Durga with a violin

[Claudine Bautze-Picron]

Dear Dr Lysenko,

This is definitely neither Durga nor Sarasvati, but Siva as he has been represented by Philip Baldaeus in his book published in Dutch in 1672 and translated into English in 1703 (search on http://www.ubka.uni-karlsruhe.de/kvk.html for the exact title).  This illustration appeared there as a wood-engraving and has been reproduced also by Partha Mitter in his "Much Maligned Monster" (Oxford: Clarendon press, 1977, fig. 28 p. 65 & see pp. 57-59 & 64). It is there evident that there is no violin in the hands of the god, but an object which looks like a bottle (which also does not make much sense).  Apparently, the engraving included in the PDF document to which you refer copied the original by Baldaeus (reversing left and right and misunderstanding the god's attributes - but Baldaeus himself did not understand all of them !).

Claudine Bautze-Picron

-----Original Message-----
From: Indology [mailto:INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk] On Behalf Of Viktoria Lyssenko
Sent: Freitag, 7. August 2009 15:39
To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
Subject: Re: Durga with a violin

It is presented byLebedev as Durga. Please, have a look yourself, p.16
http://iling.spb.ru/projects/lebedev/part1.pdf

> If it is a violin, the image must be Saraswati . She use Veena - and
> she is the goddess of knowledge
> mahendra
> On Fri, Aug 7, 2009 at 5:57 AM, Viktoria Lyssenko <vglyssenko at yandex.ru>wrote:
> 
> > Dear All,
> > Could anybody indicate where to find a good resolition gravure of Durga
> > with a violin in one of her hands? There is one in a book of Gerasim
> > Lebedev, Russian musician and traveller of the early 19th century, but it's
> > quality is not well enough.
> > Thank you in advance!
> > Victoria Lysenko
> > Institute of Philosophy,
> > Russian Academy of Sciences
> 
> 
> -- 
> Dr Mahendra Kumar Mishra
> State Tribal Education Coordinator,
> Orissa Primary Education Programme Authority,
> Unit- V Bhubaneswar 751001,India
> 
> Residential Address:
> D-9 Flat Kalpana Area Bhubaneswar 751014,India
> phone 91+674-2310167(r)
> 094376-36436(m)


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