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0217 On Ancient Central-Asian Tracks : vol.1
On Ancient Central-Asian Tracks : vol.1 / Page 217 (Grayscale High Resolution Image)

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doi: 10.20676/00000214
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CH. VII HELLENISTIC TREATMENT OF FIGURES I2I

from the elongated slanting eyes which all figures painted later in Central Asia and the Far East display. Equally significant is the drapery, the peculiar pose of the curving fingers emerging as it were from a toga, etc. As regards methods of technique a most striking testimony is supplied by the regular employment of `light and shade' wherever flesh is painted in these frescoes. The use of chiaroscuro, so well known to classical art, has never before been observed in the old pictorial work of India, Central Asia or the Far East.

Varied and instructive as the surviving fragments of those frescoed friezes are, it is the fine winged-angel figures of the dado which have from the first appealed to me most. The seven of them which had survived, have all been brought safely away and are now divided between the British Museum and my collection at New Delhi. While in all externals the aim manifestly is at a homogeneous effect befitting a heavenly fraternity, a strong individual element is cleverly introduced in the faces. Such details as the varied expression in the eyes, the pose of the head, etc., can be adequately studied only in the originals or in the full reproductions fortunately available in my Serindia. But I may at least touch upon one indication of the skill with which the painter decorators at Miran adapted designs, borrowed from the West and, no doubt, often used, to peculiar structural conditions. Care was taken so to fit the pose of the winged busts in the dado to the position they occupy low down on the wall of the circular passage that their raised gaze may just catch the eyes of the worshipper as he performs the ceremonial circumambulation of the Stupa.

Taking into account certain youthful winged forms met