Age of the Nandas and Mauryas c12.s17: IV. Animal Figures
Age of the Nandas and Mauryas c12.s17
- Language
- English
IV. Animal Figures
c12.s17.2
The almost colossal animal sculptures that crown the Mauryan columns along with the elephant of Dhauli in Orissa may conveniently be studied separately. Here too as in the case of the column itself a rough chronological sequence of the stages of striving after the desired effect can well be traced. The Basarh-Bakhira lion evidently marks one of the earliest stages; the next definite stage is reached at Dhauli where the elephant but half emerges from live rock and which is datable as we know in the twelfth or thirteenth year of Aśoka's reign; to this stage must also be ascribed the elephant of Sankissa. The Rampurva bull marks the next stage in the ascending scale closely followed by the Lauriya-Nandangarh lion; while the Rampurva lion leads us to the final stage represented by the quadripartite semi-lions of Sārnāth and Sāñchī—an unmistakable evidence of clever accumulation that always comes at a later stage of the evolution of form.
c12.s17.3
The Basarh-Bakhira lion is clumsy in form and appearance and crude in execution. The feeling for linear rhythm is evident in the flowing line gliding downwards from the top of the head but ends abruptly at the hard line of the slab where the tail turns inwards. The manes are already highly stylised and locks are treated in separate volumes clumsily arranged. The facial expression is quaint and primitive and the entire attitude lacks dignity. The volume of the lion's body has undoubtedly been fully visualised and reproduced, but the essential plastic sense has not yet matured. The living body is hardly moved by any energy and vigour that is within; it exists only by the weight of its volume.
c12.s17.4
Compared to this the Dhauli elephant shows a much more developed sense of form and is artistically far superior to its Sankissa cousin. Indeed, such plastic presentation of bulky volume, such feeling for living flesh rendered with remarkable realism, such knowledge of the physiognomical form of the subject treated and such sense of dignified movement and linear rhythm have no parallel in Mauryan animal sculptures. Compared to this even the Rampurva lion or the Sārnāth quadripartite with their tight and coagulated treatment of the veins and muscles shown in meaningless tension, in spite of full reproduction of volume and advanced proof of visualisation appear sapless and lifeless. The loud exhibitionism of pomp and power of the Rampurva or Sārnāth specimens has nothing to compare with the quiet dignity of the Dhauli elephant. With its right front leg slightly tilted and the left back straight in short angle exhibiting a slight forward motion, and with its heavy trunk flowing rhythmically in a delightful curve, it walks majestically out of a deep ravine as it were. It indeed symbolises His Imperial Majesty King Aśoka presenting himself with quiet dignity before the people of Kaliṅga. The Sārnāth quadripartite is on the other hand an exhibition of imperial pomp, power and authority before the Buddhist monks that had chosen the site of the First Turning of the Wheel as their place for the quiet pursuit of the religion of Śākyamuni. Compared to the Dhauli elephant the Sārnāth quadripartite and its Sāñchī counterpart are bombastic in style.
c12.s17.5
The Sankissa elephant is on a lower level of artistic conception. In spite of an appearance of movement the huge and plumpy animal is plastically speaking comparatively static, though there is some evidence of movement in the modelling of the muscles and of the volume of live flesh of the hind portion and the legs. The front legs are however treated pillar-like though the intended effect was presumably one of tension, since the animal appears to shrink backwards with the body-weight pressed in that direction. This attitude of the body, by the way, fails to harmonise with the abacus and the capital below. From Dhauli to Sankissa there is a steady direction, it seems, towards a stylised treatment of the plastic volume, of muscles and body-flesh. This is evident in the treatment of the upper but more in the lower portion of the chest and abdomen of the Sankissa elephant, but nowhere increasingly more and more than in the lion-figures.
c12.s17.6
Compared to the Basarh-Bakhira lion, the Lauriya-Nandan-garh example is more tense and tight without doubt; the surface treatment is also more clear and precise. On the whole the stylisation of the treatment of veins, muscles and flesh is on the increase, the form and treatment tends to be more conventional. In visualisation and realistic presentation of volume there is however hardly any advance, nor is there any attempt to harmonise the animal form with the component parts of the columns below.
c12.s17.7
From the Lauriya-Nandangarh specimen to the Rampurva lion there is a decided advance in the clear and precise cutting of the stone, in general finish, in the feeling for form and in linear rhythm. There is also an evident advance in modelling which is powerful and vigorous, specially in the muscle and thews, but the entire artistic conception is conventional and treatment stylised which is nowhere more evident than in the schematic treatment of the manes and the almost lifeless and conventional presentation of the legs and paws. Yet, compared to the Sārnāth quadripartite the Rampurva lion as a piece of independent sculpture must be considered artistically superior, though the former, architectonically speaking, is more advanced since nowhere else in the Mauryan columns has been achieved a better and more efficient harmony with the abacus and the capital.
c12.s17.8
The Rampurva bull is architectonically less advanced than the lion from the same place since ‘it fails to harmonise with the capital on which it stands’¹. Marshall argues that it is not ‘so well-executed as the (Rampurva) lion’. If he means that it is not as tense and tight in formal appearance or does not show as conventionally powerful and modelled treatment or stylisation of form he is undoubtedly correct. But at the same time it has to be recognised that the artist responsible for this piece of sculpture had a remarkable sense of form as well as of plastic volume and of the quality of the flesh. Here is indeed realistic vision and close observation of nature and full understanding of the character of the object; nothing stylised or conventional or abstract has blurred the mental image of the artist or stood in the way of his execution. The animal is supposed to stand with full weight on earth in quiet and restrained dignity, and the artist has rendered that idea with remarkable clarity and perfect realism. Here too the modelling is vigorous but not conventional, plastic and linear sense fully mature but not schematised; the energy and vitality that are within express themselves in restrained but powerful dignity; a dynamic naturalism gives it potency and strength.
c12.s17.9
¹ J. R. A. S., 1908, p. 1088.
c12.s17.10
A comparison with the vigorously striding bull on the abacus of the Sārnāth column is at once suggested. Here the bull is rendered with all the tension and accentuation of muscles, veins and bones that a vigorous movement brings into play; the sense of linear rhythm and plasticity of volume are also fully in evidence; the execution is clear and precise, but it is at the same time hard to deny that the entire treatment is conventional in as much as the muscles are unduly exaggerated, the tension in movement overemphasised and the modelling coagulated. A different aesthetic vision and tradition are indeed at work here.
c12.s17.11
The Sārnāth quadripartite is on a most superior level and must be admitted to be a very successful solution of a problem the Maurya artists grappled with from the very beginning. Of all Maurya sculptures it is the best known, most highly spoken of and reproduced on most occasions. Marshall is justified in saying that ‘the Sārnāth capital, though by no means a masterpiece, is the product of the most developed art of which the world was cognisant in the third century B.C.—the handiwork of one who had generations of artistic effort and experience behind him. In the masterful strength of the crowning lions, with their swelling veins and tense muscular development, and in the spirited realism of the reliefs below, there is no trace of primitive art. So far as naturalism was his aim, the sculptor modelled his figures direct from nature, and has delineated their forms with bold, faithful touch.... Equally mature is the technique of his relief work.’¹ But at the same time it must not be lost sight of that the entire conception and execution is conventional from beginning to end. Composition the accumulation of form of the four semi-lions is schematic, though from consideration of technique clever and efficient. The veins and muscles are overemphasised, and with all their seeming tenseness and bold delineation appear lifeless and conventional. The heads with gaping mouths and curved moustaches treated conventionally are more decorative and ornamental than endowed with real life; the same is true of the manes treated conventionally and arranged schematically. The extravagance of form saps the life out of the object that it represents, though from the point of view of technique the art is fully developed and civilised and its appearance conscious and conventional.
c12.s17.12
¹ C. H. I, I, p. 620.
c12.s17.13
The animal reliefs on the abacus are all worked almost in the round showing deep contrast of light and shade. Technically therefore they are far in advance of the row of pecking geese that decorates the Rampurva lion abacus, though the latter is very realistically treated and imparts a sense of movement that comes from life itself. One of the four animals of the Sārnāth abacus is a galloping horse very spirited in movement, and the modelling and treatment of its plastic volume partake of the same conventional attitude and execution as those of the lions discussed above. This is equally applicable to the two other animals on the abacus namely the vigorously striding lion and the humped Indian bull, the forms and types in each case having been already fixed by convention, as we shall see later on. The only animal on the abacus that is treated in a different manner and viewed from a different attitude is the elephant slowly striding forward. It is much less conventional and the modelling shows a more realistic feeling for plasticity of volume, though the form has been but inadequately realised. Compared to the Dhauli elephant the elephant of the Sārnāth abacus looks like a wooden toy.
c12.s17.14
The Sāñchī counterpart of Sārnāth belongs to the same style and is equally conventional and stylised. The manes of the lions are rendered with increasing schematisation which is perhaps an indication of a date later than Sārnāth. Architectonically it conforms to the solution already achieved at the latter place, but the Sāñchī abacus which is decorated like the Rampurva lion capital with a row of pecking geese done in higher and bolder relief, is narrower than the Sārnāth one, and is aesthetically more in harmony with the capital below and the crowning lions above.
c12.s17.15
It is somewhat curious that the lions in Mauryan art are always and invariably done in a manner that seems already to have been fixed by convention. Their formal pose and appearance, the rendering of their volume, bold and vigorous but stylised, their plastic conception in one word, and the sense of form as revealed in them are on the whole the same and already pre-determined. The trend of the style is already evident in the Basarh-Bakhira lion and it is within the limits of the given trend that the style evolves and advances in treatment and execution. The aesthetic vision and imagination and the attitude and outlook of the artist do not mark any definite change. This is partly true as well of the lion, the horse and the bull on the Sārnāth abacus. It raises the presumption that this style and convention came from outside where they were already fixed and well established. The horse on the Sārnāth abacus in its movement and modelling recalls the two horses in the relief on the Sarcophagus of the Amazons¹; the vigorously striding lion and the bull recall well-known Achaemenian prototypes of the same style and convention². Even the elephant on the abacus has a distant kinship with the horned elephants on the early coins of the Seleucids, though the Sārnāth elephant is much less conventional and shows somewhat a different sense of form and treatment.
c12.s17.16
¹ Carotti, *A History of Art*, I, p. 218, fig. 298.
c12.s17.17
² Perrot & Chipiez, *History of Art in Persia*, p. 407, fig. 195; *C. H. I.*, I, p. 463, Pl. II, figs. 1 and 2.
c12.s17.18
The aesthetic vision and imagination and the conventional style and fixed expression just spoken of are most evident in the crowning lions. Compared with later figural sculptures in the round of Yakshas and their female counterparts or the reliefs of Bhārhut, Sāñchī and Bodhgayā, the art represented by these crowning lions belongs to an altogether different world of conception and execution, of style and technique, altogether much more complex, urban and civilised. They have nothing archaic or primitive about them, and the presumption is irresistible that the impetus and inspiration of this art must have come from outside. Did it come from the Achaemenian west? This seems to be very doubtful, for the modelling of these sculptures has nothing in common with Achaemenian sculptures, nor does the powerful feeling for volume and preference for rounded forms have anything in common with Achaemenian Iran. Moreover West-Asiatic art, especially Iranian Art during the Achaemenian period came heavily under the influence of Hellenistic Art; further, ‘the few attempts made in Iran in the domain of free plastic art bear an entirely different stamp in their preference for angular forms’³. Marshall therefore argued for Hellenistic plastic tradition as practised by Graeco-Bactrian artists. From what we know of the Hellenistic colonies in West Asia and the part they played in Mauryan India, it is possible, nay highly probable, that Hellenistic art and culture played also a very dominant rôle in Mauryan Art. The Mauryan lions indeed in their aesthetic conception and plastic vision, in their conventional modelling, advanced visualisation, feeling for volume and sense of form invariably recall conventional and decadent colonial Greek works of the same art-form and design. It is here that we can trace the source of the impetus and inspiration of the conventional art of the crowning lions of Mauryan columns. Here then, in a tradition familiar with lions and bulls and horses, was the convention fixed and determined.
c12.s17.19
³ Bachhofer, *Early Indian Sculpture*, I p. 6–7.
c12.s17.20
These remarks are however hardly applicable to the Dhauli elephant or the Rampurva bull which both seem to belong to a somewhat different aesthetic vision and outlook, perhaps to a different art-tradition. True, indeed, so far as feeling for volume and its reproduction are concerned they belong to the same fully developed stage of art as the crowning lions discussed above and that there is nothing archaic and primitive about them; but it is equally true there is nothing conventional about them as well, and the plastic sense and method of treatment is altogether different. The modelling betrays a full knowledge of the softness of the flesh and of the flowing current of life that is within; it is also restrained and is not contaminated by any conventional exaggeration or localised emphasis. Nor is there any evidence of schematisation of form. Indeed these two examples (with the Sankissa elephant as a close third) represent a different aesthetic outlook, a different art-tradition than those of the crowning lions and the lion, horse and bull reliefs on the Sārnāth abacus. This difference in outlook and tradition is clearly brought to the fore when the Rampurva bull is compared with the relief of the same animal from the Sārnāth column; the two bulls belong to two different worlds as it were. It is, I think, permissible to assume that it is Indian aesthetic vision and imagination and Indian art-tradition that are here largely at work, so far as art-style at least is concerned. The same plastic conception and quality of modelling constitute the pivot round which early Indian art moves, and the same restraint and quiet dignity are the qualities that Indian art ideal has sought to achieve in higher art from the very beginning. Moreover, if the Dhauli and Sankissa elephants, particularly the former be compared with the figures of elephants in bold and high relief in the frieze of the facade of the Lomaśa Ṛishi cave, it will at once be seen that they belong to the same style and tradition of art. This cave may not be of Mauryan date, but it cannot be very much later also; all scholars recognise that the entire facade of this cave is the exact and literal translation in stone of a wooden prototype. It may be assumed therefore that figures of elephants in the same style and tradition as we see them on the stone-facade were already being rendered in wood for generations before they came to be transferred on stone. It is not unlikely that in the Dhauli elephant, the Rampurva bull and partly in the Sankissa elephant, all of which are decidedly Indian in feeling, appearance and spirit, we but witness the traditional Indian conception of these objects and the older or contemporary Indian art-style and tradition transferred into stone in terms of the requirements of that particular material and according to the dictates of bolder designs and bigger dimensions. The mastery of the third dimension, in other words the solution of the difficult problem of free figure as revealed in them, is the only lesson the artists seem to have learnt from Graeco-Bactrian art-tradition. But here too it is possible to present the counter-hypothesis that there must have existed in pre-Mauryan India an art of wood-carving and clay-modelling that carved and modelled free and round figures of men and animals out of wood and clay, and perhaps also of big dimensions.
c12.s17.21
It is difficult to say anything about the nationality of the artists of the Maurya court; there is no evidence on the point. But from what has been said above, it is permissible to assume that the Dhauli elephant, the Rampurva bull and perhaps also the Sankissa elephant are works of Indian artists working in contemporary Indian style and tradition, and having a thorough mastery of the third dimension and a full consciousness of the Indian outlook. The crowning lions of the early phases, namely the Basarh-Bakhira and Lauriya-Nandangarh examples, are also works of Indian artists but tutored in the style and tradition of contemporary Western art; this is marked in the grappling with the problem of form and its precise execution evident in these sculptures. There is decided advance in the Rampurva, Sārnāth and Sāñchī specimens; this may have been achieved by the same Indian artists working increasingly in the direction of contemporary Western art, or by colonial artists of the Hellenistic Orient imported by the Maurya Court. In any case, there are in these specimens a strong and undeniable Hellenistic stamp that may not have been imprinted by Indian hands.