Jaina Monuments and Places First Class Importance

Author(s): T N Ramchandran
Publisher: Veer Shasan Sangh Calcutta

Page 69

JAINA IMAGES FROM GWALIOR
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in early Brahmi can be seen on the back of the image, letters reading ja ka pa. Here as well as in the previous image the writings convey no sense.
Of same date as No. 1.
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4. RISHABHADEVA: 43". The Tirthankara is seated in samaparyanka on a padmāsana attached to a pedestal with its front in five recesses. The bull is seen couchant in front of the god. The hair is arranged like a jaṭāmukuta as in the case of No. from Kakatpur. The god is flanked by a standing Jina on either side (the left one is broken and missing), the läñchhana, the bull, being shown near the legs. Though at first sight the flanking gods may be mistaken for the Sasanadēvatās of Rishabhadēva, the fact that one of them who alone remains, the other having broken away, stands naked with the bull for his lañchhana, shows that Rishabhadeva was meant in both cases. There were writings in medieval characters on the asana (both in front and behind) which owing to heavy metallic pittings (the image is in a bad state of preservation) could not be easily read.
The image was found near a tank at Balipatnā, near Bhuvanesvar, District Puri, and may date from the 10th-11th century A D
3. JAINA IMAGES FROM GWALIOR.
A copper shrine and four Jaina figures representing the Tirthankaras were found in 1869 in the course of excavations in the Gwalior fortress and were presented by the Government of India. They are now in the Indian Museum. Both the shrine and the Tirthankara images appear to date from the 10th-11th centuries A.D. They are: