A History of South India from Prehistoric Times to the Fall of Vijayanagar c21.87

c21.87

The Chola period is also remarkable for its sculptures and bronzes, many of which are masterpieces. The Tanjore inscriptions mention a number of bronzes in groups illustrating the sacred legends of Śaivism but they have all disappeared. Among existing specimens in the various museums of the world and in the temples of South India may be seen many fine figures of Śiva in his various forms, Brahmā, the seven mothers, Vishnu and his consorts Lakshmī (Pl. XI) and Bhūdevī, Rāma and Sītā with their attendants, the Śaiva saints—the figures of Sambandar being most numerous among them, the infant Krishna dancing on the serpent Kāliya, and many other subjects. The statues often compare most favourably with the finest of the stone sculptures of the various schools mentioned above. Though conforming generally to iconographic conventions established by long tradition, the sculptor worked in great freedom in the eleventh and twelfth centuries and his productions show classic grace, grandeur, and perfect taste. This art is seen at its best in the numerous images of the Divine Dancer, Naṭarāja (Pl. X). Whether he be surrounded or not by the flaming aureole of the tiruvāśi (prabhāmaṇḍala)—the circle of the world which he both fills and oversteps—the King of the Dance is all rhythm and exaltation. The tambourine which he sounds with one of his right hands draws all creatures into this rhythmic motion and they dance in his company. The conventionalized locks of flying hair and the blown scarfs tell of the speed of this universal movement, which crystallizes matter and reduces it to powder in turn. One of his left hands holds the fire which animates and devours the worlds in this cosmic whirl. One of the god's feet is crushing a Titan, for "this dance is danced upon the bodies of the dead", yet one of the right hands is making the gesture of reassurance (*abhayamudrā*), so true it is that, seen from the cosmic point of view and *sub specie aeternitatis*, the very cruelty of this universal determinism is kindly, as the generative principle of the future. And, indeed, on more than one of our bronzes, the King of the Dance wears a broad smile. He smiles at death and at life, at pain and at joy alike, or rather, if we may be allowed so to express it, his smile is both death and life, both joy and pain. . . . From this lofty point of view, in fact, all things fall into their place, finding their explanation and logical compulsion. Here art is the faithful interpreter of the philosophical concept. The plastic beauty of rhythm is no more than the expression of an ideal rhythm. The very multiplicity of arms, puzzling as it may seem at first sight, is subject in turn to an inward law, each pair remaining a model of elegance in itself, so that the whole being of the Naṭarāja thrills with a magnificent harmony in his terrible joy. And as though to stress the point that the dance of the divine actor is indeed a sport, (*līlā*)—the sport of life and death, the sport of creation and destruction, at once infinite and purposeless—the first of the left hands hangs limply from the arm in the careless gesture of the *gajahasta* (hand as the elephant's trunk). And lastly as we look at the back view of the statue, are not the steadiness of these shoulders which uphold the world, and the majesty of this Jove-like torso, as it were a symbol of the stability and immutability of substance, while the gyration of the legs in its dizzy speed would seem to symbolize the vortex of phenomena?'¹