Goddess Durga from South India

This magnificent image cast in bronze, strengthened with a greater percentage of copper than the alloy usually has, represents Durga. The form of the goddess combines some of the features of the iconography of Kali and Lakshmi, a typical South Indian idiom of representing her. Such form of the goddess is usually known and worshipped in the South as Mari Amma or Mari Amman. This four-armed form of the goddess combines two sets of Shaivite attributes, one consisting of a third eye mark on the forehead and the trident, ‘damaru’ – small double drum, and serpent twisting around the ‘damaru’, carried in two upper hands, and the other, a chopper and a bowl, symbolic of skull-bowl, carried in her normal two hands, besides the flames of fire emitting halo-like from behind her head and a severed head, symbolic of Apasmara-purusha, under her feet.

Though multi-armed manifestations of the goddess, especially when conceived as battling against demons, carry such attributes even in any one form, in the established iconographic tradition, the former of these two sets is more often associated with her form as Durga and the latter, with her form as Kali. She is seen as carrying chopper and skull-bowl in her eight-armed, ten-armed and other multi-armed forms too, but Apasamara- purusha is invariably a feature of her form as Kali. However, in both cases her Shaivite identity is unquestionable. What defines the South Indian idiom of the image is its Vaishnavite cult : her Vaishnava crown, lotus-seat consisting of a large size lotus and lotus-base below it, and her seating posture, known in the tradition as ‘lalitasana’ – the posture revealing beauty of form. These are the features characteristic to the icons of the highly venerated goddess of the South Padmavati, Lakshmi’s South Indian transform enshrining numerous sanctums there.

The image presents a unique synthesis of aesthetics and votive iconography for while the figure of the goddess has been modeled on aesthetic lines, the level of its sublimation inspires far deeper devotion in the viewing mind. In South Indian tradition Parvati and Uma are more popular manifestations of Shiva’s consort in relation to her lion-riding or demon-slaying forms, perhaps because in South Indian tradition Shiva with a very wide range of his manifestations is seen as himself accomplishing most of such objectives. Correspondingly Shiva’s consort is rarely seen as deployed in battlefield eliminating demons. A form of the goddess, other than her form as Uma or Parvati, as one represented by this bronze, bereft of most of the demon-slaying myths, is not only known by a different name, that is Mari Amma, but is seen merely as engaged in accomplishing far simpler objectives of subordinate nature. Mari-Amma, sometimes considered as an independent goddess in the South, and in the North as just another name of Durga, is worshipped primarily for protecting against and redeeming from fever and pestilence and for defeating enemies and eliminating adversities. She is also worshipped for redeeming from the bonds of this material world and from the cycle of birth and death but these are her remoter boons.

Far from Kali’s ferocious and repulsive appearance and violent ways, and not even Durga-like occupied in action against demons, this form of the goddess has been conceived with benignity, feminine softness and bliss on the face : the essence of Durga’s basic iconography. Seated in ‘lalitasana’, revealing great aesthetic charm, the goddess has been represented as the model of absolute beauty. Her evil-eliminating role has been symbolised by the attributes she is carrying in her hands and by the severed human head around the base of her pedestal. The flames of fire, which comprise her halo, symbolise on one hand her inherent cosmic energy, and on the other, her power to dissolve and eliminate.

The figure of the goddess, conceived with sharp well defined nose, meditative half-shut eyes, rounded prominent cheeks and slightly pointed chin, has been installed on a tall large two-tiered seat. Its lower tier is an elevated square with a tapering lotus plinth and over it, a plain straight rising, and the upper tier, a rounded high podium made of a double lotus placed into the centre of the base-tier. The third eye, a less prominent feature, has been conceived like a ‘tilaka’, auspicious mark, conceived like the flame of a lamp. A decorative ornamental band tied around her forehead, sensuously designed ‘stana-pata’ – breast-band, enhancing the beauty of her breasts, and ‘antariya’ covering her body below her waist, are characteristic features of Chola bronzes. With a subdued belly, broad shoulders, sensuously moulded breasts and a balanced body-structure the figure of the goddess has been brilliantly modeled.

This description by Prof. P.C. Jain and Dr. Daljeet. Prof. Jain specializes on the aesthetics of literature and is the author of numerous books on Indian art and culture. Dr. Daljeet is the curator of the Miniature Painting Gallery, National Museum, New Delhi. They have both collaborated together on a number of books.

Click Here to View the Reverse of this sculpture.

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