A large sandstone stele of Marici, India, Uttar Pradesh, 11th century

Collection of Nasli Heeramaneck (1902–71).

The Pan-Asian Collection of Christian Humann (1924-1981), acquired in 1972.

Sotheby's New York, 5th October 1990, lot 23.

Pratapaditya Pal, The Sensuous Immortals. A Selection of Sculptures from the Pan-Asian Collection, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, 1977, cat. no. 38.

Alice N. Heeramaneck, Masterpieces of Indian Sculpture from the Former Collections of Nasli M. Heeramaneck, Verona, 1979, cat. no. 89.

This superb large sculpture depicts the Buddhist three-headed sun goddess striding vigorously to the left, her right foot supported on a lotus, her celestial team of eight harnessed and rampant pigs trampling demons below. They are centred on the face of the charioteer Rahu, flanked by four attendants standing in elegant tribhanga adorned in elaborate jewellery and holding floral garlands and flywhisks. The goddess is depicted wearing a belt with festoons suspending pendants, and a long floral garland falling across her body, her principal face with smiling expression, flanked by the head of a sow and a benevolent human face.

The sculpture was once in the collection of Nasli Heeramaneck (1902-71), perhaps the leading connoisseur of Indian art during the first half of the twentieth century.