| Temples & Legends Of Tamilnadu |
 |
| Temples & Legends Of India |
MAHABLIPURAM |
|
| The view held by
Ferguson and Burgess is that this sculpture represents "Serpent Worship" in
ancient India and that "in the centre on a projecting ledge between the two great masses of rock once stood the statue of the great Nagaraja who was the principal personage for whose honor this great bas-relief was designed". Vogel is of the view that the group of Arjuna and Siva did not really form the centre of the sculpture and that "once there existed here a sacred spring and the water gushing forth from the cleft was the real aim and object of all the adorning figures". A later theory supported by Langhurst and Dr. Coomaraswamy is "that it depicts the "Descent of the Ganges" from the height of Kailasa. If this view is accepted, then the personage who has been identified, as Arjuna should be called Bhagiratha and this great sculpture as Bhagiratha's penance and not Arjuna's. But no local tradition exists which can serve as a real clue to its origin. |
|
| About Mahabalipuram | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
