Memorial Stone Buff Sandstone Western India

The monumental sculpture carved in relief in two panels with inscriptions beneath each panel, the lower relief representing clashing warriors engaged in battle while the upper relief depicts more scenes of combat with the participants ascending to the abode of the celestials shown above.



The inscription, written in a localized version of Brahmi, commences with an invocation to Ganesha and includes the names of two heroes Sri Lakshmana Raja and Raja Sri Batacharja. The date samvat 996 appears on the fifth line of the inscription, which converted to the modern calendar, suggests a circa 11th Century date for the sculpture.

Memorial stones honoring heroes who had died fighting on the battlefield or engaged in a heroic act were popularly erected in southern and western India in medieval times. The places where such stones were erected were considered sacred ground in a milieu where the cult of the hero was worshipped. The sculpture's massive proportions suggest that it possibly commemmorated an important battle.

The dense carving in shallow relief achieves a remarkable pictorial effect in stone. Compare with a similar sculpture depicting the conquest of a fort from Akluj in Maharashtra, see Settar and Sontheimer (ed.), 1982, fig. 8.