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58
Khandagiri (Puri, Orissa), 11th-12th
century
Navamuni caves at Khandagiri, datable to c. 11th-12th century A.D., are important inasmuch as they show her with Jina Neminātha. It is interesting to find that while most of the Yaksis possess four to 20 hands in their collective renderings in Bārabhuji and Navamuni caves, Ambikā retains her conventional form with two arms. In both the examples, Ambikā is seated in lalitäsana with her mount lion and branches of mango tree. The figure in Navamuni cave holds as usual amra-lumbi and putra. Close to the Yakşi, wearing Jata-mukuta, the figure of her elder son Subhankara (nude) is also carved. The example in Bārabhuji cave, however, shows fruit and the twig of a mango tree in the right and left hands. The figure of her younger son, Priyankara, however, stands on lefts.O
Three images of two-armed Ambikā from Orissa are preserved in different museums of India and abroad. Of these, the earliest figure (see fig. 56 above) belonging to c. 10th century A.D., shows the two-armed Ambika as standing reposefully with amra-lumbi in right hand and the younger son Priyankara (nude), standing and holding the finger of her mother, in the left. Apart from the beautiful double-petalled louts seat, lion mount, devotees, shade of mango tree and figure of Neminātha overhead, there also appears her elder son Subhankara (not nude) on the right flank. The figure, now exhibited in the National Museum, Delhi (Acc. No. 63. 940), is a magnificent piece of art.
The second figure, assignable to c. 11th century A.D., is now preserved in the British Museum, London. Ambikā stands gracefully on double lotus in flexed pose with the figure of her Jina at the top. On both the sides are carved rising creepers showing the figures of monkeys etc. The YaKși, standing under a mango tree, wears exquisitely carved ornaments and somewhat transparent sāri. The two-armed Yaksi holds an amra-lumbi in right hand, close to which there stands her elder son Subhankara, making a bid to pluck a mango from the āmra-lumbi. The Yaksi supports with her left hand, her younger son Prabhankara, clinging to waist and touching the breast. The lion is carved on the pedestal. Almost identical images of Ambikā from Orissa are preserved in Victoria and Albert Museum, London and Standahl Galleries U.S.A.11
Apart from the above stone figures of Ambikā, some of her bronze images are also discovered by Debala Mitra from the village Achutarajapur in Orissa. These bronze images are now preserved
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Ambika 107
