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Vaishali Institute Research Bulletin No. 6
cal and Buddhist temples lie in the rendering of the deity installed in the main shrine and subsidiary deities, inspired by respective mythologies and such other things. There is no essential difference them necessitated by any particular religious belief and practice.
After Lohānipur, to our information, the next is an early bronze image of Pārsva of c. second-first century B. C. preserved in the Prince of Wales Museum, Bombay. The image is rendered as sky-clad and standing in the Kāyot sarga-mudrā with five hooded snake canopy.1
Another Pārsva image of the same period is discovered from Chausā village in Bhojpur District of Bihar and is now preserved in the Patna Museum. It is also sky-clad and in the Kayol sarga-mudrā with seven hooded snake canopy. Hundreds of such figures belonging to different period are found all over India. Depiction of snake canopy is a symbolic representation of an episode which has special significance in the life of Päráva. It also denotes his association with the Nāga.cult.
Pārśva was a historical person born in Varanasi in the ninth century B. C.. 250 years before Varadhaunāna Mahavira. He lived for hundred years, preached the religion and philosophy of roga, technically called căujjāma-samvara. At the end he attained nirvana on the mountain of Sameta, known as Pārsvanätha Hill in Hazaribagh District of Bihar. Parşva the immediate predecessor of Mahāvira is reckoned as the twentythird Tirthankara of Jaina tradition.
The images of Rşabhã, who is considered to be the first Tirthankara, have special iconographic feature just like that of Pārsva referred to above. He is endowed with falling hair locks. This depicts, according to the tradition, the state of his continued severe penance. Perhaps the specific feature of Rşabha was finalised in c. first century A. D. Both the standing as well as seated images are represented with falling hair locks.
In the history of Jaina religious images, Gupta period was a milestone. Some of the most significant iconographic features were intro
1. Shah, U. P., 'Studies in Jaina Art, Varanasi, 1955, pp. 8-9. 2. Prasad, N. K., Jaina Bronzes in the Patna Museum' Mahavira
Jaina Vidyalaya Golden Jubilee, Vol., Bombay, 1968, pp. 275-80. 3. Tiwari, Maruti Nandan Prasad, Elements of Jaina iconography,
Varanasi, 1983, pp. 5-6.
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