Yamuna and her twin tales: From sacred glory to silent despair
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In Vedic and Puranic literature, Yamuna is revered as a sacred river who is Surya's daughter and Yama's sister, Yami. Also called Krishnaa and Kalindi, her special relationship with Krishna has shaped her artistic imagination as a dark-hued, beautiful and benevolent river goddess.
Early Indian artists imagined her as a beautiful goddess with typical attributes — with her kachchhap-vahana (tortoise-mount) and kalash (vase of water). Often paired with Ganga on temple doorframes from early 5th c. CE, the feminine imagery of these twin rivers honours their divine beneficence, but also represents control, lordship and protection of their waters by gods and kings.
An inscription of the early western Chalukya rulers (696 CE), for example, records their victory over northern regions, a feat that resulted in carrying back Ganga and Yamuna pali-dhvaja (insignia-banner) to the Deccan. And Krishna's brother Balarama is known to have forcefully diverted the course of Yamuna with his plough.
Yamuna's intimate association with Krishna is best explored in the resplendent world of miniature paintings inspired by the Harivamsa, Bhagavata-purana and Vallabhacharya's Pushti Marg. Krishna-bhakti, as experienced in their verbal and visual imageries, conveys an inseparable and perennial reciprocity between nature, natural rhythms, human existence and emotions.
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