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Arhat Pārsva and Dharanendra Nexus
mūlanāyaka. At Suisā, the image of Pārsvanātha has an elaborately carved stele. Some of the details of this badly abraded carving may have a connection with the upasarga-legend associated with Pārsvanātha. Apart from the representation either independently or as mūlanāyaka, Pārsvanātha also figures on several caumukha votive shrines. Such votive shrines have been noticed at Pakbirrā (Plate 49), Purulia (Plate 50), Charrā, Barjorā (Plate 51)24 and Sāt Deuliyā (Plate 52). Another votive shrine is kept in the Haripada Sahitya Mandir Museum at Puruliā (Plate 50). A caumukha as devacchandaka or gandha-kuti having the crowning śikhara of the Latina class at Pakbirrā, while showing Pārsvanātha, Candraprabha, Rşabhadeva, and Santinātha in kāyotsarga on its four sides, exhibits on every face of its spire five Jinas in three vertically aligned niches and thus completes the figure 24 of the Jinas. Caumukha shrines from Puruliā and Barjorā are also of this type. (Do they represent Aștāpada-prāsāda?)
On several pañcatirthika stele, Pārsvanātha appears as one of the four Jinas around the mulanāyaka. Thus at Pakbirrā, he occurs by the side of Candraprabha and Mahāvīra. In another interesting example, again from Pakbirrā, the seated images of Rşabhanātha, Pārsvanātha, Padmaprabha and two other unidentified Jinas are placed in a row above the standing figure of Ambikā.
Wide distribution and the occurrence of a large number of Pārsvanātha images indicate that the Jina enjoyed a position of considerable importance in Bengal. The sculptors, who had executed these images, seem to have sufficient familiarity with the rules of Nirgrantha iconography. Commonality in the general details of all the images of the Jina in different districts and decades in Bengal may suggest that the convention which guided the sculptors did not vary with the changes of time and locale. It is, therefore, not possible to arrange these images in a strict chronological order on the basis of their iconography. What is, however, certain is that most of these images should be dated after the ninth century since none of the Jaina temples, now extant in Bengal, can be assigned to a date prior to the tenth century.25 Gauda Samgha, to which Somadeva of the Yaśastilaka-campū (tenth century) belonged, apparently had originated in Bengal.
III. APPENDIX
In different parts of Bengal, images of a multi-armed male deity under a hooded snake-canopy have been found (Plate 53). Some of the emblems, held in the hands of the deity, assert his Vaişņava affiliation. As such the god is taken to be a representation of Vişnu. Over the snake-hood canopy is shown a tiny figure in yogasana.
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