An Ancient Hindu SculptureSource: Bulletin of the Pennsylvania Museum, Vol. 5, No. 20 (Oct., 1907), p. 68Published by: Philadelphia Museum of ArtStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3793452 .

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BULLETIN OF THE PENNSYLVANIA MUSEUM

AN ANCIENT HINDU SCULPTURE On the east side of the South Vestibule near the entrance to the Museum

is exhibited a remarkable Hindu sculpture, which was found at low water mark imbedded in the mud on Saugor, an island of Bengal in the delta of

the Ganges, at the mouth of the Hugli, about fifty miles south of

-.s~,.< ~ Calcutta, in the year 1833, by Mr. .-jSSSfi&A-- ^P. G. Sinclair, a pilot in the East

-: /* - "^ 5y^A'India Company's service, and pur- . * n 1 ,,s,^t,S ~chased from him by its late owner,

Mr. John W. Rulon, who at that time was residing in Calcutta. It

:i i is carved from a solid block of ' > J^

'iP®^~ i~ :marble, five feet, eleven inches in Thi x Go ; yheight and thirty-one inches in

fee breadth at the base. The face of Ths s -cul ure, o,southe slab bears in high relief a figure

....e originl o e tof Surya, the sun god, identical t :h4e lar gest with Savitri, Ravi and Aditya,

guardian of the southwest, in the .'.''¢*s'. 4 4, Hindu pantheon. At Baroda, in

Gujarat, where a temple is dedi- cated to him, he is known as Surya Narayana. He is represented in

·r 'the sculpture as standing in his

seven coursers of the sun, and holding in each hand a gracefully

i · i... sculptured lotus. At his feet, and seated upon an elephant's head, is a figure of Aruna, the legless charioteer of the sun, holding in one hand the heaven-spun reins, and in the other a whip. On each side of Surya are two attendants, the nearest being female figures carrying chowries or fly brushes,

ANTIQUE MARBLE SCULPTURE the other two, of larger size, being The God Surya and Attendants male figures, representing the

From Saugor Island, India priest and soldier castes; at their feet are two smaller figures of archers with bows. In the background and surrounding Surya are richly carved figures, in sitting postures, playing musi- cal instruments.

This sculpture, once white, but now stained ebony black, is supposed to have originally occupied the Temple of the Sun on Saugor Island, in one of the largest cities in India, which, as related by Sir William Jones, was entirely (lestroyed by an inundation of the sea many centuries ago.

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