SUBJECT AND PURPOSE OF THE STUDY

This book is devoted to selected objects of visual culture from the Indian subcontinent that can be directly related to the topic of abundance and fertility, and especially to childcare. In the whole analysis and the problem under discussion, they constitute the most crucial group of sculptures from the Mathura art centre and are mainly dated to the first centuries CE. In some cases, the main material had to be juxtaposed with other artefacts from earlier or later epochs, including places outside the Mathura region, to create an appropriate context for the analysis. Regionally, however, they do not extend beyond North India. The most important thing for me is to focus on a certain fragment of the visual material legacy of ancient India in order to obtain the most coherent image of that community, its needs, way of perceiving the world, dealing with everyday matters of importance – as may be concluded from the number and form of the preserved representations. Assuming that Mathura workshops produced numerous and various objects for their founders, a special group of characters and images should be distinguished among them at the beginning, with an emphasis on the function assigned to them, related to the protection of offspring. According to the available studies, after analysing the objects, I included the following spirit-deities here: Ekanamsha, Hariti, Matrikas, Naigamesha, Shashthi, and Skanda. Some of them were included in the group of harmful Grahas, detailed information about which can be found mainly in various medical treatises, such as Sushruta Samhita or Kashyapa Samhita. It can be assumed that the beliefs and practices, the main rep-resentatives of which were the above listed deities, could support women during the exceptionally important time of pregnancy, childbirth and puerperium. This period was associated with many threats both to the health and life of women and their offspring, and failures in this regard had an impact on the functioning of the entire family. In addition, from the very beginning, it should be emphasised that the ancient Indian community focused on having children, which was reflected in both the visual and textual artefacts.

INTRODUCTION

The culture studied in this book is no exception if emphasis on aspects of procreation, and thus motherhood, is considered. Besides, all over the world, since prehistoric times, many finds have been preserved proving that it was one of the most important issues that occupied the human mind. Moreover, as L. Clark-Callister points out, studies on childbirth and culture provide evidence for the existence of specific assumptions related to giving birth to children, which must be looked at more broadly – including as an emotional and spiritual experience, not only a socio-cultural phenomenon (intimate experience vs. societal event). These include moral systems or values, then ceremonies and practices, gender roles in the system of blood relatives and in-laws, and finally knowledge and beliefs related to behaviours and experiences directly linked with pregnancy. There are many examples of the above in India's textual and visual culture. Two main perspectives can be expected – masculine, priestly, official, idealized; and feminine, more personal and intimate, which in the case of the ancient cultures cannot be directly observed. S. Bawa notices that early Indian art contains many representations of women, but this “does not signify either equality of status or equivalence of power in the socio-legal sphere.” To some extent, the initial positive identity and role of women as breeders, socially beneficial, has been re-evaluated, as recapped then by S. Bawa. Therefore, for the re-searcher, due to the widespread discussions about female reproduction, sexuality and finally strisvabhava, it is not possible to make a homogeneous reading of the women's images as positive. Especially if there are no direct references to motherhood in them, and female nature was often classified in negative terms. Implicitly, by collecting scattered records from texts, trying to remove the patriarchal filter from them, describing objects of material culture, one can extract basic information about the female world. To cite and analyse all the significant fragments, however, a much larger work than mine would be needed. In the previous Chapter, I drew attention to the most important objects of the visual sphere, which clearly prove that the subject of fertility and abundance must have been substantial and preserved in the images of various traditions.

INTRODUCTION

Also in the topic of fertility and abundance, I shall start with the comment that the symbols and key elements derived from nature or everyday life described in Chapter 1, were enriched with new elements in the first centuries CE. It can be assumed that the basic repertoire remained valid, and the symbols of abundance and fertility continued to be an important component of the images related to fecundity and protection of offspring in the sculpture of this time. As previously, here also mainly female depictions were associated with the offspring, but one can also find male spirit-deities in this group, though in slightly smaller numbers. The supernatural character of the figures is indisputable, they are imaginary beings – first without the use of a chisel created in the human mind, illustrated in cultural narratives, then – successively, thanks to the talent and effort of Mathura craftsmen, visualised in red sandstone. Each character presented in this chapter is commonly referred to with specific name. These names are used in various studies, and for the sake of order and clarity, I will stick to them (i.e., Ekanamsha, Hariti, Matrika, Naigamesha, Shashthi, Skanda. My main goal is to trace how a given character was visualised, what nature legends attributed to it, and most of all, what it could do to people, what kind of interaction was possible between humans and the supernatural beings, or in what spheres of life they could become useful. Thus, how was its function expressed in the visual sphere (referring to strong symbols).

Chapter 3 is therefore a key part of the work, based on a group of selected sculptures from various collections. They represent the most popular or the best known and most numerous figures in the visual culture of the time and region, relevant to the topic in question. They were mainly related to motherhood and played a key role in treatments focused on the protection of offspring, not only during the so-called the Kushan era. I will present their profiles in alphabetical order. It is worth mentioning at the outset that there were many more characters associated with requests for offspring than this group.