Chola royal portraits: how the kings and queens of Thanjavur were shown

This page is about the few pictures of real Chola kings and queens that survive, and how to read them. It covers the wall painting of Rajaraja I in his own temple at Thanjavur, the bronze that may show Queen Sembiyan Mahadevi, a stone panel of a king and queen at worship, and the ways Chola kings presented themselves as warriors in words and in buildings. For the history of the dynasty, its wars and its bronzes of the gods, read the Chola dynasty. For how the Chola court compares with India's other royal courts, see the Indian court painting guide.

Why Chola royal portraits are rare and hard to name

Most Chola art shows gods. The Cleveland Museum of Art says the serene, smiling faces of Chola bronze gods are completely idealized, so a viewer can tell at once that they show gods. India's National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) says the making of bronze images was the most distinctive craft tied to Chola temples, and that images were sometimes made of devotees as well.

People did appear in Chola art. The Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A) in London says royal portraiture was an established practice in South India from the Chola period, and that the Nayak rulers who came later continued it. The same museum says portraits of donors, the people who paid for a temple gift, are uncommon in Indian temple art.

The harder question is who a figure is. The Freer Gallery of Art in Washington, part of the Smithsonian, explains that portrait statues of this kind were more likely to be identified by their place in a temple, or by their use in a ritual, than by a true resemblance to the person. So the name attached to a Chola royal image usually comes from where it stands, from an inscription or from a festival record. Museums say so openly when the link is uncertain.

The table below lists the images this page describes and how each one is named.

Rajaraja I on the walls of his own temple

Rajaraja I became king in 985, according to both Leiden University Libraries and the American Institute of Indian Studies (AIIS), a body of universities that keeps a photographic archive of Indian temples. The two sources give different end years for his reign: 1012 at Leiden and 1014 at the AIIS. During his reign he built the great Shiva temple at Thanjavur. NCERT says it was completed around 1009. The AIIS says Tamil inscriptions call it Sri Rajarajeswaram, and that it is also known as Dakshina Meru.

The king appears inside the temple. NCERT explains that the paintings were made on the walls of the narrow passage that runs around the central shrine. When they were discovered, two layers of paint were found. The upper layer was painted in the Nayak period, in the 16th century. Cleaning that surface brought the Chola paintings underneath back into view. They show Shiva on Mount Kailash, Shiva as Nataraja the dancer and other forms of Shiva, dancing figures, and what NCERT calls a portrait of the patron Rajaraja and his mentor Kuruvar.

NCERT also describes how these painters drew people. The lines flow in planned curves, the bodies are softly shaped, and the faces and features are drawn longer than in life. NCERT sees in the Brihadisvara paintings the full skill that Chola artists had reached.

The painting fits the Freer's point about naming. The king is painted in the temple he paid for, among pictures of the god he built it for, beside his religious teacher. The setting tells the viewer who he is. The AIIS adds that a later Chola temple was built at the request of the king's spiritual teacher, and that the temples at Thanjavur, Gangaikondacholapuram and Darasuram were built under similar guidance. A king shown with his teacher records that relationship.

Queen Sembiyan Mahadevi in bronze

NCERT names the widowed Chola queen Sembiyan Mahadevi as the distinguished patron of bronze sculpture in the 10th century. The Freer Gallery of Art says she was widowed young and was a respected patron of the arts who spent most of her life paying for temples.

The Freer holds a bronze called Queen Sembiyan Mahadevi as the Goddess Parvati. It is 107.3 cm high and dates from the 10th century. The Freer bought it in 1929 from the dealer Hagop Kevorkian in New York. The museum's label tells its possible story. During the queen's lifetime, her birthday was celebrated in the Shiva temple of a town named after her, and a metal portrait of her was given to the temple in her honour. The Freer says it is possible that this bronze is that portrait.

The label is careful about the likeness too. The pose recalls the goddess Parvati, but the Freer says the figure is unusually individual in the shape of the face, the pursed lips and the long nose. The museum calls the bronze an example of royal and divine portraits mixing in ancient Indian art. Dressed in silks, jewellery and flower garlands, it would have been carried through the town for people to see. The Freer's catalogue keywords list both Parvati and Uma, two names for the same goddess, and the Smithsonian's 2002 to 2003 exhibition of Chola bronzes called it Uma as Queen Sembiyan Mahadevi.

Museums also differ on small facts about her family. The Freer says her husband reigned from 949 to 957. The Cleveland Museum of Art gives 941 to 957. Cleveland holds a bronze Goddess Holding a Lotus from around 950 and says it may have been made in the queen's workshop. Cleveland's wording, like the Freer's, keeps the link open.

A king and queen at worship in stone

One royal portrait group comes from a temple the queen founded. The AIIS says the Uma-Mahesvara temple at Konerirajapuram was founded by Sembiyan Mahadevi in memory of her husband, Gandaraditya, during the reign of her son Uttama Chola, who ruled from 971 to 988. The temple was built in or before 974.

The AIIS describes a panel of portraits there showing a king and a queen worshipping the linga, the rounded stone form in which Shiva is worshipped. The temple also has a portrait of its architect. The AIIS adds that some of the finest Chola bronzes are kept in the temples of Konerirajapuram, and that its bronze of the goddess Bhogesvari may be the earliest of the queen's castings.

In this panel the king and queen appear as worshippers, in the building their gift made possible.

Devotees, saints and donors

Chola temples honoured human worshippers as well as gods. The V&A holds a bronze of Sambandar, a child saint and one of the 63 Shaivite saints of Tamil Nadu, the saints devoted to Shiva, cast in the middle of the 11th century. He is shown as a boy singing a hymn to Shiva, with one finger pointing up. The V&A says sculptures of saints were installed for worship beside the gods and went with them in temple processions, and that the pedestal has holes for fixing it during those processions.

Donor portraits continued after the Cholas. The V&A holds a 17th-century bronze of a woman with her hands raised in worship. A Tamil inscription on the base names her as the lady Tirunilakanta of Tiruvarur. The V&A says such a portrait would only be made to go with a religious gift, and that this one shows the custom of royal portraits spreading to local officials and their families.

NCERT describes a later royal group at Tirupati. In the 16th century, under the Vijayanagara kings, life-size bronzes were cast of King Krishnadevaraya with his two queens, Tirumalamba and Chinnadevi. All three stand with their palms joined in prayer. NCERT says the sculptor combined a likeness of the faces with some idealization. These figures belong to a later dynasty, and they show the same royal pose of prayer at life size. Our page on Maratha court portraits follows Thanjavur's royal portraits into a later age.

Warriors in words and in buildings

The Chola Warrior style takes its name from a dynasty that conquered its neighbours, as NCERT describes, yet the portraits on this page show kings and queens at worship. The warrior image of the Chola kings appears in words and in buildings. NCERT says the praise poems called prashastis, written for kings of this period by learned Brahmanas (members of the priestly class), show how rulers wanted to be seen: as valiant, victorious warriors. NCERT adds that their details may not be literally true.

Chola kings also recorded themselves on copper. Leiden University Libraries describes a charter of King Rajendra I, who ruled from 1012 to 1042. It has 21 copper plates held together by a bronze ring, closed with the king's seal, and weighs no less than 30 kg. Its Sanskrit section gives the Chola family tree, starting with the god Vishnu. Its Tamil section records a gift of village revenue made by his father, Rajaraja I, to a Buddhist shrine in the 21st year of his reign.

Some victories were marked with temples. The AIIS says Kulottunga III, who ruled from 1178 to 1218, fought three wars against the Pandya kings. After the third victory he held a celebration at Madurai, took the title Tribhuvana Vira devar and built the Kampaharesvara temple at Tribhuvanam to mark the win. The AIIS calls it the last of the four great temples built by the Cholas.

What this means for a Chola Warrior portrait of your pet

The Chola Warrior style on Purrealism draws on this dynasty. The gallery has studio examples of a Rottweiler, a Vizsla and Labrador mix, and a Siamese cat in the Chola Warrior style, so you can see how the style handles dogs and cats of different shapes.

The Chola images on this page honour a person by where the image stands and how it is dressed: a king painted in his own temple, a queen's bronze dressed in silks and garlands for her birthday procession. If you choose this style, pick a photo where your pet's head and body are both clear and in focus. The portrait studio takes one photo of up to 5 MB. For a different way of painting a ruler, compare the strict side views on our page about Mughal royal portraits, or see how a later South Indian court painted its kings on our page about Mysore court portraits.