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Twenty-armed Ravana fights eagle king Sadayu on Indian painting
About this photograph
- Creator
- Margery H. Freeman
- Date created
- Unknown
- Location
- India
- License
- This photograph copyright ©2006. Terms of use
See this photograph in context
- The Ramayana: The Hindu epic The Ramayana is retold through the mural, painting, and dance of Southeast Asia. (Page 2.11)
Related media
Learn more
- Search LEARN NC for art, battles, birds, demons, India, paintings, Ravana, royal clothing, Sadayu, and weapons.
In the classroom
- See our collection of articles on visual literacy for ideas on using photographs meaningfully in the classroom.
A twenty-armed and ten-headed demon king Ravana fights the eagle king Sadayu in a detail from an Indian Ramayana painting.
Sadayu on the left is trying to pick out one of Ravana’s eyes from one of his ten heads, while Ravana is using his twenty arms to wave swords, lances, axes, ropes, and snakes at Sadayu.
Ravana is portrayed with dark skin, beards, and wild flying hair. Five of his heads look left at Sadayu while the other five look in the opposite direction to the right. One of his lower arms at the left has stabbed Sadayu with a sharp weapon and blood is visible in the feathers around the wound.
Ravana wears a white pleated tunic belted at his waist. The white cloth of Ravana’s tunic and his eyes contrast sharply with his dark skin, belt, weapons, and Sadayu’s dark feathers. The entire scene is set on a bright yellow background.
