Possibly Sanghol, Punjab
First to second century CE
Sandstone; 58.4 x 11.6 x 11.4 cm
(23 x 4-9/16 x 4-1/2 in.)
Gift of Clara T. Yager and Mary N. Morrow in honor of Gilbert J. Yager and J. Charles Morrow, 2000.12
Provenance: Acquired 19 June 2000 from Doris Wiener Gallery, LLC, New York.

Despite the mottled sandstone associated with sculptures from Mathura, her stylistic characteristics clearly place this yakshi outside that Kushan center. Like sculptures excavated from Sanghol, Punjab, the Ackland’s Rail Post with a Yakshi is carved in comparatively low relief, with a slender body, tubular arms and legs, and jewelry that is raised distinctly from the form.1 Her particular features and ornamentation, including the crescent-moon hairstyle, incised bracelets, grid-patterned belt buckle, girdle, and thick anklets also belong to the Sanghol idiom. In addition, the treatments of the protruding branches and long, slender leaves; the wide nostrils and sharply defined eyebrows; and the small rounded belly and indented navel, are also employed in other such rail-post figures from the site.2

Almost always depicted with diaphanous clothing that reveals her form, the yakshi is beautiful and voluptuous. She playfully pulls the bough of a tree with her right hand above her head. Like most of the female figures found at Sanghol, she stands atop a small creature in what appears to be a rather delicate balancing act. The creature here is ox-like, with a long tail, hoofed feet, and extraordinarily long front legs.3

The yakshi’s verticality, in combination with the three mortices on either side and tenon above, suggests that she was originally located on a railing surrounding a stupa or some structure (Figs. 26, 27, 28). She would have been situated between cross bars decorated with lotuses. The lotus medallions on the reverse of the post would have been seen by worshippers circumambulated the stupa or shrine.4 This rail post is about half the height of those found at major sites but some smaller ones do occur.5 Sanghol had both a small and a large stupa, and smaller rail posts like the Ackland’s could have been sculpted for a railing surrounding the smaller stupa, for an outer railing around the larger one, or for another structure yet unearthed.

Works like the Ackland rail post contribute to the history of Kushan art because they encourage discussion of artistically productive sites outside Mathura and Gandhara.6 Sites like Sanghol, in particular, suggest a continuum between the two major regions because they are strategically located along the route from modern day
Pakistan to northern India. MCKB

1 All of the sculptures from Sanghol are, like this one, very well preserved. It is thought that they were buried during an attack, Kushan Sculptures from Sanghol (1st–2nd cent. AD): A Recent Discovery, ed. S.P. Gupta (New Delhi: National Museum, 1985), 23; S.P. Gupta, “Sanghol: The Meeting Place of Works of Art of Gandhara and Mathura Schools” in Investigating Indian Art: Proceedings of a Symposium in the Development of Early Buddhist and Hindu Iconography (Kulturbesitz, Berlin: Staatliche Museen Preußicher/Museum für Inische Kunst, 1987), 89–104.
2 See Gupta, Kushan Sculptures: plate 4, for the multiple incised anklets; plate 13, for similar arm bands; plate 16A, for the deep-set eyes and prominent eyebrows; plate 18, for the pose, treatment of the body, bracelets, and the treatment of the tree branch; and plate 21A, for similarities in the ox-like animal.
3 In some instances the crouching figure is a dwarf, while in others it is half-human, half-animal.
4 Gupta, Kushan Sculptures, 48.
5 Stanislaw J. Czuma, Kushan Images from Early India (Cleveland Museum of Art in cooperation with the Indiana University Press, 1985), figs. 28 and 31. Figure 28 is only 53.3 cm high, and figure 31 is 76.8 cm high. Alexander Cunningham, The Stupa at Bharhut: A Buddhist Monument Ornamented with Numerous Sculptures (Bhansphatak: Indological Book House, 1962), 12–13, mentions an outer railing at Bharhut that had about 240 rail posts measuring 2 feet and 1 inch in height. He suggests they were built later than the original stupa and inner railing.
6 In their innovative study of the much-debated Didarganj chauri-bearer, Frederick Asher and Walter Spink convincingly offer a Kushan date for the figure through comparison with others found at Rajendranagar. They also claim that “by assigning those figures to the Kushan period, Mathura’s positon during that age as the premier, indeed almost exclusive, center for figural sculpture in all north India is brought into question.” Frederick Asher and Walter Spink, “Maurya Figural Sculpture Reconsidered,” Ars Orientalis 19 (1989): 1–8. Likewise, Kasinath Tamot and Ian Alsop use a recently discovered sculpture from Kathmandu to discuss the proliferation of Kushan characteristics in Nepal; Kasinath Tamot and Ian Alsop, “A Kushan Period Sculpture from the Reign of Jayavarman,” Orientations 32.7 (2001): 56-62.