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Jain Thought and Culture
vase as purna-kumbha-kanya, one of the auspicious symbols in the Lumbini procession of Queen Mayadevi.
111
Purnaghata was looked upon as a source of life and abundance also Here, mention may also be made of the vases which are shown as full of money The famous Kalpadruma capital from Besnagar, being wishfulfilling tree 1epresented by a Banyan with long pendent aerial roots, from which untold wealth is verflowing In the form of coins from th vessels placed below the tree The open vessels are all different, a large shell, a full blown lotus and a pol Ramachandran112 has published & unique terracotta plaque found at Tamluk (Tamralıptı) which depicts a Purnaghata overflown with coins Faint traces of fee. . re seen on its mouth suggesting a figure of Laksmi standing over it
Sri or the Goddess of luck or fortune was accepted as auspicious in all religious systems of India She is the symbol of plenty, beauty, purity and abundance As Mother Earth her motif includes many other aupsicious symbols of fertility such as lotus, purnaghata and elephants It appears that before her appearance in anthropomorphic form (as she appears in the dream sequence) Vedic description of the abstract form helped a lot in giving her iconographic form in the later ages In Vedic mythology she appears as Prthivi Though in the Rgveda, she has but one short hymn113 of her own, in the Atharvaveda114 we find a detailed description of her natural sights She is associated with Dyaus (sky) which reminds us of the old celestial pair of sky and earth She is great, shining and firm, and brings rain
from the clouds, a fact which shows that she borrowed an attribute of Dyaus himself115 She is identified with Sri, the great mother, worshipped from the oldest times Her popular origin is hinted at in several ways, eg, by her identity with the earth and by her birth from waters on the one hand and from heaps of cowdung on the
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111 Cf Coomaraswamy, Yaksas, pt II, p 72, Cunningham, A, ASR Vol I
112 Ramachandran, TN, 'Tamluk', Artibus Asia, Vol XIV, 3, pp 232--234, The cous coming from the vase are identified as punch-marked coins (JNSI, Vol XXVII, pt 1, pl IX)
113 RV, VII 96 Cf X 18
114 Atharvaveda, XII 1 115 Keith, RPV Vol 1, p 174
