Monthly Archives: February 2011

A Grieving Mother or a unwilling assassin?

When Dakshin put up this fantastic photographic capture from the Madurai temple and titled it as Boothagi, the first question that came to my mind was ` Wasn’t she a demoness who was hired as an assassin by Kamsa to kill Krishna?’

Our conceptions or misconceptions of Boothanai were driven not only by graphic depictions of her in our story books, but also in sculpture. This early chola depiction in Pullamangai in stone and this sudhai from from the Tanjore Big Temple ( Photo courtesy: Arvind) added to our visions of an Ugly demoness who was sucked dry by Krishna.

So who else could the beautiful maiden sculpted in Madurai be. Some references identify her as Chandramathi the wife of the legendary Harishchandra cradling her dead son Lohidasan. But then something didnt quite feel right. The great King Harishchandra being reduced to penury, had sold his wife into slavery. The sculpted figure even after discounting the ornamental excesses of the Nayak style, does sport an impressive amount of ornaments. But her face seem to show a variety of emotions, at once a bit sad, a bit like that of a demoness – but definitely not that of a loving mother. Plus the Baby seems very well endowed, very much alive and in one angle seems to be puckering his lips to suckle at her breasts. So it cannot be Yashodha and Krishna for sure.

If only we could spot something about the two that could help us with the identification ! After some frantic requests to friends, Mr Raman obliged by making the trip and getting us the required photographs.

This is going to be a really tough one – the request to him from me was very simple. Get me a good shot of the right chest of the baby. Why ?

Remember this post about the mole that adorns the chest of Vishnu – Srivatsam . Keep the last image of that post in your memory.

The Ornamentation of the baby is rich as well , compare with those of known krishna sculptures. Problem is Sambandar also seems to share the same fashion / wardrobe.

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Lets study the baby more to find more clues and why I wanted a closeup of the right chest. Please do keep in mind the position of the baby and how difficult it would have been for the sculptor to be able to sculpt any detail on the baby’s right chest.

You can see that he has not made the clear demarcation of the chest on the right side compared to what he could show in the left – where he has shown the shape of the chest clearly. I have marked in white where the right chest should have been shown.

Now lets, demarcate where the jewelery is sculpted on the chest.

Now, if you have followed closely you would see a small indentation on the right chest.

and if you can sit a bit back and focus on the same place, you can see the triangle emerge.

Compared to the standing icons of Vishnu where the Srivatsam mark is more pronounced and more towards the outer half of the chest, due to the position of the baby closer to the lady – the sculptor is forced to center it more. Compare with this

If we can fix that this is indeed the Srivatsam mark – then the question of Boothanai’s description arises. Boothanai is said to be kind of a contract killer – paid assassin, who would kill by having young children suckle at her breast ( two accounts – either her milk itself was venom or she applied a deadly poison on her breasts). This she does as she is under the grasp of the evil Kamsa. So when Kamsa wants to get rid of Krishna, the first person he turns to is Boothanai. She goes in the guise of a beautiful maiden and Yashoda allows her to suckle her baby. Kishna knowing her ploy anchors his teeth on her breasts and sucks the life blood out of her. She is either shown as falling dead regaining her ugly form or sucked bone dry as per varying accounts.

So having touched Krishna and smitten by his good looks, being a mother herself, is it the anguish of trying to kill a toddler that is shown on her face or the realisation that her end is near and a bitter happiness that she is to going to be liberated by him ?

Movement and Drama – is it possible in Stone relief ? Pradeep Chakravarthy says Yes

Friends, today we have a special guest post. Very pleased to have Mr Pradeep Chakravarthy , we have already seen a review of his book on Temple Vahanas

He has also authored a very successful book Thanjavur A Cultural History – – , and we will surely see more from this amazing person. I had requested him to do a guest post and we hope this is only the start of an insightful series. Over to him now.

Tirumeyyam is a well known pilgrim spot not very far off from Madurai. I wrote about it in The Hindu a long time back and have always visited it when possible.

After reading Vijay’s posts on sculptures that bear a message of how the sculptor conceived movement and drama, I took a closer look at the stupendous moolavar – more than 10 feet and carved out of a cave. The additions are from the 7th century by Perumpidugu Perundevi a Muttaraiar chieftain’s mother. The structural temple temple complex built around this cave is from the 12th century and later.

Thanks to Ashok for splendid feat to capture the entire scene ( digitally removing the pillars – this is copyrighted work)

The scene is of Perumal reclining in the coils of Adisesha with Brahma emerging from his navel.

In this case, like the Gupta images, the sculptor has chosen a free style in showing the coils, not neat and arranged like in other temples. Already there is drama and movement –

The action in the scene is Adisesha spewing forth venom shown as streaks of fire that move towards your right.

The heads of the serpent are backwards, as if they have just recoiled from one attack.

Just in case you missed the direction, scores of divine nityasoories are all flying to the right. Just above the Lord’s face, the sculptor has left a natural indentation, this is possibly to indicate that the flying figures are much higher than you think and to remind you that even when they are flying, they are keeping their legs away from the face of the lord.


To the extreme left is Chitragupta and Garuda who some scholars think is actually the king who commissioned this image.

Another cleft in the rock indicates a substantial distance between the deity and the two asuras


The asuras are a little slanted to give us a clue that they eventually bite the dust

The temple is one of the few Vaishnavaite cave temples still in active worship and a modified image of this theme can be seen in Mahabalipuram as well.

As part of the relief there is a depiction a deer headed person next to Brahma – who could he be?

Photo Credits : Flickr : lomaDI, Prof Swaminathan and http://senkottaisriram.blogspot.com/2008/04/thirumayam-near-pudukkoottai-tamil-nadu.html

Our voices are heard ! Many thanks

Many a time, after spending many hours working in gathering information, visiting a site, taking photographs, analysing them and presenting to them in a structured way, that you think would appeal to your target audience, you compile a post and beautifully illustrate it and then wait for that little bit of encouragement. Most of the times, its you who have to turn around and pat yourself on your back and carry on, for deep in your heart you know that hard work is done not expecting any reward. But then, sometimes, when you do get a result and in this case a solution to a pressing problem that you addressed in your post, that too from a person of authority, who you think cares a damn for these treasures, it dawns on you that after all your efforts have not gone to waste. Your voice has been heard !

Thanks to the friend who read my initial post why loot a door guardian, and notified me of the damage. If this is the case in a gallery then, thanks to the other reader who took on himself to send it to the concerned authority, and a thousand thanks to the good Samaritan who respected the concern in a blog post and took it on himself to get the problem addressed and in this case – cleaned the sculpture and restored the inscription.

thanks finally to my dear friend for doing a followup and reporting that ALL IS WELL.

Rishabantika, Veenadhara, Ardhanari Shiva – based on Mr Lockwood’s Pallava Art

Friends who would have been following the earlier posts know the influence Dr. Gift Siromoney on the genesis of this site.

The Mystery behind the horns of Pallava door guardians

I wrote thus

” Friends, i am writing about a man who changed the course my life’s pursuits. Its a tale of selfless service, the reach of the net, information sharing,knowledge assimilation, leaving a lasting impression on the generations to come. I read that Einstein once said ” If I have seen farther than others, it is because I was standing on the shoulders of giants”, thereby acknowledging the contributions of the scholars before him.

To start with, i have never met this person. For, he passed away in 1988, long before i even knew where i was headed in life.

The posts he had graciously left behind on the net, quality content, absolutely free, easily accessible, spurred me, 20 years after his death, inspiring me to use the advances in technology, the power of the net and its networking capabilities to tap on the potential of friends, to create a site, with powerful content with an unique visual appeal, absolutely free – that even a chance encounter of a casual visitor, will make him sit up and take notice, of the treasures that our great land bore out of its intellect, help protect and preserve them for future generations. Like the legendary Ekalavya, i try to follow his effort. This effort, hopefully will outlast my human existence, and pray will inspire atleast a few like me, long after i am gone.”

Now i consider it my good fortune that a chance interaction with his wife Mrs. Rani Siromoney and her generous introduction to Dr Michael Lockwood, has given me chance to relive their discoveries. I was overjoyed when he started with the words ” It was Dr.Gift Siromoney who introduced me to the magic of the Mamallapuram monuments,”

We are grateful to Mr Lockwood for allowing us permissions to use his photographs and articles. So here we are seeing a young Mr Lockwood , as he sent me the picture with this footnote – The picture of me was taken in 1969 (when I was 36 years old!). As I said in my earlier e-mail to you, the picture was taken when Gift and I (and Prof. Dayanandan) visited Vallam (2 miles east of Chingleput).)

it registered that I wasn’t even born then !!

Read more of him in this Hindu article

Dr. Lockwood

I was overjoyed with the introduction and rushed out many of my Pallava posts to him and he patiently replied to all. One such post was an intriguing one about a visit to Tirukazhukundram in search of the Somaskanda for the Somaskanda evolution series.

Tracking the evolution of the Pallava somaskanda

There in the outside corridor we had found relief sculptures of Rajasimma and I had noted one as Shiva on Rishbavahanam, little realising that it was part of a larger debate many years earlier. Mr Lockwood pointed it out with his references and also advised that there were a mirror-set on the inside of the Sanctum, but photography was not allowed.

It was while reading his references ( part of his work Pallava Art) that i realised that the debate considered a small relief sculpture in the shore temple cylindrical shrine.

The relief sculpture inside is identical to one in Tirukazhugukundram. Thanks to Ashok for the excellent photographs

Now, if someone had told me that it was not just Shiva , not just Rishabantika Shiva, but a Veenadara – ok, i would have accepted. But Dr Lockwood identified it as an Ardanari as well. Before, we go on, we need to know that Rajasimha had some stunning iconographic signature sculptures and most of his themes are repeated in either the Olakkaneshwara or shore temple or the Kanchi Kailasanathar temple.

Olakkaneshwara doesn’t have this and so we need to look in the shore temple and Kailasantha temple. We will return to the Shore temple shortly. The Kailasanthar temple has a Veenadara Ardhanari icon and another Veenadara.

Thanks to Saurabh and Krishnamurthy uncle for the photographs

We have already seen in the post on Ardhanari evolution about how the two ` halves’ are differentiated.

Tracing the refinement of the Ardhanari Image

Now, lets study the sculpture in Kailasanthar more closely

Now that we are sure that it is an Ardhanari image, lets focus on the Veena.

The Veena is more like a fret but the thing to note is the resonator. It resembles an inverted cup and is held against the breast. This tradition seems to be very much in vogue , as we see examples in Pudukkottai – A Bhairva Shiva ( Image Courtesy – Kathie), Badami ( Ardhanari again – Image courtesy – Picasa albums), Nepal ( Saraswathi – Image courtesy- Kaladarshna)

Now, the current day Veena has made the top resonator redundant.

But would be interesting to find out if we do have a variant of the earlier Veena with the reverse cup. The player would have felt the music closer to his/her heart for sure !

Ok, back to our question of identification of the Icon as Veenadara Ardhanari rishabantika shiva – Mr Lockwood supports his with two more clinching evidences. Study these two sculptures.

I quote Dr Lockwood now

Photograph A is of a sandstone image which [was] found in the courtyard of the Kailasanatha temple, Kanchipuram, and is remarkably
similar to the one in the much larger Tirukkazhukkunram panel. The figure in this photograph, like those of Tirukkazhukkunram and
Mamallapuram, is also seated on Nandi.

Photograph B- Veenadhara Ardhanarisvara seated on a plain throne – not on Nandi. This panel, carved on one face of a four-sided block of granite, was,
at the time the picture was taken, in 1969, located in the forecourt of the Shore temple. The figure in this panel is almost identical in
attributes and pose to the Tirukkazhukkunram, Mamallapuram and Kanchipuram images. Yet, as there is no bull in this panel,
obviously, this figure cannot be called Vrishabhantika-Siva

Further he adds, on the Kailasanatha sculpture – it is of a figure of Veenadhara- Ardhanarisvara, also seated on a plain throne. It is carved on the west side of the outer wall of the vimana of the Kailasanatha temple, Kanchi.

Now, the proof rests with the three sculptures – one is inside the Garba Graha of the Tirukazhukundram shrine – maybe we can get an expert artist to visit and sketch insitu. or get some very closeup shots of the Photo A and Photo B. But then the post script

Postscript 1997:
Pallava Art Photograph A was taken by me in the late ’60s. ThisVïnädhara Ardhanärïvara carving has, at some later time, been removed from Kanchipuram and is presently being exhibited, along with the carved block (Photograph B), in the A.S.I.’s site museum at Mämallapuram!

Postscript current day: can someone help us find these two ?