The volume reviewed here contains 18 peer-reviewed papers presented at the twentieth conference of the European Association for South Asian Archaeology and Art (EASAA) that was held in Vienna in 2010. The papers focus on the art and architecture of South Asia in the historic period, and are organized into six distinct sections arranged by geo-cultural regions.
The first section contains two papers on early north Indian iconography. In “Elephant goads and other marks on female figures in Bhārhut” (pp. 9–22), Chandreyi Basu explores issues of body, gender and sexuality in early Buddhism by looking at facial and body marks depicting the aṅkuśa or elephant goad on the female figures sculpted on the stupa railing at Bhārhut. Marion Franger's paper, “A terracotta relief from Ahicchattrā – sun barque, solar chariot or …?” (pp. 23–8) discusses the iconography of a fifth–sixth century plaque recovered at a temple in Lachmipur, close to the more famous site mentioned in the title, which she interprets as a representation of the moon.
The second section contains four papers on Gandhāran iconography. In “Maitreya and the past Buddhas: interactions between Gandhāra and northern India” (pp. 29–40), Kurt Behrendt argues that the cult of Maitreya originated in the north-west in the Kuṣāṇa period. In fact, early Maitreya iconography follows the Gandhāran typology, and 12 times more images of Maitreya were produced in Gandhāra than in Mathurā at that time. Katya Juhel's paper “On the necessity of contextualisation: a Nagaradevatā and other semi-nude women in Gandhāran representations of the Buddha's life” (pp. 41–51) outlines the development of the iconography of the city goddess within the Buddhist context, and then analyses such images in relation to other female figures appearing in the representations of the life of the Buddha. In “Ongoing studies of Bodhisattva imagery from Greater Gandhāra: turban ornamentation in the form of winged-lion plaques” (pp. 53–70), Carolyn Woodford Schmidt argues that the motif mentioned in the title was popular in the region between the late second and early fourth centuries, and that figures wearing such decorated headgear are representations of Avalokiteśvara. Kirsten Southworth's paper “Skanda in Gandhāra: a Hindu god in a Buddhist environment” (pp. 71–5) claims that early representations of Skanda are in fact images of Sraoša, a Zoroastrian yazata, who shared a number of iconographic features with the Brahmanical deity.
The third section contains three papers and focuses on the Deccan. In “Non-Buddhist narrative scenes at Nagarjunakonda” (pp. 77–89), Monika Zin discusses two stone pillars supposedly representing jātakas, which in fact depict popular secular stories that are, most probably, to be found in textual sources. Pia Brancaccio's paper “Aṣṭamahābhaya Avalokiteśvara in the Western Deccan: Buddhist patronage and trade between the fifth and sixth century CE” (pp. 91–8) claims that the revival of patronage at Buddhist caves in the region is the result of a new involvement of local merchants in Indian Ocean trade. In fact, images of Aṣṭamahābhaya Avalokiteśvara, which were popular in the Ajanta/Aurangabad region in the Gupta and post-Gupta periods, were also common along the Silk Road, where the main supporters of Buddhism were traders. In “Designing a new Hoysaḷa temple in Karnataka” (pp. 99–118), Adam Hardy reports on the first phase of the challenging task as an architect and a scholar of Indian temple architecture.
The fourth section contains five papers on the art and architecture of Bengal. In “A magnificent Gupta terracotta Vāsudeva-Viṣṇu image from the David Nalin Collection” (pp. 119–29), Gouriswar Bhattacharya carries out an iconographic analysis of early representations of the Brahmanical deity and claims that the object in the title could be the earliest Gupta image of the god. Vincent Lefèvre's paper “The Hindu sculpture from Pāhārpur reconsidered” (pp. 131–42) theorizes that the central temple of the Buddhist site was in fact built as a Brahmanical temple in the sixth–seventh century, and then appropriated by the Buddhists at a later time. In “Ten illustrated leaves from a Pañcarakṣā manuscript in a private European collection” (pp. 143–51), Eva Allinger analyses the images accompanying the text of a manuscript that, she argues, was produced during the first half of the thirteenth century within the cultural area of the Senas. Perween Hasan's paper “Architecture as identity: architecture of the Bengal Sultanate” (pp. 153–66) claims that the Turkic rulers adapted local artistic and architectural forms to their ritual needs, creating the peculiar Bengal style. In “Images of Ardhanārīśvara from Bengal and Nepal – a chronological survey” (pp. 167–82), Gerd Mevissen provides a comparative iconographic analysis of this specific image that appeared in Bengal in the second half of the twelfth century during Sena rule.
The fifth and sixth sections contain two papers each and focus, respectively, on Tibet and the Himalayan region, and Central Asia. Helmut Neumann and Heidi Neumann's “Thirteenth and fourteenth century wall paintings in west Tibetan caves: style and iconography” (pp. 183–95), Erika Forte's “On a wall painting from Toplukdong Site No. 1 in Domoko: new evidence of Vaiśravaṇa in Khotan?” (pp. 215–24), and Ciro Lo Muzio's “New evidence on Sogdian painting from Uch Kulakh (Bukhara Oasis–Uzbekistan)” (pp. 225–36) represent significant contributions to the study of mural paintings of the cultural borderlands of South Asia. In “The Magru Mahādeva temple at Chhatri (Distr. Mandi, Himachal Pradesh): architectural and iconographical observations” (pp. 197–214), Anne-Claire Juramie analyses the architectural elements and iconographic programme of the building in the title, and defines its style – made of decorative elements of the classical nāgara style, vernacular architecture, and peculiar iconographies – as a regional development.
The publication of the proceedings of the EASAA conference is a much anticipated event for scholars working on South Asia. Since 1970, when the association was founded, the research presented at the conference has been at the forefront of the scholarly debate on South Asian archaeology and art, and this volume aptly follows the well-established tradition. The second volume of these proceedings was published in 2016.
