More Documents of Jaina and Gujarati Paintings

Author(s): Umakant P Shah
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

Page 18

Figs. 17, 17a are from a palm-leaf MS. of Uttarādhyayana Sukhabodhā-vřlli, in the Sāntinātha Bhāndara, Cambay, assigned by Muni Sri Punyavijayaji to first half of the fourteenth century V. S., i. e. between 1250-1300 A. D.
Fig. 17 deserves special notice for a miniature of Pārsva with attendants in a shrine with two banana bushes on two sides. Fig. 17a shows the temple of Adinātha at Satruñjaya and the Rāyana tree nt arby.
Fig. 22 is an example of a long miniature from a palm-leaf MS. of Avaśyaka Laghuvrtti, copied in Samvat 1445 (1388 A. D.), preserved in Sāntinātha Bhāņdāra, Cambay, representing in eleven sections, the ganadharas of a Tirthankara who is represented in the centre in a Samavasarana. The painting is done on red ochre background. The format is 73 inches long x 21 inches broad.
Some years ago from Muni Punyavijyaji's collections (now in L. D. Institute of Indology, Ahmedabad) was published by U. P. Shah and Moti Chandra, a Kalpa-sūtra dated in V. S. 1403=1346 A. D.9+ which shows greater use of green and gold. It was given as a gift to him from a collection in Gujarät.
The date of the above manuscript, though given in margin by a later hand, as the last folio was perhaps mutilated (and now lost), must be regarded as genuine for this paper manuscript and the old theory of dating on the basis of size following the earlier palm-leaves need not be regarded as an absolute guide in view of the format of a paper MS. of Sālibhadrakākakula, dated in Samvat 1358 (see fig. 25), in the collections of the Oriental Institute, Baroda, and another of Daśāśrutaskandha, eighth chapter (Kalpa-stilra), written in the V. S. 1443 (1386 A. D.), from the same collections (see fig. 26). Also may be compared a manuscript of Mahipa-kośa (from Oriental Institute, Baroda) dated in V. S. 1493 (1437 A. D.).25
Fig. 23 illustrates a page from a palm-leaf of jñātā-dharmakathā-sūtra-vrtti edited by Dronācārya in V. S. 1120 - 1063 A. D. A later entry on the page (fig. 24) shows that the MS. was at some later date purchased and donated by a lady in Samvat 1411 (= 1354 A. D.). The manuscript is somewhat earlier and perhaps dates from the beginning of the thirteenth century. The miniature shows the four-armed yakși Ambika. The figure of the standing child to her right and the modelling of the face of the goddess shows traits nearer to the twelfth century rather than the fourteenth. It is a beautiful miniature with mango-trees represented, on two sides, with trunks bent in a wavy zig
24. Moti Chandra and U. P. Shah, New Documents of Jaina Paintings, Mahavira Jaina Vidyalaya
Golden Jubilee Volume (Bombay, 1966) pp. 359, 374-376, figures 1-3 and colour plate 1. 25. The style of the Kalpa-Satra dated V. S. 1403 can also be compared with that of another
Kalpa-Satra, painted at Pāțan and dated V. S. 1438 (1381 A. D.) from Khajanchi collection, now in the National Museum, New Delhi; (see catalogue of Miniature Paintings from Motichand Khajanchi collection, New Delhi, 1960, p. 22, figs. 1, 2, 3.) The type of face with a typical long straight-nose of the Tirthankara, is also seen in the Kalpa-Sätra of V. S. 1403. Even the format and script of both these manuscripts are related. The National Museum has a KalpaSatra dated v. S. 1474 (= A. D. 1427) whose format is also noteworthy.