 11 parts
c16.s3 Section III. Jewellery — 8 parts
c16.s4 Section IV. Reliquaries and Gold Images — 19 parts
c16.s5 Section V. Silver Paterae and Bowls — 17 parts
c16.s6 Section VI. Copper Vessels — 2 parts
c16.s7 Section VII. Wood-Carving — 18 parts
c16.s8 Section VIII. Ivories — 9 parts
c16.s9 Section IX. Terra-Cottas and Clay Figures — 11 parts

Chapter X. Hindu Minor Arts

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Several classes of Hindu minor works of art, which cannot properly be treated under the major heads of sculpture and painting, demand notice, and may be grouped together conveniently in a single chapter. Strict chronological arrangement being impracticable, the selected objects are classified, chiefly with regard to material, under the heads of (1) coinage; (2) gems, seals, and jade; (3) jewellery; (4) reliquaries and gold images; (5) silver *paterae* and bowls; (6) copper vessels; (7) wood-carving; (8) ivories; (9) terra-cottas and clay figures. Merely a small selection of specially interesting artistic works is offered, no attempt being made to discuss generally the industrial arts.

Section I. Coinage

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The early punch-marked and cast indigenous coins of India make no pretence to artistic excellence. Regular double-die coinage with royal portraits and legends recording kingly names and titles was an importation from Europe which never became thoroughly acclimatized. The brilliant realistic portrait dies of Eukratides and other Indo-Greek rulers on the north-western frontier between 200 and 100 b. c., never successfully imitated by Hindu die-cutters, cannot be claimed as the production of Indian artists. Fergusson's proposition that the history of Indian art is 'written in decay' is absolutely true in the numismatic field, all Indian attempts to carry on Hellenistic tradition in coin types being failures. For some reason or other the foreign practice of cutting well-designed coin dies did not interest the artists of India, who never produced even one coin of high merit.

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The few tolerably good specimens are collected in Plate LXXIII. They belong to two periods, that of the foreign Kushān or Indo-Scythian sovereigns about a. d. 100, and that of the earlier kings of the native Gupta dynasty in the fourth century.

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Figs. 1 and 2 are gold coins of the Indo-Scythian king, Wima or Hima, commonly called Kadphises II, who conquered the Panjāb at some time in the first century of the Christian era. They show a fairly successful attempt at realistic portraiture. The reverse bears the purely Indian device of Siva and his bull.

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Figs. 3 and 4, which seem to be authentic, recognizable portraits of the great Kanishka (? a. d. 78 to 123), are curiously superior in design and execution to the contemporary effigy on the Peshāwar reliquary (*post*, p. 358). Figs. 5 and 6 similarly give distinctive portraits of Huvishka, the second successor, and probably son of Kanishka. The later Kushān coinage is barbarous or semi-barbarous.

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A temporary revival in the die-cutter's art, obviously based on European models, took place in the reigns of the earlier Gupta kings of the fourth century, whose best efforts are shown in Fig. 7, the Tiger type of Samudra-gupta; Fig. 8, the Archer type of the same king; and Fig. 9, the unique Retreating Lion type of his son and successor, Chandra-gupta II. This last is the best coin ever struck by a native Indian sovereign.¹ Many of the coins of Chandra-gupta II are quite barbarous. After A. D. 400 no Hindu coin is worthy of mention in a history of art.

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¹ The coins figured in Pl. LXXIII are: (1) Kadphises II (Wima), obv., *not in Catalogue*; (2) the same, obv., Gardner, *Catal. of Greek and Scythic Kings*, Pl. XXV, 8; (3) Kanishka, obv., *ibid.*, Pl. XXVI, 16 (in text 17, by mistake); (4) the same, obv., *ibid.*, Pl. XXVI, 15 (16 in text); (5) Huvishka, obv., *ibid.*, Pl. XXVII, 9; (6) the same, obv., *ibid.*, Pl. XXVIII, 9; (7) Samudragupta, Tiger type, B.M. Eden; (8) the same, Archer type, obv., B.M. Eden; (9) Chandra-gupta, B.M. All the coins are gold. Another variety of the Retreating Lion type has been discovered recently.

Section II. Gems, Seals, and Jade

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The allied art of engraving gems and seals with artistic designs equally failed to attract Indian taste, although the lapidaries of India were unsurpassed in manual skill and had models of the highest class before their eyes in the numerous Greek gems imported.² Gems and seals of Hindu origin are sufficiently common, but very few can claim any considerable degree of artistic excellence. From the British Museum collection I was able to select only three trifling examples, of slight merit, as reproduced in Plate LXXIII. Fig. 10 represents in chalcedony a lion, with the symbols of Taxila, as seen on the coins of that city. Fig. 11 exhibits on a seal of green schist the device of a king on an elephant receiving a wreath from a Victory; and Fig. 12, with a conventional lion, is photographed from an ancient clay impression of a seal presumably bronze, like two closely related seals also in the British Museum. The legend is *Śrī Sūrya-mitrasya*, '[the seal] of Śrī Sūrya-mitra.'³

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² For the Sanskrit treatises on gems, see Finot, L., *Les Lapidaires indiens*, Paris, 1896.

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³ Published by Mr. Rapson in *J. R. A. S.*, 1901, p. 104, Fig. 7.

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A few other more or less artistic Indian seals are recorded, some of which were excavated from *stūpas* in Afghanistan. One of the most remarkable specimens of such seals is that figured in *Ariana Antiqua*, Pl. I, 7, an oval sard engraved with two figures squatted in the Indian manner, and interpreted as Krishna and Rādhā, but more likely to be Buddhist. Several Indian gems, including three with representations of the Indian humped bull or cow, have been described and engraved by Raspe.⁴

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⁴ *A Descriptive Catalogue of Engraved Gems*, London, 2 vols., 4to, 1791, Pl. XIII.

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I cannot trace a wonderful object briefly described by Mr. King—a sardonyx of great intrinsic value, six inches in height and width, and nearly the same in thickness, engraved with a representation of Buddha seated in a cave, surrounded by numerous attributes, and all cut with marvellous skill.⁵ The subject evidently was the visit of Indra, as treated in the Gandhāra and Mathurā sculpture (*ante*, Figs. 51, 60). The late General Pearse's rich collection of gems and seals, recently bought by the Government [Figure: 1

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⁵ *Antique Gems and Rings*, London, 1872, p. 87. The object is said to have come from a *stūpa*. Mr. King did not name the owner.

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2 6 8 7 3 9 10 4 11 13 12 PLATE LXXIII. Hindu Coins and Seals in British Museum, and jewellery.]

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of India, is not yet available for study, and I am unable to offer any other instances of truly Indian gems or seals deserving of notice for their artistic qualities. Mr. Parker has published a remarkable large intaglio seal obtained from the very early Yaṭṭhāla *dāgaba* in Ceylon, which he believes to have been made in India in the third century B. C. The subject is a king seated on a peculiar basket-work chair, with a 'rustic' back of curved rods. The gem (0·8″ × 0·64″) evidently was a royal signet put into the relic chamber in honour of the relics.¹

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¹ *Ancient Ceylon*, p. 494, Fig. 156.

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The unsurpassed skill of the Hindu lapidaries in working the most refractory stones is best exemplified by the great jade (or ? jadeite) tortoise, found many years ago in the bank of the Jumna near Allahabad, and now exhibited in the British Museum, Room IV. It is 17½ inches long, and must be one of the largest known works of art in jade (Plate LXXIV, Fig. A). Mr. King observes that 'for fidelity to nature and exquisite finish' it is 'worthy of the ancient Greeks'. The tortoise plays a prominent part in Hindu mythology, and we shall presently notice an exquisite example of the treatment of the subject in ivory.

Section III. Jewellery

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The prevalence in India of the practice of cremation deprives the archaeologist of the chance of obtaining the rich sepulchral deposits so abundant in other countries, and the frequent catastrophes to which nearly every Indian town of importance has been subject have involved the destruction of countless hoards of private wealth. Ancient jewellery of intrinsic value is consequently very rarely found in India. The few examples known are believed to have all come from the relic chambers of *stūpas* or *dāgabas*, in which it was customary to deposit valuables at the time of dedication, in honour of the relics. The most artistic specimens extant are a pair of pendants bought, with other minor articles, from a dealer at Rāwal Pindi, and alleged to come from the site of Taxila, but conjectured by Mr. Marshall to be part of a hoard found in the Yūsufzai subdivision of the Peshāwar District, and to date from the third century of the Christian era. The better preserved pendant is reproduced in Plate LXXIII, Fig. 13.

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'The lower half of the ornament consists of a fanciful design, on either side of which is an infant Eros riding on a winged sea-lion, with four chains and bells suspended beneath him. . . . The Erotes and sea-monsters appear to have been cast in a mould, and afterwards chased with a graver's tool; the hair of the boys is very carefully worked, and falls on their shoulders in a natural row of ringlets. Their wings, and the wings and ears of the monsters, both front and back, were inlaid with paste, a fragment of which, of blue-green colour, still remains in one of the ears. A very similar figure of a boy riding on a sea-lion, but without wings, occurs on a golden plaque discovered with a great many other relics on the northern bank of the Oxus in ancient Persia [and now in the British Museum]. . . . As to the influences traceable in the designs and technique of these articles of jewellery, the seemingly Western features which they exhibit . . . are the Erotes riding on sea-lions, the granulated decoration, and the clusters of gold drops; while the Eastern and Indian elements are discernible in the

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incrustate gems, the pendant chains and bells, the *stūpa*-like design of the medallion, Fig. 3 [not reproduced], and perhaps also in the floral *motif* of the upper portion of Figs. 1 and 2 [the pendants].'

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The ornaments presenting this hybrid character may be presumed to be of Indian workmanship, designed in accordance with the principles of the widely diffused art of Western Asia.¹

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¹ Marshall, 'Buddhist Gold Jewellery' (*Ann. Rep. A. S., India*, 1902–3, pp. 185–94, Pl. XXVIII). For 'Indian Jewellery' generally, see the exhaustive treatise by Col. Hendley, C. I. E., in *J. Ind. Art*, vol. xiii, fully illustrated.

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The Hindus, as Mr. King observes, were among the earliest of mankind to attain to mechanical perfection and facility in the treatment of the hardest stones, executing with facility many operations which would baffle the skill of the most expert modern lapidary; such as boring fine holes with the greatest precision, not merely through the sardonyx, but even through the sapphire and ruby.² The components of the broken jewellery deposited with the relics of Buddha in the very ancient Piprāwā and Bhattiprolu *stūpas* include many examples of minute leaves and other pretty trifles wrought in various hard stones with the most exquisite delicacy. All considerable collections of Indian antiquities comprise numerous specimens of pierced beads made of various precious and semi-precious stones, which display the complete mastery of the old craftsmen over the most difficult materials.³

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² King, *Antique Gems and Rings* (1872), pp. 86, 87.

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³ For Piprāwā, see *J. R. A. S.*, 1898, p. 573 and plate. For Bhaṭṭiprolu, see Rea, *South Indian Buddhist Antiquities*, vol. xv of *A. S. Rep., New Imp. Series*.

Section IV. Reliquaries and Gold Images

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Numerous reliquaries or caskets—made of various materials, gold, silver, bronze, rock-crystal, &c.—have been excavated from *stūpas* in India and the neighbouring countries. Most of these, while of high archaeological interest, are of little account as works of art. One such may be briefly noticed because of the testimony borne by its contents to the disputed date of Kanishka, a matter which I have been obliged to touch on more than once. The reliquary referred to was found in the Ahīn Pōsh tope or *stūpa* at Jalālābād in the valley of the Kābul river, and is now in the Gem Room of the British Museum. It is simply a plain octagonal cylinder (if the expression be allowable) with a knob at each end set with green stones and almandine garnets. It contained one coin of Kanishka and one of Kadphises II (Wima). Lying around it were fourteen other coins of the same kings, with one piece of Huvishka, the successor of Kanishka, and one each of Domitian (A.D. 81–96), Trajan (A.D. 98–117), and Sabina Augusta, wife of Hadrian (A.D. 117–138). These facts plainly suggest, although they do not absolutely demonstrate, that Huvishka, the latest of the three Indian kings, must have been the builder of the *stūpa* and the contemporary of Hadrian. That natural inference is strongly confirmed by the additional facts that the single coin of Huvishka was in good condition, whereas some of the coins of his immediate predecessor, Kanishka, were 'much worn', and those of Kadphises II were 'very much worn'; while the one coin of Sabina Augusta was 'considerably worn'. In all probability, therefore, the coins were deposited not earlier than A.D. 130, Sabina having assumed the title of Augusta in 117. This evidence, not noticed or considered by Mr. R. D. Banerji, harmonizes so well with his view, based on inscriptions, that Huvishka reigned alone from A.D. 123 to 140, Kanishka having died in the former year, that at present I accept that theory of the chronology.¹ The dates to be assigned to the sculptures discussed in Chapters IV and V of this work depend in large measure on the date of Kanishka.

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¹ For the coins, &c., see *Proc. A. S. B.*, 1879, pp. 77, 209, 212, Pl. II, III, XI. A fragment of a Roman Ionic capital was obtained from the *stūpa*, as well as Corinthian capitals. In India proper Vāsishka intervened between Kanishka and Huvishka, but the latter probably succeeded Kanishka directly as Emperor.

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Two reliquaries, namely, that from the Bīmarān *stūpa* in the British Museum and that from Kanishka's *stūpa*, lately discovered at Peshāwar, can fairly claim rank as works of art, and are of considerable importance in the artistic history of India.

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The first-named casket, found long ago by Masson in the foundation deposit of No. 2 Bīmarān *stūpa* to the north of the road between Kābul and Jalālābād, and now in the British Museum, was associated with freshly minted coins of Azes I, and may, therefore, be dated about the beginning of the Christian era, or rather earlier. It is made of pure gold, about 2¾ inches high, and 2 inches in diameter, studded with rubies, and adorned with repoussé Buddhist figures and decorative designs (Plate LXXIV, Fig. B). Both the upper and lower rims are studded with *balās* rubies, separated by a four-petalled ornament of the kind known as *śrī-vatsa*. The circumference between the jewelled lines is divided into eight niches, which enclose four distinct figures, each repeated. Flat pilasters with sunken panels separate the niches, which are crowned by arches, circular below and pointed above. The interspaces, or spandrils, are filled up by cranes with outstretched wings. All the details are finely executed, and the whole composition takes high rank as a specimen of ancient goldsmith's work. The four distinct figures are (1) Buddha in the attitude of benediction; (2) lay follower, with his hands clasped in adoration; (3) a male ascetic, with twisted hair and a water-pot in his hand; and (4) a female disciple, praying. Nos. 2 and 4 are shown in the photograph. M. Foucher's engraving shows Nos. 1, 3, 4. Birdwood's figure places No. 3 in the centre, with No. 2 on the proper right and No. 1 on the proper left. The style bears a general resemblance to that of the earlier Gandhāra sculptures, with the important difference that the quasi-Corinthian capital, characteristic of Gandhāran art, is absent. The form of the arches also is not exactly the same as that of any Gandhāran sculpture known to me, and I think that the reliquary may be regarded as a precursor of the Gandhāra school.²

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² The casket or reliquary is described and engraved in *Ariana Antiqua*, p. 53, Pl. III, and Foucher, *L'Art gréco-bouddhique du Gandhāra*, p. 51, Fig. 7; and also by Birdwood, *Industrial Arts of India*, Pl. I. An open lotus is neatly incised on the bottom. The pilasters of the tope or *stūpa* were plain, quasi-Doric, with arches enclosed in double lines of mouldings, a clear indication of early age.

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The little gold statuette of Buddha in the British Museum (Plate LXXIV, Fig. C) evidently must have come, like the casket, from a *stūpa* deposit. Small gold or silver [Figure: FIG. A. Ancient Jade Tortoise, British Museum; 17½ in. long.

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[Figure: FIG. B. Bīmarān gold reliquary, British Museum. (Full size, from a photo.)]

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[Figure: FIG. C. Gold Buddha, British Museum. (Full size, from a photo.)]

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PLATE LXXIV. Jade and gold objects.

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images of Buddha have been frequently enshrined in the *dāgabas* of Ceylon.¹ Although the feet of the British Museum statuette are coarsely executed, the figure and hands are fairly well modelled. The style suggests the Gupta period, about A.D. 500.

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¹ *Ind. Ant.*, xiii, 15. Specimens are in the Colombo Museum.

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The second casket or reliquary claiming special notice, that recently excavated from the ruins of Kanishka's huge *stūpa* at Peshāwar, is of equal artistic and still greater historical interest. The material is an alloy of copper, which seems to have been gilt. The circular, *pyxis*-shaped, main body is nearly five inches in diameter and four inches in height, the total height, including the figures on the lid, being about 7 1/4 inches (187 mm.). Mr. Marshall's description is as follows:—

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‘The lid, which is slightly curved and incised to represent a full-blown lotus, supports three figures in the round; a seated Buddha in the centre, and a Bodhisattva on each side. The edge of the lid is further adorned by a frieze, in low relief, of flying geese bearing wreaths in their beaks; while below, on the body of the vase, is an elaborate design in high relief, of young Erotes bearing a continuous garland, in the undulations of which are seated Buddha-figures and attendant worshippers leaning towards them out of the background. But the chief and central figure on the casket is that of the Emperor Kanishka himself, standing erect with a winged celestial being bearing a wreath on either side. The figure of the Emperor is easily recognizable from his coins, but the identity is further proved by the inscriptions on the casket. These are in Kharoshṭhī and are four in number, punctured in dots in the leaves of the lotus on the top and on the background between the geese and other figures on the sides’ (Plate LXXV, Figs. A and B).

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From the point of view of the historian of art the most interesting of the four inscriptions is that which records the Greek name of Kanishka's ‘Superintending Engineer’. The words are:—‘The servant, Agiśala (Agesilaos), the overseer of works at Kanishka's *vihāra*, in the monastery (*sanghārāma*) of Mahāsena’. Indian inscriptions, apart from coin legends, present only two other Greek names. Kanishka's coin legends are in Greek characters, a fact which indicates that Greek was well known at his court.

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The surprisingly coarse style of the decoration is cited by Mr. Marshall and Dr. Spooner as convincing proof that in the time of Kanishka Indo-Hellenistic art was already decadent, and that consequently all the Gandhāra sculpture of good quality must be anterior to Kanishka.² I cannot accept those inferences. The low standard of execution of the repoussé figures on the casket must be admitted, but established facts negative the opinion that art was generally decadent in the days of Kanishka. His best gold coins are far superior to the work of the casket (*ante*, p. 351), and the Sanghāo sculptures, certainly executed in his reign, are among the better productions of the Gandhāra school, although not, perhaps, of the highest class (*ante*, Fig. 70). There is no doubt that many excellent sculptures at Mathurā and elsewhere must be referred to the reigns of Kanishka and his successor Huvishka, as Cunningham showed long ago (*ante*, pp. 99, 126, 131, 132, 148). Whatever be the correct explanation of the [Figure: FIG. A. Buddha and two Bodhisattvas on lid. (Photo. No. 393.)]

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² *J. R. A. S.*, 1909, pp. 1056–60, Pl. II.

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[Figure: FIG. B. One Bodhisattva only on lid; Kanishka standing below. (Photo. No. 390.)]

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PLATE LXXV. Kanishka's casket; *cir.* A. D. 100. (A. S. photo., Nos. 393 and 390.)

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inferior style of the Peshāwar reliquary, it cannot be that advanced by the Director-General of Archaeology in India. It may simply be that Kanishka did not command the services of any artist good at repoussé work. The geese in low relief are not bad. The date of the work may be taken as A. D. 100 in round numbers. The walls of the *stūpa* were decorated with rows of Buddha-figures in relief, separated by *Corinthian* pillars in stucco, a clear proof that the building dates from the time of the Roman Empire. The earlier Bīmarān *stūpa* had not Corinthian pillars.

Section V. Silver Paterae and Bowls

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The Badakshān silver patera, representing the triumph of Dionysus or Bacchus, now in the British Museum, was acquired in 1838 by Dr. Perceval Lord from Ātmarām of Kunduz, by whom it had been bought from the Mīrs of Badakshān, who claim the honour of descent from Alexander the Great. The dimensions are—diameter 8⅞ in., depth 1⅝ in., and thickness from 1/20 to ⅛ inch. The weight is 29 oz. 5 dwt. Troy (Plate LXXVI). Sir George Birdwood's careful description of the design may be quoted:—

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‘It represents in high relief, with all the usual adjuncts of classical mythology, the procession of Dionysus. The god himself sits in a car drawn by two harnessed females, with a drinking-cup in his extended right hand, and his left arm resting on the carved elbow of the seat on which he reclines, or it may be on the shoulder of Ariadne. In front of the car stands a winged Eros holding a wine-jug in his left hand, and brandishing in his right a fillet, the other end of which is held by a flying Eros. A third Eros is pushing the wheel of the carriage, behind which follows the dancing Heracles, recognized by the club and panther's skin. Over all is a rude and highly conventionalized representation of a clustering vine; and in the lower exergue a panther is seen pressing its head into a wine-jar, placed between the representations of some tree; possibly the pomegranate, arranged symmetrically on either side of it. The figures, which show traces of gilding, are all encrusted on the surface of the patera, and the heads of the Dionysus and Heracles are both wanting.’

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The style of art is clearly an Asiatic degradation of a Greek motive, and it is possible that the work may have been executed in India. The authorities of the British Museum probably are not far wrong in suggesting that the date may be about A. D. 200.¹

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¹ Badakshān is a mountainous region lying to the north of the Hindū Kush range between 36° and 37° N. lat., and 70° and 71° E. long. The patera has been described and figured by Sir George Birdwood, *Industrial Arts of India*, p. 148, Pl. II; and *Trans. Roy. Soc. Liter.*, vol. xi, N. S.; by Prinsep, *Trans. A. S. B.*, vol. vii; by Burnes, *Cabool* (1843); and by Sir H. Yule, *Marco Polo*, 2nd ed.

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A somewhat similar Bacchic subject is represented in a mutilated relief from Gandhāra, now preserved in the Lahore Museum, concerning which M. Foucher writes:—

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‘Nous y reconnaissons au passage la plupart des figurants habituels du cortège de Bacchus, tout comme s'il les avait oubliés derrière lui, à son retour de l'Inde, dans la lointaine vallée où la tradition plaçait la fameuse Nysa et qui est encore célèbre aujourd'hui pour ses raisins magnifiques.’²

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² *L'Art gréco-bouddhique du Gandhāra*, p. 246, Fig. 129.

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Plate LXXVI. The Badakshān patera, ‘Triumph of Bacchus’. (British Museum; from a photo.)

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A second object of the same class, but probably slightly later in date, and thoroughly Indian in subject and style, may be designated the Tānk patera, having been found in August, 1892, near Buddhaghara, about four miles west of Tānk, the ancient capital of the Dera Ismail Khān District, N.W. Frontier Province. Mr. Longworth Dames, I.C.S., acquired it and presented it to the British Museum in 1897 (Pl. LXXVII, Fig. A). The material is silver, apparently alloyed with copper; the diameter is 9⅞ inches, and the device is *repoussé*. The wide margin is decorated with radiating wavy flutes, such as are often seen on modern English crockery.

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The central design represents a man drinking, waited on by a woman, who offers him a goblet with her left and a wreath with her right hand. The man wears no clothing except buskins with turned-up toes and a waistcloth, dropped so as to expose his person. He is squatted on the ground drinking from a horn (*rhyton*) held in his right hand, while his left hand grasps the neck of a full skin of wine resting against his left thigh. He has a moustache and bushy hair, and is crowned with vine-leaves and grapes. Even his ear-rings are grapes, while he and his attendant are encircled by a thick-stemmed vine loaded with fruit. His ornaments are armlets and a torque.¹

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¹ Described, with full-size plate, by Mr. C. H. Read in *Archaeologia*, vol. lv (1897), pp. 534–6.

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This carousing personage has been described as the ‘Indian Bacchus’. He seems to me to be intended for a Yaksha, one of the semi-human sprites who played so large a part in ancient popular Buddhism. His action in allowing his waistcloth to fall is exactly the same as that of the winged Yaksha in a Gandhāra relief, and many sculptures from both Gandhāra and Mathurā (*ante*, pp. 134-9) are concerned with the representation of hard drinking. Mr. Growse long ago pointed out that a debased, licentious form of Buddhism ‘would seem to have been very popular at Mathurā’. The textbook of this school is a Sanskrit composition entitled *Tathāgata Guhyaka*, or *Guhya samagha*, first brought to notice by Rājendralāla Mitra, which is described as having all the characteristics of the worst Hindu Tantras, and yet as being a work to which worship is still constantly offered by the Buddhists of Nepāl. The Tānk patera, I think, was used by votaries of some similar ancient form of villany, posing as Buddhist religion.²

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² Growse, *Mathurā, a District Memoir*, 3rd ed. (1883), p. 170. For the Yaksha, see Burgess, *Gandhāra Sculptures*, Pl. XXIV = Pl. XXVI of *J. I. A. I.*, July, 1898. Compare Foucher, *op. cit.*, p. 248.

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A third work of art in silver, obtained somewhere in Northern India, which may be called the Indo-Persian bowl (Pl. LXXVII, Fig. B), is of special interest because of its apparent connexion with the paintings of Persians in Cave I at Ajantā (*ante*, p. 291, Fig 210). It is a deep hemispherical bowl, 5·35 inches (13·5 cm.) in diameter, solidly wrought in silver, with the design chased in low relief on a gilt background. The exterior is ornamented with five medallions, each containing a male bust, the interspaces being filled by floral scrolls. The persons represented are all dressed alike in tunics and mantles fastened by the ends round the neck. They wear conical caps tied behind with ribbons and ear-rings with double pendants. The hair of the head is long, gathered up under the cap, and appearing outside it. Two of the men have pointed [Figure: FIG. A. The Tānk silver patera; ? a Yaksha. (British Museum, from a photo.)]

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[Figure: FIG. B. Indo-Persian bowl. (British Museum, from a photo.)]

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beards, the others, as in the medallion figured, are beardless. The bowl has not the conical form of the cups depicted at Ajaṇṭā, but the general resemblance of the figures to those of the Persians in Cave I at Ajaṇṭā is so strong that the work may be referred with some confidence to approximately the same period as the paintings, somewhere about a. d. 600. The bowl may have been made in either India or Persia.¹

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¹ Fully described and illustrated by Mr. O. Dalton in *The Treasure of the Oxus and other Objects from Persia and India* (B. M., 1905).

Section VI. Copper Vessels

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Although domestic utensils of copper, bronze, or other alloys of copper have been used in India from time immemorial, ancient examples are extremely rare. The most noteworthy is the copper water-pot (*loṭā*) discovered in 1857 in a chamber in a Buddhist building, apparently a *stūpa*, at Gundlā (Kundlah) in the Kullū subdivision of the Kāngrā District, Panjāb. The vessel, quite ordinary in form, is remarkable for the band of engraving carried round the body, which represents a prince, apparently Gautama Buddha as Prince Siddhārtha, riding in a four-horsed chariot preceded by musicians and followed by horsemen and an elephant with a rider. The style closely resembles that of the early sculptures at Bharhut, Sānchī, and Bhājā, and the approximate date of 100 b. c. may be assigned to the work. The date, a. d. 200–300, suggested by Sir G. Birdwood and entered on the label on the reproduction at South Kensington is much too late. The original is in the British Museum.²

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² Described and figured by Birdwood, *Industrial Arts of India*, p. 154, Pl. XII; Burgess, *A. S. W. I.*, vol. iv, p. 6.

Section VII. Wood-Carving

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The art of wood-carving in India unquestionably goes back to time immemorial, but specimens of works of ancient date executed in a material which is specially perishable in a country infested by white ants and other destructive pests, naturally must be exceedingly rare. The oldest extant examples of considerable artistic merit probably are the weird carvings from Kashmīr-Smats. The most beautiful are the exquisite modern sandalwood relief pictures of Mysore and Travancore, which display exact observation of nature, pleasing fancy, and admirable composition, in addition to high manual skill. In wood-carving the roughly-drawn division between works of fine art and the productions of industrial art almost disappears, and, if space permitted, examples of beautiful artistic compositions in both India and Ceylon might be multiplied indefinitely. It is not practicable for me to give more than a few illustrations of Indian pieces which appear to deserve prominence for one reason or another.

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The only wooden carvings ever found in the Yūsufzai country were discovered in 1888 by the late Sir Harold Deane buried in guano on the floor of a huge, mysterious cavern named Kashmīr-Smats, containing several chambers and galleries. The carved plaques (Plates LXXVIII, LXXIX) were ‘in excellent preservation, though blackened with age’. It is not easy to determine their date. The form of the trefoil arch and the cornice suggest the eighth century, but they may be older. Both designs are conceived in a spirit of mockery which baffles explanation. The subject of No. 1026 (Plate LXXVIII), a skeleton figure posturing to the music of a demoniac band, suggests a burlesque of the Dancing Siva (Naṭeśa), but why such a sacred composition should be burlesqued is a mystery. I cannot make any guess concerning the intention of No. 1027 (Plate LXXIX), which represents a demon figure receiving with contemptuous gesture a young man who carries an earthen pot suspended from the fingers of his left hand. Although the carvings have been already published to a certain extent in *Ancient Monuments*, edited by Dr. Burgess, they are little known, and it is possible that wider publicity may elicit satisfactory explanation of their meaning. From the artistic point of view both groups deserve high praise for their originality, grim humour, and bold modelling.¹

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¹ The cave was described, with a plan, by Deane in *J. R. A. S.*, 1896, pp. 668–71. The remains of a wooden coffin were found in it. The carvings were made over to Dr. Burgess and by him deposited in the British Museum.

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PLATE LXXVIII. Wood-carving; ? Śiva dancing; B. M., from Kashmīr-Smats cave, Yūsufzai. (Photo. 1026, I. M. List.)

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The Chambā State, a small principality situated among the lower Himalayan ranges between Kashmīr territory and the British Districts of Kāngrā and Gurdāspur, is rich in temples and inscriptions going back to the seventh century of the Christian era. The antiquities of the State, already partially described in the *Annual Reports of the Archæological Survey*, will form the subject of a special work in three volumes, upon which Dr. Vogel is engaged.² The temples contain much excellent wood-carving. Out of several photographs kindly supplied by Dr. Vogel I have space for one only, a fine frieze from the ceiling of the temple of Kālī at Mirkula or Udaypur (Plate LXXX). Dr. Vogel believes its date to be much later than a. d. 700, but the wigs, or wig-like hairdressing, worn by the little demons (*gaṇa*) in the lower band of the frieze suggest a possibility that the work may be as early as the seventh century. The principal figures, the male god with sixteen arms, and the female with ten, are presumably Siva and Pārvatī. A small bull (*nandi*) stands near the god's right foot. The carving is clever and spirited, and the general effect decorative, notwithstanding the grotesqueness of the design. But for the wigs I should be inclined to suggest the ninth or tenth century as the date. The style is so local that extensive special experience is needed to estimate the age of specimens with any confidence.

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² See also the same author's scholarly *Catalogue of the Bhuri Singh Museum at Chambā* (Calcutta, Baptist Mission Press, 1909).

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Works of art dedicated to the service of the Christian religion are necessarily rare in India. A wooden panel in the Roman Catholic Church at the old Danish settlement of Tranquebar, dating apparently from the seventeenth century or the early part of the eighteenth, evidently is the work of local carvers, copied from some old picture of the Descent from the Cross, which cannot be identified (Pl. LXXXI). Another panel preserved in a side room of the Protestant Church at the same settlement, which appears to have been built in 1718, represents the Last Supper in a German or Scandinavian style, and probably was imported ready made (Photo. No. 1205, Madras).³

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³ These opinions are in accordance with the judgement of C. F. Bell, Esq., Keeper of the Fine Art Dept., University Galleries, Oxford.

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PLATE LXXIX. Wood-carving; subject unknown; B. M., from Kashmīr-Smats cave, Yūsufzai.

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[Figure: Wood-carving on ceiling of Mirkula (Udaypur) temple of Kālī, Chambā State. (A. S. photo., No. 84.)]

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PLATE LXXXI. Descent from the Cross; wooden panel in R.-C. church, Tranquebar, Tanjore District, Madras. (Photo. No. 1206, A. S., Madras.)

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The modern craftsmen of many localities in India produce highly ornamental carved work in various styles. That of Mysore and Travancore rises to the level of fine art in the best examples, which are wrought in sandalwood with the utmost freedom of fancy and beauty of execution. Sir George Birdwood (*Industrial Arts*, p. 217) mentions a little cabinet, exhibited by Major Puckle in the Annual International Exhibition of 1871, as being the most beautiful example of Mysore sandalwood carving ever shown in England. The subjects illustrated were mythological. Sir George Watt describes and reproduces as ‘one of the most perfect examples of sandalwood ever produced’ a pierced panel intended as a spandril for a doorway in the new palace at Mysore, the stone sculptures of which have been noticed in Chapter VII of this work. The panel depicts the incident in the life of the youthful Krishna when he stole the clothes of the Gopīs while they were bathing, and carried the garments up into a tree. The basal frieze with its procession of homing cattle is delightful. The whole work is admirably composed, being symmetrical without formality (Plate LXXXII, Fig. A).¹

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¹ *Indian Art at Delhi*, p. 150, Pl. XXXVI.

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A third example of Mysore sandalwood carving is, perhaps, equally good. Sir George Watt gave a commission to the most expert carvers in the State to produce the very best carved work-box they could make, leaving the decoration absolutely to their judgement and taste. His confidence was justified by the result. The side panels depict hunting and forest scenes with much feeling, in a style which reminds Sir G. Watt of Chinese and Japanese ivory carving.

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The top (his Plate 36 A) offers a magnificent picture of a god drawn in a four-wheeled car. The borders are filled with rich ornament in the style of the Chalukya temples.²

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² Work of this kind is necessarily expensive. The box was priced Rs. 1,438, or £96 at the present low rate of exchange, £143 at ‘par’. The negative is missing.

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A Travancore sandalwood carving, which gives a most vivid and delicately executed picture of the life—human, animal, and vegetable—in a tropical forest, is reproduced in Plate LXXXII, Fig. B.

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It is, indeed, strange that the craftsmen who are capable of producing such beautiful and artistic work seem to be half-unconscious of their power, and wholly devoid of ambition. Sir George Watt notes that the most delicate productions, the result of weeks of painstaking labour, are often ruined in a few months by the effects of careless joinery, and that the eight families of artisans engaged in the work at the principal centre in Mysore are ‘profligate, apathetic, indigent, and of intemperate habits’; firmly set against the slightest modification of their accustomed ways, and deaf to admonition.

Section VIII. Ivories

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There can be no doubt that the art of carving ivory has been practised in India, the home of the elephant, for uncounted ages. For instance, the ancient drama, ‘The Little Clay Cart,’ composed, perhaps, in the fifth century of the Christian era, Plate LXXXII. Sandalwood carvings, Mysore and Travancore.

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Fig. A. Krishna and the Gopīs; a panel in the new palace at Mysore. (From a negative lent by Sir G. Watt, K.C.I.E.)

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Fig. B. Forest scene, Travancore. (From Pl. LXI of *Industrial Arts of India*, by permission of the Controller of H.M. Stationery Office.)

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describes the entrance to Vasantasenā's mansion as shining 'with its high ivory portal'.¹ But I am not in a position to mention a single extant ancient object in ivory of any importance. In modern times many localities are famous for their ivory carvings.

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¹ Act iv, Ryder's transl. (Harvard Or. Series), p. 67. Much earlier is the record at Sānchī of *circa* 200 to 150 B.C., which informs us that one of the piers of the southern gate was not only dedicated, but executed by the ivory carvers of Bhilsā. 'The workers in ivory of Vedisa have done the carving' (**वेदिसकेहि दंतकारेहि रूपकम्मं कतं**). This implies that even at a date so early the carvers of ivory were organized as a guild (*śreṇī*) (*Ep. Ind.*, ii, pp. 92, 378; Tope I, inscr. No. 200 = C. 189). The record further shows that workers in ivory were prepared to carve in stone.

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The productions of Travancore and Mysore are adjudged by Sir George Watt to hold 'the very foremost position among the ivories of India'—an honour partly due to the excellence of the material used, but mainly the result of the fine artistic quality of the designs and execution, which have been sufficiently illustrated by the similar examples of sandalwood carving discussed in Section 7 of this chapter. The motives of the patterns are closely related to those of the stone carvings on the temples of the Deccan, or so-called Chalukya style (*ante*, p. 45, Fig. 16), and are quite distinct from the grotesque extravagance of the Tamil *swāmi* designs. In Travancore the old conventional designs are still favoured, but the Mysore artists prefer the more modern 'jungle patterns'.

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The subject not being of sufficient importance to require exhaustive treatment in this work, my illustrations will be restricted to two excellent examples produced about 1830 by Gobind Ratan of Nayagarh in Orissa. The tortoise (Plate LXXXIII, Fig. A) is described by Sir George Watt as 'a wonderful creation', which raises the artist who produced it to a position of 'equality with the ivory carvers of Europe, Japan, or China'. The statuette of Krishna (Plate LXXXIII, Fig. B) is characterized by the same expert critic as an 'exquisite piece of work'.

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The ivories in the Colombo Museum, Ceylon, include contemporary portrait figures of the last king of Kandy (1798–1815), with the chief priest, and two ministers, or Adikārs. Mr. Joseph has shown me photographs of statuettes of kings and queens in the Kandy Museum, which are very quaint and neatly executed, but of little account as works of art.²

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² For a good summary account of Indian ivories of all kinds, see Watt and P. Brown, *Indian Art at Delhi*, especially pp. 172–93. Several official monographs treat the subject provincially, and describe the art of ivory carving as practised in Bombay, Bengal, Assam, Burma, Southern India, the Panjāb, and the N. W. P. and Oudh (now the U. P. of Agra and Oudh). They are printed separately, and also in vol. ix of *J. I. A. I.* An account of the Ceylon ivories will be found in Dr. Coomaraswamy's work on *Mediaeval Art*. The Kandy statuettes are reproduced by Codrington, *Notes on some of the Principal Kandyan Chiefs and Headmen, and their Dresses* (Colombo, Government Printer, 1910).

Section IX. Terra-Cottas and Clay Figures

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The considerable part played by terra-cotta in the evolution of Indian sculpture has not been generally recognized, although Cunningham showed long ago that the early brick temples which preceded stone edifices in many parts of Northern India were decorated with ‘terra-cotta ornaments and alto-rilievos’.¹ The art of handling terra-cotta as a material for works of art has been extinct for centuries, except that it lingered late in a debased form in Bengal; but in the early centuries of the Christian era terra-cotta was considered good enough for friezes, floral ornaments, animal figures, and even statuettes two or three feet in height. Many of the terra-cotta figures at the Bhītargāon brick temple, dating perhaps from the fifth century (*ante*, p. 28), are, as Cunningham observed, ‘boldly designed and well drawn,’ though marred by a tendency to excessive violence in the expression of movement and consequent liability to lapse into grotesqueness. The fragile nature of the material naturally causes a dearth of good specimens, and little attention has been paid to those few which survive. A single plate (LXXXIV) must suffice for the illustration of this ancient and forgotten form of art. The Graeco-Persian head from Sārnāth dating from the Maurya period (Plate LXXXIV, Fig. A) has been published by Mr. Marshall in *J. R. A. S.*, 1908, Plate IV, 6.

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¹ *A. S. Rep.*, vol. xi, p. 42. See also in same volume, pp. 21, 35, 44, 52, 53; and vol. xii, pp. 47–50. M. Migeon considers terra-cotta to be the primitive mode of expression of the sculptor’s art: ‘objets exécutés en bronze, qui, pour être ainsi réalisés, ont dû être précédés d’ébauches en terre cuite, premières expressions de la pensée du sculpteur’ (*Manuel d’Art Musulman*, t. II, p. 61).

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FIG. A. Tortoise.

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FIG. B. Krishna.

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The preference commonly felt by modern European artists for realistic as compared with idealistic art finds frank expression in Mr. Percy Brown’s dictum that ‘the very highest form of fine art in India is to be met with in the terra-cotta statuettes made in Lucknow’.² This verdict is supported by reproductions of some terribly realistic figures of the victims of famine made for the Delhi Exhibition by Bhagwān Singh of Lucknow, ‘a modeller by caste and an artist by instinct,’ which the kindness of Sir G. Watt enables me to republish from the negative supplied by him (Pl. LXXXV). Not only do these figures image accurately the horrible facts as I have seen them, but they do something more, and suggest with moving vividness the emotions and sufferings hidden behind the visible physical appearances. The effigy of the skeleton son carrying the skeleton father pick-a-back opens up to the eye of imagination the whole sad story of extremest misery sanctified by intensest filial piety, and the other figures are hardly less suggestive of unrecorded tragedy. The man who could model forms so adequately expressive of the deepest emotions was no mean artist, and it is strange that he should have been content to waste his genius on petty, unregarded clay images, which, in all probability, have been ground to dust long ago, and would have been, like himself, utterly forgotten, but for the chance which enshrined them in an Exhibition catalogue. A philosophical Hindu, perhaps, would say that Bhagwān Singh deserved to be forgotten as a fit penalty for his realism. To the European he seems to be a lost spirit, who, in happier surroundings, might have become the founder of a school of sculptors and heir to undying fame. Images, like books, *habent sua fata*.

Linked texts (11)

Guhyasamājatantra — Sanskrit
Epigraphia Indica
Sāñcī
Bharhut
Tranquebar
Bhâjâ
Kangra
Ajanta
Kanishka stupa
Sānchi version of the Schism Edict (ed. Bühler 1894) — Prakrit
Sanchi Stupa I inscription (No. 204) — Prakrit