Explore the early development of Indian art, from the artefacts of the Indus Valley to the Hindu and Buddhist sculpture of north India and Gandhara.
This powerful head of Shiva, with ascetic’s locks and the third eye of yogic insight, may have belonged to a full-length image or else to a mukhalinga, the primordial phallic form of Shiva in which the face of the god projects from its side.
Harle, J. C., and Andrew Topsfield, Indian Art in the Ashmolean Museum (Oxford: Ashmolean Museum, 1987), no. 24 on p. 19, pp. xiii & 12, pl. 4 (colour) & p. 19
Harle, J. C., Gupta Sculpture: Indian sculpture of the Fourth to the Sixth Centuries A.D. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1974), 44-50
Philadelphia: Philadelphia Museum of Art, 29 March-7 June 1981, Manifestations of Shiva, Kramrisch, Stella (Philadelphia: Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1981), 15
Kramrisch, St., ‘Notes: 'Madhupāna' Scenes from Mathurā, etc.’, Journal of the Indian Society of Oriental Art, 6/June-December, (1938), pp. 200-202, pl. 44
Woodward, John, Treasures in Oxford (London: The British Council, 1951), 76, pl.76, fig.9
Saraswati, S. K., ‘Chapter XIX: Architecture’, R. C. Majumdar, A. D. Pusalkar, and A. K. Majumdar, eds, with a foreword by K. M. Munshi, The History and Culture of Indian People, iii: The Classical Age, 6 vols, The History and Culture of Indian People (Bombay: Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, 1954), iii, 524, fig. 38
Harle, J. C., ‘The Head of Siva from Mathura in the Ashmolean Museum: Is the Moustache Recut?’, Asian Review, 2/April, (1965), 38
Kreisel, Gerd, Die Śiva-Bildwerke der Mathurā-Kunst: Ein Beitrag zur frühhinduistischen Ikonographie, Monographien zur indischen Archäologie, Kunst und Philologie, 5 (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag Wiesbaden, 1986), no. 90a-c on pp. 226-227, pp. 97, 107, 119, & 139, pls 90a-c
Piper, David, and Christopher White, Treasures of the Ashmolean Museum: An Illustrated Souvenir of the Collections, revised edn (Oxford: Ashmolean Museum, 1995), no. 37 on p. 41, illus. p. 41 fig. 37
Oxford: Ashmolean Museum, 24 May 2006-23 December 2008, Treasures: Antiquities, Eastern Art, Coins, and Casts: Exhibition Guide, Rune Frederiksen, ed. (Oxford: Ashmolean Museum, 2006), no. 173 on p. 62, illus. p. 62
Branfoot, Crispin, ‘Pilgrimage in South Asia: Crossing Boundaries of Space and Faith’, Ruth Barnes and Crispin Branfoot, eds, Pilgrimage: The Sacred Journey (Oxford: Ashmolean Museum, 2006), p. 46, illus. p. 47 fig. 38
Oxford: Ashmolean Museum, 2006, Pilgrimage: The Sacred Journey, Ruth Barnes and Crispin Branfoot, eds. (Oxford: Ashmolean Museum, 2006), pp. 46 & 47, illus. p. 47 fig. 38
Ahuja, Naman, ‘Early Indian Art at the Ashmolean Museum - Catalogue in progress’, 2016, no. 113
Objects are sometimes moved to a different location. Our object location data is usually updated on a monthly basis. Contact the Jameel Study Centre if you are planning to visit the museum to see a particular object on display, or would like to arrange an appointment to see an object in our reserve collections.
Objects may have since been removed or replaced from a gallery. Click into an individual object record to confirm whether or not an object is currently on display. Our object location data is usually updated on a monthly basis, so contact the Jameel Study Centre if you are planning to visit the museum to see a particular Eastern Art object.
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