- Museum number
- 1962,1231,0.13.12
- Description
-
Opaque watercolour painting of the personification of Viṣṇu’s chakra (discus) as a youthful sixteen-armed figure in pratyalidha, whose head is surrounded by tongues of fire. He strides from within two equilateral triangles forming a six-pointed star, inscribed in a circle. A flame marks each point where the corners of the star touch the circle. On his forehead Sudarshana sports a Vaishnava namam (emblem). A bow is slung over his left shoulder. He carries various attributes in his right hands: the chakra (discus), a sword, buckler, axe, spear, ankusha (elephant goad), danda (staff) and trishula (trident); in his left hands are the shankha (conch), arrows, pasha (noose), hala (plough), pestle, club, curved sword (which probably represents the vajra) and trishula.
- Production date
- 1830 (circa)
- Dimensions
-
Height: 22.60 centimetres
-
Width: 17.60 centimetres
- $Inscriptions
-
- Curator's comments
- Dallapiccola 2010:
The sixteen-armed form of Sudarshana became very popular in South India during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, as can be seen from the many depictions in sculpture, e.g. on a pillar in the open mandapa of the Ramasvami temple at Kumbakonam. Sudarshana is known in Tamil literature and epigraphy as Chakrattalvar.
This painting is part of an album of ninety-one paintings (1962,1231,0.13.1–91) illustrating gods, goddesses, saints and scenes from Hindu mythology. One of the most interesting features of the album are the eight major temple sites included: Srirangam, Tiruvallur, Rameswaram, Tirunelveli, Palani, Madurai, Thiruvanaikoil (Tiruvanaikka or Jambukeshvara) and Tiruchchirappalli. Furthermore, included in this series are some of the most important murtis enshrined in temples such as Venkatachalapati of Tirumala, Vitthala of Pandharpur and Thyagarajasvami of Tiruvarur. The geographical area covered by the paintings encompasses the totality of the former Madras Presidency and extends into the former Bombay Presidency, giving an insight into the most revered pilgrimage sites in early nineteenth-century southern India.
The drawings were first done in pencil, traces of which are still visible. In the course of his work the artist has sometimes changed his mind, as for instance in the positioning of the arms and feet of the figures. Slight shading has been consistently applied to the faces, arms and legs of the figures to suggest three-dimensionality. The vibrant colours and the delicacy of the drawings make the figures stand out from the pages.
The pages are numbered in reverse order from the back, on paper water marked ‘1820’. Occasionally, a brief note is pencilled in English, probably by a British Museum curator, at the back of some of the temple depictions. An almost identical work, albeit containing a hundred drawings, each with bilingual inscriptions in Telugu and English, is in the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum, London (IM 355-1923 to 454-1923). The sequence of the images is similar to that in this album.
- Location
- On display (G33/dc66b/s3)
- Exhibition history
-
Exhibited:
2010-2011, July-Jan, BM, Room 2, 'New Publications'
- Acquisition date
- 1962
- Acquisition notes
- Transferred from the Department of Oriental Manuscripts and Printed Books (OMPB) in 1962.
- Department
- Asia
- Registration number
- 1962,1231,0.13.12
- Additional IDs
-
Miscellaneous number: 1167 (Egerton number)
