Shiva and Parvati

Kausambi, 5th century AD
Indian Museum, Calcutta

Kausambi is located in Northern India (Uttar Pradesh), near the confluence of the Ganges and Yamuna rivers, just upriver (west) from Varanasi. Although Kausambi is a Buddhist site, this relief depicts Shiva and Parvati (yes, he is glad to see her). Shiva carries a water-pot, which is found in some other (early) images of the god, but he also raises his right hand at shoulder level in abhaya mudra, usually a Buddhist gesture. Both figures wear distinctive headdress.

Parvati's right hand is raised in the gesture of carrying something, but the hand is empty. Her left hand grasps a trident - appropriately, since this is Shiva's emblem - with a short, curved handle. This unusual relief may illustrate a Buddhist influence on its iconography (Shiva's mudra), or may even (speculatively) represent these Hindu deities as co-opted into a Buddhist context, keeping in mind that the relief we see is only a partial fragment. The writing on its base might shed further light on this.