Jainism in South India and Some Jaina Epigraphs

Author(s): P B Desai
Publisher: Jain Sanskruti Samrakshak Sangh Solapur

Page 95

8. JAINTEM IN TAMIL NAD
of miniature Jinas.? We may devote more attention to these conspicuous figures of bigger size.
YAKSHIŅI AMBIKA: The last image seated on the proper right may be Nēminātha. The next standing image to the left is Pārsvanātha. To the left of Pārsvanātha is a standing female figure with two hands and without attributes. She might be either Padmāvati or Siddhãyikā. A bit away to the left is Mahāvira in sitting posture with his usual attributes. To the left of this and the last of the series is a stately female figure standing. She has two hands: the right is in the varada pose and the left is hanging free by her side. A lion with massive head facing the front is seen on her right side. Below the head of the lion is a female attendant standing. Two children of smaller size are standing by her side on the left. I am inclined to think that this deity must be Ambikā, the Yakshiņi of Nominātha. The prominence given to this Yakshiņi in these sculptures alongside of or even in preference to the masters, the Jinas, is in keeping with the Jaina religious conventions that had evolved in the Tamil land, as we have noticed before in a number of instances. .
Five RECORDS: Now we shall review the contents of the epigraphs. These are engraved near the above sculptures in the Vatteluttu alphabet and Tamil language. One inscription of the reign of the Pandya king Vikraināditya Varaguņa records a gift of golden ornarents to the Bhatāriyār of Tiruchchāranattumalai, made by the lady teacher Guņandāngi Kurattigal, disciple of Arattanāmi Bhatāra of Põrayakkudi. Another is a record of Ajjanandi noticed above. The third refers to the carving of the sculpture caused by Varagunan, disciple of Pattini Bhatūrar of the Tiruchchāraṇam Hill. The fourth speaks of a similar performance by the teacher Uttaņandi Adigal hailing from the Kāttāmballi monastery at Tiruneďumburai. The fifth relates to another soulpture prepared by the teacher Viranandi Adigal who belonged to the Mēlaipalli monastery at Ti unarungondai. From the palaeography of the inscriptions and the rather crude and archaic mode of the sculptures, these antiquities of Tiruchchāṇattumalai inay be broadly assigned to the 9th and 10th centuries A. D.
BHAȚĀRI-BHAGAVATI: One of the inscriptions noticed above registers a gift to the Bhatāriyār. Bhatāriyār is the honorific plural of Bhatāri which means a goddess or a female deity. We are justified in assuming that this deity is identical with the Yakshiņi Ambikā of the above description. Tbis
1 Trava, Arch. Series, Vol. I, photo facing p. 194. 2 The late Mr. Gopinatharao has tried to identify this sculpture as Padmavati, which is
incorrect; ibid. Vol. II, p. 127. 3 Ibid., pp. 125-6.