Chapter 2 - Characteristics features of Orissan Temples

hoods and its female counter part is nāgini. The nāga figures of the Mukteśvara and the Śiśireśvara compounds are represented as human figures with canopies of snake hoods and holding foliated vases in their hands. The nāga figures appear as dvārapāḷas flanking the doorway of the Śiśireśvara temple. These nāgas are standing figures, each with a canopy of snake hoods over the head and holding a foliated vase. Afer the Śiśireśvara temple, the nāgas do not appear in purely human form. In the later temples, they are found entwined with the pillars. Such nāga pillars appear for the first time in the twin temples of Gandharāḍi and the Varāhī temple at Caurāśī. These massive pillars, entwined with the nāgas and nāginis flank the doorway and the windows of the mukhaśāḷā. Here the nāgas and the naginis are represented combining both their human and reptile forms. The upper portion is in human form with a canopy of hoods over the head and the lower portion is the form of reptile. They are twisted round the pillars in such a way that both the faces with hoods and the tails remain on the fornt side. Such pillars are also found in the entrance to the Panca-Päṇḍava temple at Ganeśvarpur and the Rājarāṇī temple at Bhubaneswar. Apart from the above pillars, nāga pilasters are noticed in the recesses formed by the pagas on the vimāna of the Varāhī temple at Cauräsi and the Tirtheśvara, the Gauri temple at Bhubaneswar and on both vimāna and mukhaśāḷā of the Muktesvara temple at Bhubaneswar. These nāga pilasters also appear in the outer walls of the bhogamandapa of the Jagannātha temple at Puri. At the base of these pilasters two small lions are carved crouching on two elephants. The objects in the hands of the nāgas vary from temple to temple. A difference is also noticed in the manner how they are shown on the pillars. At Gandharāḍi and Caurāśi, nāgas are shown ascending the pillars with their tails at the bottom, whereas in the some of the temples they are shown descending the pillars with their tails at the top. The treatment of nāgas in the nāga pilasters of the mukhaśāḷā of the Kosaleśvara temple at Baidyanatha is different from the others. Here the nagas are purely in reptile form. Mythological Stories: The tendency for story telling is a feature of the art of the early as well as later Orissan temples. The theme always remained the Hindu mythology. In the Parasurameśvara temple the story of Śiva curbing the pride of Rāvaṇa has been depicted in a panel on the front rāhā of the vimāna. The same panel has been 70