The Age of the Imperial Guptas c7.46

c7.46

The gods worshipped, though practically the same as of modern Hindu India were slightly different both in shape and in name. The worship of Viṣṇu was universal as at the present day but the form in favour in the Gupta period was slightly different. Except among the sculptures recently discovered by Mr. K. N. Dikshit M.A. of the Archæological Survey of India, Eastern Circle at Paharpur in the Rajshahi district of Northern Bengal, images of Rādhā and Kṛṣṇa are absolutely unknown in the Gupta period. Even bas-reliefs representing the life of Kṛṣṇa, as described in the 10th Skandha of the Bhāgavata Purāṇa, are exceedingly rare. The only specimen known is the huge image unearthed at Sarnath and supposed by Rai Bahadur Pundit Dayaram Sahni as an image of Kṛṣṇa holding the Govardhana mountain, which is a case of mistaken identification.¹ More importance is given to the worship of the Avatāras, “incarnations” of Viṣṇu than to Kṛṣṇa. Among the Avatāras the Boar incarnation appears to have been regarded as more important than any other. The deities mentioned in the Damodarpur plates are Śveta-Varāha-Svāmin and Kokā-Mukha-Svāmin. Śveta- Varāha-Svāmin is undoubtedly the Boar incarnation of Viṣṇu but Kokā-Mukha-Svamin is still unknown. Most probably it was an image of Śiva and Pārvatī. The cave excavated by the Sanikānīka chief, who was the son of the Mahārāja Viṣṇudāsa, contained two images, one of the four-armed Viṣṇu attended by his wives and another of Durgā as Mahiṣa-mardini.¹ The undated cave inscription of Candragupta II at Udayagiri records the dedication of the cave as a temple of Śiva by one Vīrasena, a hereditary minister. But the Varāha cave, though uninscribed, is distinctly a Vaiṣṇava shrine belonging to the early Gupta period.² In the same group at Udayagiri is to be found the colossal image of Viṣṇu lying on the snake-king Ananta twelve feet long.³ The popularity of the Boar incarnation of Viṣṇu can be gauged from the erection of the great Boar by Mahārāja Dhanyaviṣṇu, the younger brother of the deceased Mahārāja Matṛviṣṇu in the first year of the reign of the Hūna king Toramāṇa, which marks the end of the Gupta period proper. In this period two forms of the Boar incarnation were adopted (1) a man with a Boar's head, and (2) a real boar as at Khoh in the Nagod State.⁴ Other examples of the incarnations of Viṣṇu, belonging to this period, are to be found at Kaman in the Bharatpur State. There is a fragment bearing the Fish, Tortoise, Boar, Man-Lion and Dwarf incarnations. Most probably the series was complete.¹ The oldest image of the four-armed Viṣṇu is to be found in the Udayagiri cave mentioned above. The next specimen was that the dedication of which was recorded in the inscription of the emperor Skandagupta at Bhitari in the Ghazipur district to which a village was granted.² During the reign of the same emperor Cakrapālita, the son of Parṇadatta, the Viceroy of Kathiawad, after the restoration of the great dam of the Sudarśana lake, erected a temple of Viṣṇu and dedicated an image of Cakrabhṛt, “the wielder of the Discus.”³ The last example of the dedication of an image of Viṣṇu is that of the colossal image at Eran in the Sagar district of the Central Provinces to which a flag-staff (*Dhvaja-stambha*), was dedicated in the year 165 during the reign of the emperor Budhagupta by the *Mahārāja* Mātṛviṣṇu and his younger brother Dhanyaviṣṇu.⁴