A note on the Takuapa Visnu
H.G. Quaritch Wales responds to S.J. O’Connor’s re-dating of the Takuapa Viṣṇu in a short note published in JMBRAS Vol. 40 (1967).
Summary
Wales challenges O’Connor’s recent placement of the Takuapa Viṣṇu among the later series of long-robed “mitred Viṣṇus” of the Malay Peninsula and Chen-la (late 7th–8th century A.D.), arguing instead for Dupont’s earlier dating to the 6th century A.D. with Pallava affinities (p. 153). His central objection is that the Takuapa statue’s upper arms are entirely free and in the round, a technical achievement inconsistent with the later series, in which upper arms are joined to the mitre by reserves of stone — a device O’Connor himself acknowledges as evidence of “lack of technical facility” in the Satingphra black stone Viṣṇu (p. 154). Wales concludes that the later series must have derived from an Indian prototype with free upper arms, to which the Takuapa figure closely adheres, and that the Satingphra torso serves as a stylistic connecting link between the two groups (p. 154).