Ambika on Jaina Art and Literature

Author(s): Maruti Nandan Prasad Tiwari
Publisher: Bharatiya Gyanpith

Page 76

20 Narsinghapur (Madhya Pradesh), 11th century (p. 60)
becomes all the more important due to its being the confluence of the three principal Indian sects, the Vaidika, the Buddhist and the Jaina. A series of five Jaina caves (Nos. 30 to 34), occupying the northern horn of the Ellorā ridge, are very important from the stand-point of the study of Jaina iconography (and architecture) in south India in early medieval times. These caves, belonging exclusively to the Digambara tradition, are datable to the ninth century A.D. The Jaina caves apparently were carved during the reign of the Rāstrakūta king Amoghavarsa I (A.D. 819-881), the great patron of Jainism. These caves contain the figures of Jina Pārsvanātha, Jina Mahāvīra, Bahubalin, Sarvānubhūti Yakşa, and Cakreśvari and Ambikā Yaksis.
Among the Yakşīs Ambikā undoubtedly was accorded a very favoured position in Ellorā. She is represented by about 20 figures, the number being equal to the figures of Pārsvanātha and Mahāvīra Jinas and hence suggesting her great popularity. The cave 32 (Indra-sabhā, C. A.D. 810-80; Figs. 21 to 23) alone has yielded 14 images while the other caves have one to three figures. In all the examples (Fig. 24), the two-armed Ambikā is shown as