Encapsulating Dance in Sculpture: The Story of “Arjuna and the Hunter” as Represented in the Hoysaḷa Temples

Abstract

This article assesses the topic of theatrical performances and sculpture in medieval India through an analysis of the relationship between narrative sculptures, literary works of poetry (kāvya), and theatrical performances, as these are described in the manuals on dance/theatre (nāṭya), such as the Nāṭyaśāstra of Bharata, with the commentary Abhinavabhāratī by Abhinavagupta, Saṅgītaratnākara, and Nṛttaratnāvalī. The sculptures included in this study are found in four temples built by the Hoysaḷa dynasty in the 12th and 13th centuries and represent the story of “Arjuna and the Hunter (kirāta)”, told in the Mahābhārata and in later literary works that were well-known in the courts of South India, including the Hoysaḷa court. After providing a detailed description of the sculptures based on the śilpa and nāṭya śāstras (treatises on sculpture and theatre), the study suggests that the sculptors carving these images adopted the technical language of nāṭya according to its theatrical usage (viniyoga), as an instrument to convey specific meanings and to express the emotions (bhāvas and rasas) evoked in the story, in both dancing and non-dancing figures.

Keywords:

• Dance sculptures
• Hoysaḷa
• Indian dance
• Kirātārjunīyam
• Nāṭyaśāstra
• Pampabhārata

Acknowledgements

I would like to acknowledge the late M. S. Nagaraja Rao, who supervised my field work in India for five years and wrote a renowned monograph on the visual representations of the story of ‘Arjuna and the Hunter’ in the art of Karnataka. I am grateful to Jonathan Ebel, Adam Newman, and all the faculty and staff at the Department of Religion, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Thanks to Katherine Kasdorf, for sharing her beautiful pictures with me, and to Elisa Ganser, Elena Mucciarelli, Isabella Nardi, and Rajeshwari Pandharipande for their invaluable feedback and suggestions on earlier drafts of this paper. I am especially grateful to Vanamala Viswanatha for her beautiful and poignant translation of Pampa’s description of the apsaras’dance. Finally, I wish to thank two anonymous reviewers for their careful reading and insightful comments. M. A. Lakshmithathachar, my teacher, recently passed away. This essay is dedicated to his memory.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. For reference to recent literature on dance sculptures, see Tosato 2017 ‘The Voice of the Sculptures: How the “Language of Dance” Can Be Used to Interpret Temple Sculptures. An Example from the Hoysaḷeśvara Temple at Haḷebīd’, in Theatrical and Ritual Boundaries in South Asia, ed. by Elisa Ganser and Eva Debicka-Borek, (Cracow Indological Studies, vol. 19, n. 2, 2017), pp: 79-109 (79-82).

2. They are: Nandagopal, C. 1990. Dance and Music in Temple Architecture (Delhi: Agam Kala Prakashan, 1990); H. Govindarajan, 1983. ‘Classical Dance of Karnataka as Represented in Art Forms’ (unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Mysore, 1983); S. Nadig, Dance as Depicted in Hoysala Sculptures (Mysore: Associated Printers and Publishers, 1990); S. Ramaswami, ‘Dance Sculpture as a Visual Motif of the Sacred and the Secular: A Comparative Study of the Belūr Cennakeśava and the Haḷebīd Hoysaḷeśvara Temples’ (unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Hong Kong, 2000).

3. Tosato ‘Voice of Sculptures’.

4. A karaṇa is defined in NS 4.30b as: ‘a combined movement of the upper and lower limbs’ (hastapādasamāyogaḥ), where the words hasta and pada must be intended as upalakṣaṇa (synecdoche) for ‘upper limbs’ and ‘lower limbs’ respectively. See Nāṭyaśāstra of Bharatamuni with the Commentary Abhinavabhāratī by Abhinavaguptācārya, ed. by M. Ramakrishna Kavi, 2^nd rev. edn (Vadodara: Gaekward Oriental Series, 2001), II, pag. 90. For a detailed discussion on the karaṇas of dance, see Tosato ‘Voice of Sculptures’, pp. 85-89. Unless specified otherwise, all translations from Sanskrit are my own.

5. I will discuss this hand posture in detail below.

6. Indira Viswanathan Peterson, Design and Rhetoric in a Sanskrit Court Epic-The Kirātārjunīya of Bhāravi (New York: SUNY Press, 2003).

7. The fact that sculptors had access to theatrical performances can be inferred by several elements. See below, notes 29, 30, and 33 of the present text.

8. See The Mahābhārata, trans. and ed. by J. A. B. Van Buitenen (Chicago. University of Chicago Press, 1975), II. 3. 37-42. Unless otherwise specified, all translations from the MBh are by Van Buitenen.

9. MBh 3. 39. 10: ‘Dressed in grass and bark and carrying stick and deerskin, he passed one month eating fruit every fourth night, a second month he ate every eight night, a third month only once a fortnight, subsisting on a dead leaf that had fallen on the ground, When the fourth month came and the moon was full, the strong-armed scion of Pāṇḍu lived on wind alone, with arms raised, without support, balanced on the tips of his toes. And because of his ceaseless bathing the braided hair of the great-spirited hero of boundless might took on the sheen of lightning and lotus’.

10. Pāvako’ṅgāradhūmavān. The Mahābhārata of Krishna Dwaipayana Vyasa, trans. by K. M. Ganguli (Calcutta: Bharata Press, 1884), 3. 40. 48.

11. This passage, found in a number of manuscripts, has not being included in the Critical Edition of the MBh. See Peterson ‘Design and Rhetoric’ 2003, p. 177. The episode is retained in many Kannada renderings of the kirāta story, as discussed below.

12. Śivāparādha, literally: ‘offence towards Śiva’. This term is used śaiva texts to refer to errors or omission in the ritual conduct.

13. See Ganguli’ translation of this passage (Ganguli, ‘Mahābhārata’, p. 89): Soon, however, he regained consciousness, and, rising from his prostrate position, with body covered with blood, became filled with grief. Mentally prostrating himself before the gracious god of gods, and making a clay image of that deity, he worshipped it, with offerings of floral garlands. Beholding, however, the garland that he had offered to the clay image of Bhava, decking the crown of the Kirāta, that best of Pāṇḍu’s sons became filled with joy and regained his ease. Note that Ganguli translates sthaṇḍila as ‘image’.

14. For a list of other literary works having as their subject the story of ‘Arjuna and the Hunter’, see M. S. N. Rao, Kirātārjunīyam in Indian Art (Delhi: Agam Kala Prakashan, 1979), p. 1-15 and Peterson ‘Design and Rhetoric’, pp. 161-162.

15. The first is an inscription dedicated to king Pulakeśin II of the Cālukya dynasty found in the Meguti Jain temple in Aihole (Karnataka), dated 634: here the author (Ravikīrti) mentions Bhāravi together with Kālidāsa as examples of poets who have achieved great fame (See Epigraphia Indica, Vol. 6, N. 1: 1-12). The second is the account for Bhāravi’s life found in the Avantisundarīkathā (7th-8th centuries) of Daṇḍin: himself a poet in the Pallava court of Kancipuram (Tamil Nadu), Daṇḍin indicates that Bhāravi’s work was known and appreciated in the Cālukya, Ganga and Pallava courts (an area that includes modern Karnataka, Andhra and Tamil states). See also Peterson, ‘Design and Rhetoric’, 2003: 23-24 and T. N. Ramachandran, 1950-51. ‘The Kirātārjunīya or ‘Arjuna’s penance’ in Indian Art’. Journal of the Indian Society for Oriental Art XVIII (1950-51), 1-111, pp. 8-12. The Pallava king and poet Mahendravarman I (7th century), also mentions Bhāravi’s Kir in the finale of his acclaimed play Mattavilāsaprahasana, 22. See Mattavilāsaprahasana of Mahendravikramavarman, trans. and ed. by N. P. Unni (Trivandrum: College Book House, 1974), 22.

16. Although introducing one important variation in the epilogue of the fight that I will highlight in the second part of the work.

17. See Sheldon I. Pollock, The Language of the Gods in the World of Men: Sanskrit, Culture, and Power in Premodern India (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006), p. 360.

18. See Pollock ‘Language of the Gods’, pp. 357-379.

19. Vikramārjuna Vijaya, 1. 8. Vikramārjuna Vijaya ed. by Anantarangācār (Bengaluru: Kannaḍa Sāhitya Pariṣattu, 2005).

20. The dancing apsaras motif (in that case two) is also depicted in the Vīrabhadra Temple at Lepākṣī (16^th century), not included in this study.

21. Regarding this, it will be useful to quote the definition of kāvya in Daṇḍin’s work on poetics Kāvyādarśa (7th-8th century): ‘The composition in cantos is a great poem (māhakāvya). Its definition is as follows. Its beginning is a benediction, a salutation, or an indication of the plot. It is based on a traditional narrative, or on a true event from some other source. It deals with the fruits from the four aims of life. Its hero is skilful and noble. Adorned with descriptions of cities, oceans, mountains, seasons, the rising of the sun and moon, playing in pleasure-parks and in water, drinking-parties and the delights of love-making, the separation of lovers, weddings, the birth of a son, councils of war, spies, military expeditions, battles, and the victory of the hero; not too condensed, pervaded with rasa (aesthetic mood) and bhāva (emotions), with cantos that are not overly diffuse, in meters that are pleasing to hear, with proper junctures (sandhi), and ending with different meters.’ Quoted in Peterson ‘Design and Rhetoric’, pp. 8-9.

22. The title Kirātārjunīya is explained by Mallinātha in his commentary on Kir 1. 46 as: kirātārjunāv adhikṛtya kṛto granthaḥ (‘a work about the Kirāta and Arjuna’), stressing the inclusion and the importance of both characters starting from the title itself. Quoted in Peterson ‘Design and Rhetoric’, p. 40.

23. Yat tv atiśayārthayuktaṃ vākyaṃ śilpaṃ ca karmarūpaṃ vā. Abhinavagupta explains: ‘It exceeds. Hence it is extraordinary’ (atiśeta ity atiśayaḥ, Abh ad NS 6.75, page 324. Translation by Daniele Cuneo, ‘Emotions without Desire: An Interpretive Appraisal of Abhinavagupta’s Rasa Theory. Annotated Translation of the First, Sixth and Seventh Chapters of Abhinavagupta’s Abhinavabhāratī’ (unpublished doctoral thesis, ‘Sapienza’ University of Rome, 2008-2009), p. 390. On the definition of adbhuta rasa, see NS 6.75-76: ‘Now the adbhuta [rasa] has wonder (vismaya) as its stable state (sthayibhāva). It is caused by determinants (vibhāva) such as: the sight of heavenly beings, fulfilment of desires and wishes, going to gardens, temples, assembly halls, [seeing] aerial carts, illusions, magic tricks, etc.’ (athādbhuto nāma vismayasthāyibhāvātmakaḥ sa ca divyajanadarśanepsitamanorathāvāptyupavana devakulādigamanasabhāvimānamāyendrajālasambhāvanādibhir vibhāvair utpadyate). Similar words are used in Daśarūpaka (Dhanamjaya, Daśarūpaka with the commentary Avaloka by Dhanika and the sub-commmentary Laghuṭīkā by Bhaṭṭanṛsiṃha. T. Venkatacharya (Madras: Adyar Library and Research Centre, 1969), 4. 79, where the determinants for adbhuta are described as ati-loka, ‘supernatural [objects, events, etc.]’.

24. Kir 10. 10-14. Unless otherwise specified all translations from Kir are from Arjuna and the Hunter (Kirātārjunīya) of Bhāravi, ed. by Indira Viswanathan Peterson, Murty Classical Library of India (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2016).

25. Kir 10. 17.

26. Kir 10. 40.

27. See Rao ‘Kirātārjunīyam’.

28. On the relationship between women and landscape in Bhāravi’s poem, see Peterson ‘Design and Rhetoric’, pp. 89-115.

29. Temple buildings included specific spaces for performances (rangamaṇḍapa) sometimes featuring benches for the audience. Literary descriptions of such performances, held for example during festivals, are available in texts such as Kuṭṭanīmatam, an 8^th century verse novel that describes the acting of the play Ratnāvalī by a group of women in a śaiva temple. Also, an inscription located on a pillar on the North side of the East porch of the Virūpākṣa temple at Paṭṭaḍakal (8^th century) mentions a person named Acalan who is “proficient in the art of dance as expounded by Bharata” (bharata nuta vachana rachanā virachita nāṭyasevya). Acalan is mentioned in another inscription in the same porch where his mastery of the art of Bharata is praised. See: M. A. Annigeri, Guide to the Pattadakal Temples (Dharwar: Kannada Research Institute, 1961), pp. 50-51.

30. The practice of dedicating girls to the temple where they were performing dance and other ritual activities is well attested in the epigraphical sources of the Hoysaḷa period. For some examples, see Tosato ‘Voice of Sculptures’, p.83, footnote 11. The inscription in Guṇḍuḷepet taluk (Epigraphia Carnatica, henceforth: EC, 4. 34, dated 1372) is particularly noteworthy as it records the financial engagement of an artisans’guild (vīra-pañcāhaḷa) to contribute permanently to the support of a dancing girl (devara-pātra-bhogakke), named Ketavve. recently dedicated to the god Rāmanātha of Vijayapura. See Epigraphia Carnatica, IV. Inscriptions in the Mysore District, ed. by Rice, B. L. (Bangalore: Mysore Government Press: 1898).

31. Artisans’ guilds are called with various names: kottaḷi, gaṇa, vīra-pañcāḷa. The most prominent guild during the Hoysaḷa reign appears from the inscriptions to be the Sarasvatī-gaṇa who includes amongst its members many artists who migrated South from the Cāḷukya kingdom. On this topic see Kelleson Collyer, The Hoysala Artists, their Identities and Styles (Directorate of Archaeology and Museums, Mysore, 1990), pp. 105-112.

32. Possibly from a corruption of the Prakrit word “uvājjhā” (Sanskrit: “upādhyāya”). See Collyer ‘Hoysala Artists’, p. 55.

33. EC 5. 1. 265 (from Channarayapatna Taluk, dated 1206?) mentions an architect “sought after to construct building and upper storeys” who is also described as “versed in all the śāstras (sakaḷa-śāstra-pravīṇaru)”. See Epigraphia Carnatica, V. Inscriptions in the Hassan District, ed. by Rice, B. L. (Mangalore: Basel Mission Press: 1902). EC 7. 169 (from Shikarpur Taluk, dated 1067) calls the engraver of the same inscription: śāstra-karmmi, “the observer of the śāstras”. See Epigraphia Carnatica. Inscriptions in the Shimoga District, ed. by Rice, B. L. (Bangalore: Mysore Government Press: 1902). The existence of artists trained in different branches of the art is attested from before the Hoysaḷa too, see EC 6. 36 (from Mūḍgere Taluk, dated 749) talks about “Viśvakarmācārya, skilled in all arts, including citra “painting/sculpture” (sarva-kalānatarpāti-citra-kalābhijñena viśvarmmācāryyeṇedaṃ)”. See Epigraphia Carnatica, VI. Inscriptions in the Kadur District, ed. by Rice, B. L. (Mysore: Institute of Kannada Studies, University of Mysore: 1977).

34. A stone slab in the ruins of the Rudreśvara temple, Haḷebīd (the Mysore Archeological Department describes the style of the temple as ‘early Hoysaḷa’, see Mysore Archeological Department, University of Mysore. 1934. Annual Report for the Year 1930. Bangalore: Government Press), p. 51, shows Arjuna practicing tapas close a dancer surrounded by musicians. The sculpture has not been included in this study because the postures of Arjuna and the apsaras do not look as if they are related to each other from the point of view of the posture, unlike the other examples analyzed here, and the absence of a programmatic iconographic context does not allow for a proper identification of the dancer as belonging to the story of ‘Arjuna and the Hunter’. The dancing apsaras motif (in that case two) is also depicted in the Vīrabhadra Temple at Lepākṣī (16^th century), not included in this study.

35. In the description of this scene, VAV (VAV 7. 89-91) mentions the names of three apsarases: Urvaśī and Tilottamā are described as dancing, while Menakā is described as singing. Other sculptures represent the scene with more than one apsaras, see for example the panel at the Vīrabhadra Temple at Lepākṣī.

36. Kir 10. 41-43.

37. In the original: nāṭakābhinaya.

38. See VAV. 7. 89-9. Translation by Vanamala Viswanatha (unpublished).

caṃ || magamagisuttum irpa mṛga-nābhiya nīr-daḷivalli kaṃpanā

ḷd’uguḻd’alasu(su x ru)ttum irpa padadoḷ padavaṭṭu podaḷdu tōra ma |

lligeya tuṟuṃbu rāhu tave nuṃgida caṃdranan’oyyanoyyan’aṃ

d’uguḻvavol oppiral baladoḷ urvasi dēsige dēsiyāḍidaḷ ||87||

caṃ || pada koral iṃpan’appukeye koṃku nayaṃ gamakaṃgaḷiṃ poda

r-kodaḷ-eḻid’ikkidaṃte sutiyoḷ samavāgire jāṇanāṃtu me |

cceda teṟadāsevaṭṭalasad’ettidavōl dorevettu dūṟid’ā

ṟida dani muṭṭe mēnake sarasvati bāydered’aṃte pāḍidaḷ ||88||

caṃ || naḍu naḍugalke purvu poḍaralke kuruḷ miḷikalke bāy beḍaṃ

g’iḍideḷasal teraḷtu tuḍukalke taguḷdudu keṃdanīke ka |

nnaḍipaḷo pāḍid’ī nevadin eṃbinegaṃ daniyiṃpu bīṇeyaṃ

miḍidavolāge gānadoḷ’oḍaṃbaḍe mēnake muṃde pāḍidaḷ ||89||

odavida ketta kaṃkaṇada purvina jarvu layakke laka le

kkada gati nāṭakābhinayamāytene gēyadoḷīke sorkan’i |

kkidaḷene kaḷge cakkaṇamenippudu sāgenisalke sālva sa

ggada posa dēsiy’ōḷigaḷan’orvaḷoṟaldu neṟaldu pāḍidaḷ ||90||

āḍada meygaḷilla niḍumeygaḷum āḍiduv’aṃte meṭṭudaḷ

nōḍidar ellaraṃ piḍidu meṭṭidaḷ iṭṭaḷamāytu dēsi ke |

ygūḍidudilla mārgamene vismayamāgire tanna muṃde baṃ

d’āḍidaḷ’ā tiḷōttameyan’oldanumilla narēṃdratāpasaṃ ||91||

39. As it happens in the Hoysaḷa temples, the sculptor carved his name on the sculpture.

40. The name Indra-kīla to indicate the place of Arjuna’s penance is not found in the MBh and it first appears in Bhāravi’s Kir. The name Indrakīla is used also in Pampa’s VAV.

41. The sculptor does not follow the description of Arjuna’s yogic posture found in MBh 3. 39. 23e: ‘he is keeping a raised arm and standing on his toes’ (ūrdhvabāhur nirālambaḥ pādāṅguṣṭhāgraviṣṭhitaḥ).

42. See NS 9. 128: ‘The añjali hand gesture is performed by joining together two hands in patāka. It is used in greeting gods, teachers and friends’ (patākābhyāṃ tu hastābhyāṃ saṃśleṣādañjaliḥ smṛtaḥ | devatānāṃ gurūnāṃ ca mitrāṇāṃ cābhivādane ||). The patāka hand (hasta) is defined in NS 9. 18 as: ‘In patāka hasta the fingers are stretched and straight and the thumb is bent’ (prasāritāḥ samāḥ sarvāḥ yasyāṅgulyo bhavanti hi | kuñcitaś ca tathāṅguṣṭhaḥ sa patāka iti smṛtaḥ ||). See Nāṭyaśāstra of Bharatamuni with the Commentary Abhinavabhāratī by Abhinavaguptācārya, ed. by K. Krishnamoorthy, 4^th rev. edn (Vadodara: Gaekward Oriental Series, 1992), I.

43. Kir 6. 21.

44. See NS 8. 60: ‘In the haughty glance, the eyes are steady and wide open. The eyeballs are motionless and convey prowess. It is used in representing courage’ (saṃsthite tārake yasyāḥ sthitā vikasitā tathā | sattvamudgiratī dṛptā dṛṣṭir utsāhasaṃbhavā ||) and NS 8. 52: ‘The heroic glance is bright, open, deep, serious and with the eyeballs kept straight. It is used in representing vīra rasa’ (dīptā vikasitā kṣubdhā gambhīrā samatārakā | utphullamadhyā dṛṣṭis tu vīrā vīrarasāśrayā ||). On the contrary, the glance (dṛṣṭi) usually recommended to represent a meditative state (śānta) is described according to NS (8. 54) as having ‘the eyes shut and directed towards the tip of the nose with the eyelids slightly squinting’ (nāsāgrasaktānimiṣā tathādhobhāgacāriṇī | ākekarapuṭā caiva). On the śānta rasa portion included in a number of NS manuscripts and on Abhinavagupta’s commentary on it, see Kavi’s preface to the second edition of NS, Vol. 1 (Kavi: 11-12). In general, the determinants (vibhāva) and consequents (anubhāva) for vīra rasa listed in NS 6 are all consistent with the literary and sculptural renderings of the figure of Arjuna. Among the determinants there are: ‘composure, resolution, discipline, strength, courage, power, splendour, dignity, etc.’ (sa cāsaṃmohādhyavasāyanayavinayabalaparākramaśaktipratāpaprabhāvādibhir virbhāvair utpadyate). Among the consequents: ‘perseverance, fortitude, prowess, liberality, clearness of mind, etc.’ (tasya sthairyadhairyaśauryatyāgavaiśāradyādibhir anubhāvair abhinayaḥ prayoktavyaḥ).

45. Pampa calls him ‘narendratāpasan’ (VAV 7. 91).

46. Kir (Kir 6.18) describes the mountain’s peak where Arjuna stops as ‘covered with blossoming creepers’ (puṣpitalatāvitatiḥ).

47. The sculpture is located at an elevation of ca. 170 cm from the ground.

48. See NS 9. 260b: ‘When the lower legs are turned outwards it is known as askṣipta’ (vikṣepāc cāpi jaṅghayāḥ kṣiptam ity abhidhīyate ||). NS 9. 263b mentions the usage of this posture for physical exercises and dance: kṣiptaṃ vyāyāmayogeṣu tāṇḍave ca prayujyate ||.

49. The presence of a stool brings to mind some theatrical traditions, like kūṭiyāṭṭaṃ, where the stool is the only permanent stage prop. The actors/actresses climb on it to articulate the stage space according to the development of the performance, e.g. to indicate flying, ascending to a higher place, or an event taking place mid-air. I thank Heike Oberlin and Elena Mucciarelli for drawing my attention to this detail.

50. The tryaśra (literally: ‘triangle’) foot has the heel touching the middle of the other foot and the toes pointing outwards.

51. The word muṃde, ‘in front’ used by Pampa is given in modern Kannada as arjunana muṃde baṃdu hāḍiḍaḷu, ‘having positioned herself in front of Arjuna, she danced’.

52. See NS 9. 235-6: ‘It is called nata when the waist and one side are slightly bent, with the corresponding shoulder slightly sinking/drooping down. The opposite side of nata is called unnata (raised) because as a result the waist, side and shoulder will be raised’ (kaṭī bhavet tu vyābhugnā pārśvam ābhugnam eva ca | tathaivāpasṛtāṃsaṃ ca kiñcitpārśvaṃ nataṃ smṛtam || natasyaivāparaṃ pārśvaṃ viparītaṃ tu yuktitaḥ | kaṭīpārśvabhujāṃsaiś cābhyunnatair unnataṃ bhavet ||).

53. See NS 9. 148: ‘It is called dola [hasta] when the shoulders are relaxed and both hands in patāka [hasta] are hanging down while performing a karaṇa’ (aṃsau praśithilau muktau patākau tu pralambitau | yadā bhavetāṃ karaṇe sa dola iti saṃjñitaḥ ||)

54. See NS 9. 91: ‘It is [called] alapallava [hasta] when all the fingers are turned round towards the palm of the hand, standing sideways and separated’ (āvartitāḥ karatale yasyāṅgulyo bhavanti hi| pārśvagatavikīrṇāś ca sa bhaved alapallavaḥ ||).

55. See NS 4. 248b-249a: ‘Listen as I speak about the four [types] of recaka [movements]: the first recaka is that of the feet, the second of the waist, the third of the hands and the fourth of the neck. [The word] recaka [means] moving around the limbs or drawing them up or any movement [performed] separately’ (caturo recakāṃś cāpi gadato me nibodhata | pādarecaka ekaḥ syāt dvitīyaḥ kaṭirecakaḥ || kararecakas tṛtīyastu caturthaḥ kaṇṭharecakaḥ | recitākhyaḥ pṛthag bhāve valane cābhidhīyate || udvāhanātpṛthag bhāvāc calanāc cāpi recakaḥ |).

56. See Katia Légeret-Manocchaya, Les 108 Karaṇa: Danse et Théâtre de l’Inde (Paris: Librairie Orientaliste Paul Geuthner, 2017), pp. 74, 133.

57. See VAV 7. 89: naḍu naḍugalke, literally: ‘shaking, trembling waist’.

58. The Mysore school of dance (also known as Mysore bani) developed at the Mysore royal court under the patronage of the Wodeyar family. Amongst its most prestigious exponents are dancers Jetti Tayamma (1857-1947) and her disciple Venkatalakshamma (1906-2002).

59. See NS 8. 23a: ‘The head moving slowly in one direction is called dhuta’ (śiraso recanaṃ samyak chanais tad dhutamiṣyate). Moreover NS 8. 24: ‘The dhuta head is used in dissent, aversion, astonishment, confidence, in looking sideways, desolation and denial’ (anīpsite viṣāde ca vismaye pratyaye tathā | pārśvāvalokane śūnye pratiṣedhe dhutaṃ śiraḥ ||).

60. See NS 8. 46: ‘The kāntā glance is performed by contracting the eyebrows and casting sideways looks out of intense love. It has its origin in joy and graciousness and it is used in expressing love’ (harṣaprasādajanitā kāntātyarthaṃ samanmathā | sabhrūkṣepakaṭākṣā ca śṛṅgāre dṛṣtir iṣyate ||).

61. See VAV 7. 90: purvina jarvu layakke, lit: ‘the eyebrows are moving about to the tempo’, glossed as: ‘hubbina alugāṭāvū tāḷada’. Also, in VAV 7. 89, the eyebrows (purvu) of the dancer are poḍaralke, ‘trembling’. The quick up and down movement of the eyebrows is use notably in theatre to express śṛṅgāra.

62. See NS 8. 24 (note 59 above).

63. See the definition of karaṇa, above, note 4.

64. See NS 8. 26a: ‘When the head moves alternately to both sides it is called parivāhita’ (paryāyaśaḥ pārśvagataṃ śiraḥ syātparivāhitam |).

65. See NS 8. 27: ‘The parivāhita head [is used in expressing] accomplishment, wonder, joy, remembering, intolerance, agitation, reluctance, loveliness’ (sādhane vismaye harṣe smṛte cāmārṣite tathā | vicāre vihṛte caiva līlāyāṃ parivāhitam ||).

66. See above, note 57.

67. See NS 10. 45; SR 7.958-9; NR 4. 56.

68. See NS 9. 277b-279a: ‘It is known as kuñcita when the heel is thrown upwards, the toes are bent and so is the middle of the foot. It is used in the aristocratic gait, in turning around and in the performing of the atikrāntā cārī’ (utkṣiptā yasya pārṣṇiḥ syād aṅgulyaḥ kuñcitās tathā || thathākuñcitamadhyaś ca sa pādaḥ kuñcitaḥ smṛtaḥ | udāttagamane caiva vartitodvartite tathā || atikrāntakrame caiva pādam etaṃ prayojayet |).

69. See Abh ad NS 4. 72, p. 102: ‘The pallava [nṛtta hasta?] should be performed with one hand in patāka and the other in alapallava alternately brought to the [level of the] shoulders’ (bāhuśirasi ca pallavaṃ patākālapallavacchāyādvitīyaṃ paryāyeṇa bibhrad vidheyaḥ). The NS (NS 9. 196a) mentions a nṛtta hasta named pallava: ‘It is called pallava [nṛtta hasta] when two patāka hands are loose at the wrists’ (maṇibandhanamuktau tu patākau pallavau smṛtau |).

70. The karaṇa kaṭicchinna, which includes the pallava nṛtta hasta (see note 69 above), is ‘to be used in representing the meaning of a sentence where the [emotion of] wonder is prevalent’ (vismayaprādhanavākyārthābhinaye cāsya prayogaḥ). This indication validates the correspondence in the theatrical usage of the hand gestures respectively known in dance as alapallava hasta and in iconography as vismaya mudrā. On the alapallava hasta and its viniyoga, see below (note 81).

71. These are movements of the fingers classified as hasta karaṇas. In the āveṣṭita/udveṣṭita movements, the fingers open up and close down starting with the forefinger. See NS 9. 215-6: ‘It is called āveṣṭita [hasta karaṇa], [the movement in which] the fingers starting with the forefinger move inward in succession’ (āveṣtyante yadāṅgulyas tarjanyādyā yathākramam | abhyantareṇa karaṇaṃ tadāveṣṭitam ucyate ||). And ‘it is called udveṣṭita [hasta karaṇa], [the movement in which] the fingers starting with the forefinger move outwards in succession’ (udveṣṭyante yadāṅgulyas tarjanyādyā bahir mukham | kramaśaḥ karaṇam viprās tad udveṣṭitam ucyate ||).

72. In the vyāvartita/parivartita movements the fingers spread out and close back starting with the little finger. See NS 9. 217-8: ‘It is called vyāvartita [hasta karaṇa], [the movement in which] the fingers starting from the little one turn inwards in succession’ (āvartyante kaniṣṭhādyā aṅgulyo’bhyantareṇa tu | yathā krameṇa karaṇaṃ tad vyāvartitam ucyate ||). And ‘It is called parivartita [hasta karaṇa], [the movement in which] the fingers starting from the little one stretch outwards in succession’ (udvartyante kaniṣṭhādyā bāhyataḥ kramaśo yadā | aṅgulyaḥ karaṇaṃ viprās tad uktaṃ parivartitam ||).

73. Kaṭīmadhyasya valana (NS 9.24), from which the name kaṭicchinna (‘splitted waist’) most likely derives. In the kaṭibhrānta (‘whirling waist’) karaṇa (NS 4. 103b-104a; SR, 7. 649-652; NR 4. 120-2), the movements of the fingers end with both hands in caturaśra nṛtta hasta (See NS 9. 184: ‘it is known as caturaśra, when two khaṭakāmukha hands are kept in front of the chest at [the distance of] eight aṅgulas, with the elbows and the shoulders kept at the same level’, vakṣaso’ṣṭāṅgulasthau tu prāṅmukhau khaṭakāmukhau samānakūrparāṃsau tu caturaśrau prakīrtitau ||). According to Abh ad NS (Abh ad NS 4. 103b-104a, page 116), the kaṭibhrānta karaṇa is used on stage to represent ‘moving about’ and ‘filling a pause in music’? (gatiparikrame’sya tālākārādi/lāntarālādi yatiparipūrṇaviṣaye prayogaḥ).

74. NS 4. 91b-92a.

75. ‘[It is used in representing something] graceful (lalite)’. Saṅgītaratnākara of Śārṅgadeva with Two Commentaries: Kalānidhi of Kallinātha and Sudhākara of Siṃhabhūpāla, ed. by S. Subhramanya Sastri (Madras: The Adyar Library, 1953), chapter 7. Vol. IV, and Nṛttaratnāvalī of Jāya Senāpati, ed. by V. Raghavan (Madras: Government Oriental Manuscripts Library, 1965).

76. On the possible reasons why Pampa has opted for this version of the fight’s end, especially with reference to his own Jaina faith, see Venkatesa K. Acharya, Mahabharata and Its Variations: Perundevanar and Pampa. A Comparative Study (Kurnool: Vyasaraja Publications, 1981), p. 304, V. Sitaramiah, Mahakavi Pampa (Mumbai: Popular Prakashan, 1967), p. 104 and Rao ‘Kirātārjunīyam’, pp. 84-91. As seen above, the MBh version of the fight’s epilogue has Arjuna reduced to “a ball of flesh”, after which he regains consciousness and recognizes the true nature of the Kirāta (whether by offering flowers to an altar or by just looking at him in his divine form, according to the different versions). Bhāravi offers yet another finale to the fight between Arjuna and the Kirāta. Here, in the last moments of the fight, the Kirāta takes a leap in the air. Arjuna in turns jumps and seizes his feet. Having grabbed his feet, Arjuna plans to flip the Kirāta onto the ground. Śiva is astonished (vismitaḥ, Kir 18. 13) by this act of bravery and presses Arjuna ‘to his chest in a tight embrace’ (parirabhya vakṣasā, Kir 18. 13). At this point Śiva shows Arjuna his true form and restores him to his original hero appearance giving him back his weapons as well: it is now Arjuna’s turn to be ‘astonished’ (upāyayau vismayam, Kir. 18.16). For a discussion on how in the Kir, the theophany is anticipated and followed by the elements of vismaya and adbhuta, see Peterson ‘Design and Rhetoric’, p. 175.

77. Notwithstanding all possible sectarian prejudices, Pampa, who writes his VAV two centuries later, could have just reported an oral version of the kirāta story that was widespread in his time and region. This thesis was first advanced by Rao (Rao ‘Kirātārjunīyam’). As it will be shown later, in all the examples considered in this study the fight ends with Arjuna crushing the Kirāta to the ground.

78. Different versions describe this mark as a fish-shaped mark or a mole. The story has also been recorded from a temple priest in Lepākṣī (and dismissed ‘in the absence of textual authority’) by Ramachandran ‘Arjuna’s penance’, p. 49.

79. This oral version of the story explains the defeat of the supreme God Śiva by the hand of a mortal as the līlā of the God, who is acting to please his wife (note that Pārvatī is absent in the Kir version of the story, see Peterson ‘Design and Rhetoric’, pp. 182-3). On another perspective, according to the bhakti theology, God’s love for his devotee is such that God does not mind letting his devotee win. See Rao ‘Kirātārjunīyam’, p. 90. On the interplay of bhakti and rasa in the Kir, see Indira Viswanathan Peterson, ‘Arjuna’s Combat with the Kirāta: Rasa and Bhakti in Bhāravi’s Kirātārjunīya’, in Essays on the Mahābhārata, ed. By Arvind Sharma (Leiden: Brill, 1991), pp. 212-250 and ‘Design and Rhetoric’, pp. 181-2.

80. Differently, in the Paṭṭadakal relief, Pārvatī is holding Śiva’s head in her lap, while her left hand is raised in alapallava hasta/vismaya mudrā.

81. See NS 9. 91-2: ‘It is [called] alapallava [hasta] when all the fingers are turned towards the palm of the hand, standing sideways and separated. It is used in denial, in saying: “of whom are you?” and “It is not!”, in words devoid of sense and in women’s repeated references to themselves’ (āvartitāḥ karatale yasyāṅgulyo bhavanti hi | pārśvāgatavikīrṇāś ca sa bhaved alapallavaḥ || pratiṣedhakṛte yojyaḥ kasyatvaṃnāstiśūnyavacaneṣu | punarātmopanyāsaḥ strīṇām etena kartavyaḥ ||). SR 7. 144-6 adds that the alapallava hasta (or alapadma hasta, since the text defines the two names as synonyms) can be also used by women to express words that are insignificant, inappropriate and false (tucchāyuktānṛtatvoktiṣveva strībhiḥ prayujyate).

82. śūnyavacanāni ‘tac chāstramasatprayuktam’ ityādīni | punararthe ahamarthe upanyāse ca vismaye abhinayaḥ strīṇām upanyasyate punaḥ punar abhinīyate vismayāpādakatvād ity upanyāsaḥ (bold is mine).

83. Légeret, personal communication. On this see also Légeret ‘Les 108 Karaṇa’, p. 87.

84. SR 7. 698-9.

85. NR 4. 61.

86. Rao ‘Kirātārjunīyam’, p. 33 does not mention the dancer and musicians in his description of the panel, while Kirsti Evans, Epic Narratives in the Hoysala Temples. The Rāmāyaṇa, Mahābhārata & Bhāgavata Purāṇa in Haḷebid, Belūr & Amṛtapura (Leiden: Brill, 1997) seems to consider the dancer and the orchestra part of the Arjuna narrative when she writes: ‘musicians witness the [hunting] scene to the left’, see Evans ‘Epic Narratives’, p. 201.

87. A possible reason to explain the choice of this posture for the dancers represented in the Hoysaḷeśvara temple at Haḷebidu could be that the alapallava/vismaya gesture conveyed a meaning (the experience of wonder) deemed appropriate to the temple setting. See Tosato ‘Voice of Sculptures’.

88. See NS 10.33: ‘It is known as ūrdhvajānu [cārī] when one kuñcita foot is thrown upwards with its knee at the level of the breast, while the other is kept firm’ (kuñcitaṃ pādaṃ utkṣipya jānustanasamaṃ nyaset | dvitīyaṃ ca kramastabdhaṃ ūrdhvajānuḥ prakīrtitā ||).

89. The leap of the hero’s leg is very different from the movement seen in Figure 3, where, by carving a heavy, almost lifeless limb, the sculptor effectively succeeds in conveying the extreme physical exertion of the yogic posture. In that case too, the dancer’s posture, with both feet touching the ground, and Arjuna’s posture match. On the other side, Arjuna’s upper body presents no variations in the five panels, where, in all cases, the hands are held in añjali hasta in front of the chest.

90. See NS 4. 85b-86a: ‘It is known as ūrdhvajānu [karaṇa] when one foot in kuñcita is raised so that the knee is placed at the level of the breast, while the hands move accordingly’ (kuñcitaṃ pādam utkṣipya jānustanasamaṃ nyaset | prayogavaśagau hastāv ūrdhvajānu prakīrtitam ||).

91. See Abh ad NS 4. 85b-86, p. 109: ‘In ūrdhvajānu, the hand on the side of the knee raised at the level of the breast with the foot in kuñcita is to be whether alapallava [hasta] pointing upwards or arāla [hasta], while the other hand is in khaṭakāmukha [hasta] at the chest’ (ūrdhvajānu evaṃ bhaviṣyati kuñcitasamakālaṃ sa eva hasta eva kuñcitastanasamajānūpari vordhvamukho’lapallavo’rālo vā tatrāparastu vakṣaḥsthakhaṭakāmukhaḥ).

92. See NS 9. 46: ‘[In the] arāla [hasta], first the forefinger is bent like a bow, then the thumb is also bent and the rest of the fingers are spread out and facing upwards’ (ādyā dhanur natā kāryā kuñcito’ṅguṣṭhakas tathā | śeṣā bhinnordhvavalitā hy arāle’ ṅgulayaḥ kare ||). See also SR 7. 122-8 and NR 2. 152-3.

93. See NS 9. 60: ‘[In the] khaṭakāmukha [hasta], the ring finger and the little finger of the kapittha hand (the thumb and forefinger of a fist are bent and pressing each other) are raised and bent (akṣiptavakrā tu yadānāmikā sakanīyasī | asyaiva tu kapitthasya tadāsau khaṭakāmukhaḥ||). See also SR 7. 134-137 and NR 2. 113.

94. This is the movement known as nitamba, see NS 9. 196: ‘it is called nitamba [nṛttahasta] the [movement] where the hands move away from the shoulders’ (bāhuśīrṣād viniṣkrāntau nitambav iti kīrtitau). See also: SR 7. 238-9. The nitamba nṛttahasta is represented in the sculptures of the Naṭarāja temple at Chidambaram with two arms stretched down at the sides. For a possible representation of the nitamba nṛttahasta in the Śārangapāṇi temple, see also Kapila Vatsyayan, Dance Sculpture in Sarangapani Temple (Madras: Society for Archaeological, Historical and Epigraphical Research, 1982), p. 34.

95. See NS 4. 78b-79a: ‘It is known as alāta [karaṇa] when, having performed the alāta cārī, the right hand moves away from the shoulder. After this, the ūrdhvajānu cārī shall be performed’ (alātaṃ caraṇaṃ kṛtvā vyaṃsayed dakṣiṇaṃ karam | ūrdhvajānukramaṃ kuryād alātakam iti smṛtam ||). The word ‘vyaṃsayed’ is translated after Abhinavagupta (Abh ad NS 4. 78b-79a, p. 106): ‘[the word] vyaṃsayed [is used in the sense of] moving away from the shoulder’ (aṃsād viniṣkramaṇam vyaṃsayediti). According to SR 7. 615-6 and NR 4. 197-9, the karaṇa ends in the caturaśra nṛttahasta (see NS 9. 184, see note 73), although the sculptures identified with this karaṇa in the Naṭarāja temple at Chidambaram and in the Śārangapāṇi temple in Kumbakonam show the hands in nitamba (see above, note 94).

96. See Abh ad NS 4. 78b-79a, p. 106: prayojaś cāsya lalitanṛttaviṣaye.

97. The feet are also described as painted red with lac as if Urvaśī’s ‘passionate desire for the ascetic had taken material form’. See above: Kir 10. 43.

98. Amongst the vyabhicaribhāvas listed in the NS, moha (‘bewilderment’, NS 7. 52-3) could describe the mental confusion and the shock experienced by the apsaras, while unmāda (‘enhanced intoxication’, NS 7. 84-5) could relate to the mental disturbance that generates the confused gestures (anavasthitaś ceṣṭa, see NS 7. 84) of an intoxicated person, in this case the cause of intoxication being passionate love and the gestures being, of course, those of dance.

99. NS 22. 17 lists ‘confusion’ (vibhrama) in the context of the abhinaya (‘representation’ of four kinds, see NS 6. 23) as one of the alaṃkāras (lit. ‘ornaments’, see definition below) of women: ‘The inversion in the order of different things, such as words, gestures, make up and psychophysical states due to intoxication, passion or joy is known as confusion’ (vividhānām arthānāṃ vāgaṅgāharyasattvayogānām madarāgaharṣajanito vyatyāso vibhramo jñeyaḥ). Alaṃkāras are defined in NS 22. 4: ‘According to the experts in nāṭya, the alaṃkāras of young women are the support of bhāva and rasa. They consist of extreme changes in the face and other limbs of the body’ (alaṃkārās tu nāṭyajñair jñeyā bhāvarasāśrayāḥ | yauvane’bhyadhikāḥ strīṇāṃ vikārā vaktragātrajāḥ ||)

100. In VAV 7. 91, Pampa first uses the verb piḍidu ‘to capture’: ‘she dances capturing all who are watching’ (meṭṭudal nōḍidar ellaraṃ piḍidu). In the next line he describes the dance to be such as ‘to create wonder’ (vismayamāgire).

101. By introducing the impassibility of Arjuna as the last element in the dance description, Pampa succeeds in presenting it as an extraordinary act of tapas that in turns it becomes a determinant for vismaya in the readers of VAV.

102. See VAV 7. 89-90: ‘vibrating waist’ (naḍu naḍugalke), ‘quivering eyebrows’ (purvu poḍaralke), ‘fluttering curls’ (kuruḷ miḷikalke), ‘chiming bangles’ (odavida ketta kaṃkaṇada), ‘quivering eyebrows’ (purvina jarvu).

103. Dhātupāṭha 32.12. For an introduction on theatre as vibration and on the link with the dance of Śiva, see Elisa Ganser, ‘Theatrical and Ritual Boundaries in South Asia: An Introductory Essay’, in Theatrical and Ritual Boundaries in South Asia, ed. by Elisa Ganser and Eva Debicka-Borek (Cracow Indological Studies, vol. 19, n. 1, 2017), pp. vii-xxiv.

104. In Pollock ‘Language of Gods’.

105. ‘[her] deśī [dance] not mixed with mārga became beautiful’ (iṭṭaḷamāytu dēsi ke ygūḍimadilla mārgamene). Mārgamene is glossed as mārga-miśra-illa.

106. This is the sense of the word in Daśarūpaka 1.9, see Pollock ‘Language of Gods’, p. 407, note 62.

107. Bhāratam is another name for VAV.

108. Quoted from VAV 1. 8.

109. See NR 2. 2-5. Quoted from Pollock (Pollock ‘Language of Gods’, p. 407).

110. On the relationship between the cosmopolitan Sanskrit and the vernacular Kannada, see Pollock (Pollock ‘Language of Gods’, pp. 367-368): ‘It is notable that, while the technical vocabulary of the Mārgam for discussion metrics, lexicon, and the rest is almost exclusively Sanskrit, their aesthetics impact is usually described in a vernacular idiom. […] In the passage cited earlier, highly Sanskrit language pertaining to systematic thought is complemented by deśi words for beauty (beḍaṅgu) or force of expression (nuḍivalme). It is as if the localization of the imaginative and the aesthetic, in the face of the globalization of the informational and the conceptual, had become part of the common sense of vernacularity—as if it were possible, at the start of the vernacular epoch, to be local only in feeling the world but not in knowing it.’

111. See Peterson (Peterson ‘Design and Rhetoric’, p. 109).

112. Kir 8. 5-7. Also 6. 26 the trees are described bowing to the penitent Arjuna with their ‘young sprouts as hands cupped in reverence’ (navapallavāñjali).

113. See VAV 7.91 and 92.

114. See ABh ad NŚ 1.44, p. 22: tena śṛṅgārābhivyaktihetau sukumāre caturvidhe ’py abhinaye yojite madhuramantharavalanāvartanābhrūkṣepakaṭākṣādinā vinā śṛṅgārarasāsvādasya nāmāpi na bhavati. Translation: Elisa Ganser, ‘Trajectories of Dance on the Surface of Theatrical Meaning’, in Puṣpikā: Tracing Ancient India Through Texts and Traditions. Contributions to Current Research in Indology, ed. by M. N. Mirnig, P.-D. Szántó and M. Williams, vol. 1 (Oxford: Oxbow Books, 2013), pp. 173–202 (p.188, n. 137).

115. Kir 6. 39-45.

116. Peterson ‘Design and Rhetoric’, p. 123.

117. Peterson ‘Design and Rhetoric’, p. 124.