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| Home > Types Of Sculpture > Icons and Imagery > Personification of Icons
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| | Personification of Icons
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In earlier references, it was mentioned about the icons of the individual deities, but has not described what they are. No doubt, they are related with the primitive hallows or some divine power, in that they primarily show a focal point for the sense of the numinous, a dwelling place for the divine. But, treating it as the anthropomorphic icons, it is an individualized & distinct form of divine power.
One very much important thing that makes Western scholars more chaotic to appreciate Indian art is the extraordinarily confusing relationship that exists among the various named deities, and the protean quality of each of them. But this very quality can be said as their most significant feature. Of course, and as a matter of fact still, the divine or the ultimate power is nameless. But for ordinary people to make its acquaintance in direct relation, it needs to give a name and a visible form.
 Generally, in all the different regions and villages of India, the numina may have been resident from many centuries in their stones and trees, without being personified in any special appearance more than a general way. But at some point in history, most of these have acquired a name and even a distinct personality. Since from the second century AD, a process of assimilation has been going on to study this particular icon history. This is the result of the effort of the Brahmin mind. It is said so because they tried in fusing together literary legends, many of them of great antiquity with the personae of the Indian deities. Due to this, at the end the multitude, the originally nameless local numina were collected and synthesized into the form of personalities of a limited number of individual deities. The most popular or special legends, which were recorded in every locality, the life and character of the local divinity, were attributed to a phase in the history of one of the major deities. Therefore, the local legends became long and adventurous.
And as in this way, various anthropomorphic icons came into existence with time, mainly to represent the deities in their various legendary guises. The special stories that were connected with the deities deliberately made to repeat by various means. Therefore, the gesture of a hand, or something held in the hand, some detail of the image would identify the deity and his legend in the mind of beholder. Even, more than two hands were given to Indian images to serve or indicate these many aspects of the deity.
Of course, the stories related with the gods, and collected by the Brahmin community, during the early middle ages in the texts called Puranas, were cut in both ways.  Certainly, somewhere the process called iconotropy must have taken place. Even, many images of the gods would have been created so as to correspond with their characteristics, recounted in some text. But, on the other hand it is said that, many of the stories evolved with time of the gods were invented in order to provide an explanation for traditional features of some icon. But in doing so, maybe the true explanation or real meaning of it had been forgotten, or had been kept secret. Some of the icons are of great antiquity and deep psychological significance, such as the Hermaphrodite images of Shiva, is the kind of image that always has universality and autonomy purely as an image.
Number of stories can be woven around it or inserted afterwards, to provide some sort of narrative setting only for convenience. All sorts of metaphysical, numerological, astrological and alphabetic speculations attach themselves to it. None can claim precedence or superiority of theme over the image itself. So one can easily point out, Indian versions of many of the great autonomous images of humanity that have been assimilated into the narratives of Indian legend. However, as icons they may appear in all the majesty of their original autonomy.
One more special kind of icon, which is very famous and reached in considerable numbers to the West, is a bronze made sculpture. These icons are nothing but the little bronze figures, which served for providing the focus on domestic ceremonies or social gatherings. These figures are found in all sizes, however the small size -they have may be as small as two inches in height, they are capable of embodying the numinous icon with dignity. Their sculptural forms, even though done on a miniature scale, are developed in the same way as the forms of major works in stone are seen.
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