Jainism and Karnataka Culture

SR No.: 011062
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: S R Sharma
Publisher: Karnataka Historical Research Society Dharwar
Publication Year: 1940
Total Pages: 263
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 9 MB

Page 154

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JAINISM AND KARNATAKA CULTURE
over the head of the latter, Bahubali is flanked by two small figures, one with six hands, and another only with two. Of the six hands of the former, three hold respectively an ankuśa, a kalasa, and a trident; the rest hold fruit. Another seated male figure has four hands holding an ankuśa, akṣamālā, and fruit in the three, with the fourth hand in Varada-hasta pose. There is also a female figure with twelve hands: four on the right and four on the left, holding each a cakra or disc; two with a thunderbolt, and the remaining, with a lotus and varada-hasta. On the ceiling are lotuses and other flowers. 154
Often on the pillars of Jaina temples are curious figures, like that of the giraffe, or the interlaced basket-work, of which Fergusson finds parallels in Irish manuscripts and crosses, as well as, in America, and the valley of the Danube in Europe.155 The number of pillars also is sometimes far in excess of mere architectural needs, as in the case af the Thousand Pillar Basti' of Mūḍbidrê. It is very extensive, magnificient, containing on and about a thousand pillars and no two alike. In the prophylaeum are of several great size, the lower halves square, the upper round and lessening, recalling Egyptian forms, and all covered with a wondrous wealth of sculptured gods, monsters, leaf and flower-work, and astonishing arabesque interlacement, cut with admirable cleanness. One quadrangular face bears a hymn, graven curiously in twenty-five small compartments, each containing four compound words, which may be read as verses in all directions, up or down, along or across. On the outer pediment there is a long procession of various animals, living and mythical, among them the centaur and mermaid and an excellent representation of a giraffe.156 The two specimens of wood-carving, reproduced elsewhere, viz. the Pancanāri-turaga and Navanāri-kuñjara, are also from Mūḍbidrê and belong to the Couter's palace there.
154 Cf. Mysore Archaeological Report, 1925, p. 2. 155 Of. Fergusson, op. cit., p. 82.
156 Walhouse, quoted by sturrock, op. cit., p. 88,