Visualising the Rāmayāṇa: Power, Redemption and Emotion in Early Narrative Sculptures (c. Fifth to Sixth Centuries CE)

Abstract

This article seeks to explore the images based on the Rāmayāna tradition within archaeological, cultural and literary contexts in late fifth and early sixth century ce. It uncovers elements of politico-religious agency, art and historical knowledge. Narrative panels, spatially located largely in central and north India, narrativise the episodes set in the forest represented in the Aranya and Kiskindhākānda. Evolution of narrative complexities through placement, composition and representational devices in terracotta and stone relief sculptures at sites such as Nachna Kuthara and Deogarh is traced. Rāma’s idealised character, expressed through renunciation, benevolence, ameliorative power, authority and dharma, emerges within the physical and emotional landscape of Rāmayāna imagery. Ideal and deviant behaviour is represented through narratives based on Ahalya, Anusuyā, Śūrpanakhā, Vālin and such characters. The construction of the ‘other’ in form of monkeys and demons, vānaras and rāksasas, in the visual discourse, and the fascination with devotion, romance and heroism that is projected through these is seen as a thread that runs through the Rāmayāna narratives.