Tadaki^[*] , Ahalya, and the Boatman

Rama's encounters with Tadaki^[*] , Ahalya, and the Boatman form a closely linked sequence in Orissa in several texts, performances, and, particularly, pictures. Tadaki^[*] was the principal scourge against whom the sage Visvamitra enlisted the aid of the young prince, and Rama's success in felling her provides a preview of his subsequent success at demon slaying. In both the Adhyatma Ramayana^[*] and the Vaidehisa Vilasa^[*] , two works radically different in literary character, a beautiful woman emerges from Tadaki's^[*] huge corpse, released from a curse.^[12] Then, minimizing other demons, these versions move on immediately to another tale of an accursed woman, Ahalya.^[13] ç This luckless beauty had committed adultery with Indra. Her husband, the sage Gautama, cursed the god to bear a thousand wombs (hence Indra's thousand eyes), and he turned his own wife to stone until she should be liberated by the touch of Rama's foot. In the Adhyatma Ramayana^[*] this release ushers in Ahalya's long devotional hymn to the pervasive power (maya ) of Rama. Here and in Upendra Bhañja's versions, the event is juxtaposed with the story of the boatman, who insists on washing Rama's feet before he steps aboard the boat lest the boat that he needs to make his living turn into a woman (who would also be expensive to support). This brief episode is both a humorous hu-

man touch, catching the simple man's naïveté, and a profoundly moving statement of the devotional theme that links this entire sequence of events.^[14] In the Dasapalla Ramalila^[*] , the second night is regularly devoted to these three episodes alone. Tadaki's^[*] frenzied fight culminates in her deathbed worship of Rama. Ahalya emerges from a mysterious papier-mâché rock to pray while her story is recited. The boatman appears in a simple boat, a plain sari stretched over an oblong flame, and his washing of Rama's feet concludes the evening with humble reverence.

Several of these events are commonly depicted not only recently in Orissa but also in earlier sculpture of other regions.^[15] At Buguda the three incidents follow in sequence, although the scene of the boatman (Figure 201, third tier, left) is separated from Ahalya. The figure of Tadaki^[*] is badly abraded, but it is mainly her size and the tree with which she threatens Rama that indicate the fear she inspired (Figure 201, second tier, right). Her pose and general configuration resemble those of the small, meek Ahalya to the right, as if Tadaki^[*] and Ahalya were the same figure transformed.

In this depiction of the demoness, later pata^[*] painting is no less obviously heir to Buguda than are some manuscripts. In Jagannath Mahapatra's set, Tadaki^[*] takes the form of a standard raksasi^[*] —naked, disheveled, with blue skin and a grotesque face. Yet she, like Ahalya in the next scene, rises from a hill of rounded lobes, which lends continuity to the two events (Figures 224, 225). His straightforward version of the boatman scene appears fairly commonly on separate small patas^[*] , reflecting the popular appeal of this devotional theme (Figure 226).

Among manuscripts, even the Brahma Ramayana's^[*] cursory narrative includes Tadaki^[*] and Ahalya (Figures 195, 196). The two occur on opposite sides of the same leaf, and the arrow-filled fight on one side does not necessarily invite comparison with the sedate, hieratic composition on the other. Tadaki^[*] has fangs and a hooked nose like demons in many palm-leaf illustrations, although other details are unusual.^[16] The skillful artist of this manuscript uses a dark rectangle to define Ahalya's rock, a vivid device unique in Orissan images, quite possibly of his own devising.^[17] ç

In the Adhyatma Ramayana^[*] we have a text that juxtaposes the three incidents in question as examples; of Rama's maya . While Sarathi Madala Patnaik illustrated Ahalya's devotional hymn (replacing Rama with Visnu^[*] ) in three of his four preserved versions of this favorite text, in none did he include all three incidents (Appendix 1). His two quite unrelated versions of Ahalya's release (Figures 50, 56) demonstrate his freedom from any visual formula. This freedom, the diversity of incidents selected, and the unfinished drawing of the figure of Visvamitra to the right in Figure 50 may all indicate a lack of deliberation on the part of Sarathi Madala. It is worth underscoring as we search for conscious or unconscious programs in illustration that some artists worked too haphazardly to meet our expectations.

In the case of the Vaidehisa Vilasa^[*] , the Baripada master Satrughna included Tadaki^[*] in the form of a black animal-headed monster spread over five folios (Plate 3), and he also depicted the boatman (Figure 90), but this manuscript is too jumbled to reveal the original effect of the sequence. From the same artist's other, probably earlier, copy of the same text we have the Ahalya episode pre-

served in a distinctive form (Figure 99).^[18] Above the rock, letters are decoratively arranged to read,

Offering
lotus flowers,
Ahalya worshipped
Rama, son of
Kausalya
with
great
pleasure.

This seems to be a case of Satrughna's vaunted ingenuity in welding together image and text.^[19]

Michha Patajoshi meticulously depicted each turn of events, spelling out Tadaki's^[*] apotheosis (Figure 103). He included amusing details from Upendra Bhañja's poem such as Indra's slinking past the irate Gautama in the guise of a cat (Figure 105).^[20] As usual, this artist follows his own compositional formulas, such as the rounded rock from which Ahalya rises, without repeating every detail (Figures 104, 114, 127). From this point on, one example of his depiction of a single subject will suffice.

The abbreviated text of the Lavanyavati^[*] in general grants great freedom to its illustrators. Balabhadra Pathy draws the clearest parallel between Tadaki^[*] and Ahalya, for the two figures occur on successive leaves and would be viewed together (Figures 158, 159). The sequence of Visvamitra, Laksmana^[*] , Rama, and a woman in a thicket is identical in the two. Thus differences stand out—the arrows released in the first and Tadaki's^[*] rapacious form. Pathy, in his element here, uses the spreading plants to underscore Tadaki's^[*] frenzy, as opposed to Ahalya's modest pose, echoed by drooping branches. This is one of the few Ramayana^[*] sequences in Orissa that omits the boatman, although the incident is mentioned in the text of this very poem.

The Round Lavanyavati^[*] organizes these events similarly on successive pages, but the two compositions attract less immediate comparison (Figures 6, 8). Tadaki^[*] here combines some attributes of an attractive woman with demonic face, hair, and dugs. Rama strides from Ahalya's rock to the boatman with identical pose, displaying a clarity of action that is the forte of this manuscript.

In the Dispersed Lavanyavati^[*] , Tadaki^[*] and Ahalya occur at opposite ends of successive leaves (Figures 143, 145). There is a dramatic continuity between Rama, who grows from a baby to a heroic adult before our very eyes, striding from the role of executioner to that of savior and ultimately of divinity. Again this anonymous artist uses ellipsis effectively. Ample surrounding space and subtle scenery serve to emphasize Rama's heroism in these three scenes, following the import of Upendra Bhañja's longer poem, or for that matter the Adhyatma Ramayana^[*] .

In Raghunath Prusti's version Ahalya follows Tadaki^[*] on the reverse of the same leaf, which makes direct comparison impossible for the viewer of the manu-

script (Figures 177, 178). Yet the general similarity of the main actors conveys some relationship. The demoness is distinguished only by her hooked nose, in which this artist may again have been influenced by the Buguda wall paintings, although he does not follow their composition. One unique element is the inclusion of Bharata (as identified by label, second from the left in Figure 177). I know of no Oriya text or other illustration that included him in this expedition, although it is conceivable that some oral version did.^[21] Even if Prusti had such a basis, one must credit him with originality in introducing a character not included at Buguda or in the Lavanyavati^[*] itself. The neat interlocking of Ahalya and the boatman and the elegant structure of the page, with the dark river in the center, are characteristic of his pictorial skill.

In general, one might argue that the parallels presented between the release of the two cursed women in many manuscripts and in the chitrakaras' tradition represent no more than the use of stock figures, common in both literary and visual traditions. In the texts, the emphasis upon the two female characters, at the expense of the male demons who play a larger role in Valmiki, strengthens the comparison, which in turn befits the later authors' concern with Rama's transforming maya .^[22] On the whole I am most convinced of a similar intent in pictures when added details enhance the similarity and when Tadaki^[*] is not presented in her predictable demonic form. Certainly this linkage is more appropriate to visual images, where similarity can be grasped at a glance, than to words, where repetition must be remembered or pointed out.