THE STYLE OF EARLY HISTORIC TERRACOTTAS

FROM THE INDO-GANGETIC DIVIDE

In a previous article, to which this forms a sequel, we initiated a discussion on the characteristics, both iconographic and stylistic, of terracotta objects from the Indo-Gangetic Divide with special focus on Sugh, in Jagadhri District, Haryana. There we looked particularly at the prolific output of images of a child scribe, a kingly yaksha like personage with a tall headdress and pot belly, the nature of ornament, coiffure and fine drapery, and found that objects from the region can be stylistically recognised as exhibiting subtly distinct features that differentiate them from their close counterparts in Mathura and Taxila. The style was found to be in transition: with its foundations in the general tradition of mould-made plaques that was widespread across northern South Asia- from Bannu [NWFP] to Mahasthangarh [Bangladesh] - but at times, mixed, in this region, with some extra-Indian influences that must have come from contemporary Indo-Greeks, Parthians and Scythians in the Pre-Kushan period. Moreover, the plaques have a sophistication that rivals that of the better known centres for such art in India like Chandraketugarh in Bengal or Kaushambi in U.P. This artice discusses three hitherto unpublished terracotta plaques from the Indo-Gangetic Divide. 

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CHANGING GODS, ENDURING RITUALS:

Observations on Early Indian Religion as seen through

Terracotta Imagery, c. 200 BC-AD 100

NAMAN P. AHUJA

There are people who perform various auspicious rites in times of illness, or on occasions of marriage of sons and daughters, or on those of births of sons, or in setting out on a journey to a distant place, - on this and on (similar) other occasions the people perform various auspicious rites. Here particularly the womenfolk perform many and diverse, minor and meaningless rites. If the auspicious rite is to be performed (it should be noted that) such a rite produces small fruit...

Akoka's Rock Edict-IX ¹

Two things are learnt from this quotation. 1. That there were well established and popular religious practices current in the period of Akoka which involved gatherings, festivities, rituals performed by people on specific occasions. 2. That Akoka shunned them in favour of his more tempered state policy of dhamma. The latter is of no concern here, it is to the prevalence and nature of aspects of the other cults that we draw our attention.

Northern Indian moulded terracotta objects tend, in the period under discussion, to be mostly in the nature of artistically sophisticated flat tablets of two-dimensional reliefs. They have been found (Fig. 1) at sites in the regions of Chandraketugarh in 24-Parganas District, Mahasthangarh, Tamluk and Midnapore in Bengal, along the Ganga Valley through the rest of the northern parts of the Subcontinent at sites such as Kaushambi, Mathura, Rajghat, Ayodhya and further through the maidans of the Indo-Gangetic Divide at Sugh, Ropar, Taxila and up to Bannu in the NWFP.² While they possess tremendous artistic merit and variety in regional and local styles, they are examined in this paper as important communicators of aspects of Indian religious expression contemporary with their use and production in the Early-Historic period.³ Studies that have come closest to their religious import are mostly concerned with trying to identify in this early pantheon of figures the names of those gods more familiar to us from later iconography. While it is indeed a natural first-question to ask a person, whether two-dimensional and divine or otherwise, to identify himself, early Indian moulded terracottas have not in any straightforward way disclosed their cultic affiliation or their names.

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A PANTHEON

REDISCOVERED?

The so-called ‘minor' antiquities from Afghanistan, Punjab, the north Indian plains in U.P., Bihar and all the way to Bangladesh, roughly in the period 200 BC - AD 200, (usually called the ‘Shunga', post-Mauryan or pre-Kushan periods) reveal a consistent and prolific language of imagery. These images are startlingly sophisticated: The plaques, free standing images, mould, pots and architectural elements discussed in this website allow us to make parallels with the surviving stone images from sites such as Mathura, Sanchi, Bharhut and Amaravati. Sites, about which much has been written.

The most dominant type of image of this pantheon is that of the goddess with weapons in her headdress. These come from different regions and were made in different media. In the Gallery section of this website, you will see that the piece from the Metropolitan Museum reveals the context of the type of shrine she would have been worshipped in and what sort of worship would have been accorded to her. The image from the Ashmolean is the most well known one in the world, and arguably, still the finest of its ilk. Apart from having over a century of academic discourse behind it, more recent investigation into this image has shown its importance in studying the special nature of the talismans she is covered with, revealing a dimension of early Indian religious practice about which we have known little so far. The tiny pieces in bronze and amber from Kaushambi and the Northwest Frontier, show how such private images may have been made in precious materials to suit a different class of patrons. Furthermore, the amber piece is of a pre-existing Mauryan style, the appearance of which in Afghanistan and the Northwest is an important marker for the westward spread of this Indic influence. Finally, the inclusion of fine moulds, the type from which the hundreds of terracotta plaques of the period would have been pressed, allows us to simultaneously be aware of "mass-production" for the urban middle classes in antiquity, as it informs us of the techniques involved in manufacturing these artworks.