the popular sculpture shiva nataraja depicts shiva—or siva—as dancing.
the popular sculpture shiva nataraja depicts shiva—or siva—as dancing.
the popular sculpture shiva nataraja depicts shiva—or siva—as?
dancing
the nataraja temple has ancient roots, likely following the temple architecture tradition that is found all over south india from at least the 5th century. textual evidence, such as those of the sangam tradition, suggest a temple existed here along with madurai in ancient times, but the town is not named chidambaram in these pre-5th century texts. the earliest mention of "dancing god of chidambaram" as shiva is found in 6th and early 7th century texts by appar and sambadar. the "suta samhita" embedded inside "skanda purana" and variously dated between 7th and 10th century mentions the chidambaram dance. the surviving nataraja temple has a structure that is traceable to the early chola dynasty. chidambaram was the early capital of this dynasty, and shiva nataraja was their family deity. the chidambaram temple town remained important to the cholas, albeit with increasing competition from other temple towns when rajaraja chola i moved the capital to thanjavur, built a new city and the massive brihadeeswarar temple dedicated to shiva in early 11th-century, which is now a world heritage site.
nataraja temple, chidambaram
nataraja is the cosmic representation of shiva's different dance forms. the temple has the earliest representation of nataraja in sculpture. as per hindu mythology, shiva is a violent dancer and while he dances, a snake named karkodaka winds in his legs, leading to shiva performing the "bhujamgatrasa", the snake fight posture. the sculpture of nataraja in the temple depicts the posture. shiva is sported with four hands, with his one of the left hands showing "dola hasta" posture, "parasu" in the second left, "abhaya mudra" (protecting posture) in the first right hand and fire in the second right hand. archeologist dr.r.nagaswamy believes that the hooded snake at the foot of nataraja is the proof of "bhujamgatrasa". it is believed that all forms of dance are derived from "natya sastra" by sage bharatha and mahendravarma's knowledge of delicate postures are exemplified in the sculpture. he also affirms that by the image mahendra shows the connection between "bhujaṅga trāsita" and that the dance of nataraja, the cosmic form of shiva leads to the ananda.
avanibhajana pallaveshwaram temple