Jain Journal 1975 04

Author(s): Jain Bhawan Publication
Publisher: Jain Bhawan Publication

Page 17

110
JAIN JOURNAL
In her upper hands she carries discs; the lower right in abhaya-mudrā and the corresponding left has a conch. Garuda seated in äliḍha-pose is supporting her with her hands.1 The figures wear some of the quaint jewellery of the period.
The pedestal bears a dated inscription of V.S. 1114 (1056 A.D.), which records that it was installed by Abhaya Sakarsala and Kanka, the father and son respectively: samvat 1114 sudi 11 abhaya sakarsalah tata sutah kankah. The figures hovering in the sky and those flanking Adinatha have typical haloes behind their heads. Besides this, the schematic folds in the lower garments of some of the figures remind us of the similarity with many sculptures executed during the Cedi period at Bheraghat, Tripuri, Bilhari and other places. This image thus appears to have been fashioned during the Cedi period in early 11th century A.D. It is also apparent that the depiction of Adinatha with Bharata and Bahubali was probably confined only to the Cedi area, as such images are not known from other parts of the country.
A covisi of Adinatha is another important image (No. 74. 290; ht. 25.5 cms., pl. 2). A covisi (Gujarati) is a caturviṁsati (-pata), i.e., a group of twenty-four Jaina Tirthankaras, with the main image in the centre and the remaining twenty-three figures depicted on the two sides and above of the central figure. A number of such images have been found from different parts of India. In the present image, the main deity is Adinatha, the first Tirthankara, seated in dhyana-mudra on a lion throne. In almost all the images of Adinatha, his locks of hair are shown flowing on the shoulders.2 But in absence of this particular feature in this image, his identification with Adinatha can be safely suggested by the presence of his cognizance, the couchant bull, shown on the left side of his tri-ratha pedestal. Suparsvanatha and Parsvanatha are shown near his knees, along with other twenty-one Tirthankaras inside the niches, on his both sides and above. A pūrṇa-ghata and two swans are also depicted in the upper most niche along with the two Tirthankaras of the same group. The pedestal in front shows a banana tree with two miniature figures, probably representing the sasanadevatās of Adinatha, while on the extreme ends are carved the figures of the donor and his wife in reverential attitude. The back side of this damaged image bears
1 See for details U.P. Shah, Iconography of Cakresvari, the Yaksi of Rsabhanatha, Journal of the Oriental Institute, Baroda, XX, 3, pp. 280-313.
2 A. K. Coomaraswamy (Catalogue of the Collections in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 1923, p. 86, pl. XLIII) and B. C. Bhattacharya (The Jaina Iconography, Lahore, 1939, frontispiece) have wrongly identified the images of Rsabhanatha with Mahavira, the twenty-fourth Tirthankara.