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CHAPTER 37)
MUSEUMS ABROAD :: four hands (plate 317A). She stands in triflex pose under a three-hooded
oobra with the head shightly inclined towards right. The higti karanda-mukuta, necklace and waist-band and the delicate modelling of the body-contours suggest that the image was fashioned by a gifted Paramära artist in the Malwa region in the tenth-eleventh century. A snake, the mount of the Devi, is depicted as crawling near her feet. The attending figures shown on either side of the goddess are completely damaged. A miniature image of a Tirthařkara with attendants is depicted above the central hood of the Yaksi.
The worship of Sarasvati was equally popular among the Brāhmapists, Buddhists and Jaipas. In Jainism she is the Yakşi of Padmaprabha, the sixth Tirthankara. Some medieval images of the goddess have been found at Pallu," Ladnun* and Deogarh. A white marble image of Sarasvati, probably from south-western Rajasthan, is shown standing gracefully in tri-bhanga-pose on an inscribed padma-pitha (plate 317B). Her right hands are lost, while in her left hands she holds a rosary and a book of knowledge. The elaborate karandamukuta, the charming jewellery and the diaphanous sarī secured with a girdle reminds us of the famous Pallu image of Sarasvati displayed in the National Museum of New Delhi (below Chapter 38). She is flanked by two DhyaniTirthankaras on her either side. A miniature figure of Padmaprabha along with garland-holding flying couples is shown above the image of the Devi. Two standing images of female attendants and the donor-couple are depicted near her feet. The image can be assigned to the Paramāra period, twelfth century.
Though under the Caulukyas of Gujarat and later countless metal images of Tirtharkaras and other Jaina divinities were produced, most of them are stereotyped, because they were made in great numbers for worship by the Jaina devotees mainly of the Svetāmbara sect, and hence no emphasis was given on their beauty and aesthetic appeal. A pañca-tirthika of Mahāvira in the collection shows him seated cross-legged in dhyana-mudrd on a cushion-seat mounted on
R. P. Chanda, Mediaeval Indian Sculpture in the British Musenm, London, pp. 41-42, plate IX
Compare this image with the famous Sarasvati sculpture from Dhara in the British Museum, London. B. N. Sharma, Social and Curwal History of Northern India (c. 1000-1200 A.D.), Now Delhi, 1972, plate IX.
* H. Goetz, Art and Architecture of Bikaner State, Oxford, 1950, plates IX-X.
•D. Handa and G. Agrawala, 'A new Jaina Sarasvati from Rajasthan', East and West, XXII, 1-2, pp. 169-70 and plate.
B. C. Bhattacharya, Jaina Iconography, Delhi, 1974, plato XLI.
W. Rothenstein, Examples of Indian Sculpture in the British Museum, London, 1923, plate VI. .
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