The large number of ashtadhatu metal images found at Nalanda and Kurkihar in Bihar belong to which school?

The correct answer is B, Mohenjo-daro. The Dancing Girl is a small bronze figure about ten and a half centimetres high, found at Mohenjo-daro in the Larkana district of Sindh and now displayed in the National Museum, New Delhi. She stands with her right hand on the hip, her left arm covered from shoulder to wrist with bangles, her hair tied in a bun and her head tilted back, and she is the earliest known Indian object made by the lost-wax process. Option A is wrong because Harappa gave the red sandstone male torso and the granaries, not this figure. Option C is wrong because Lothal is known for its dockyard, beads and the terracotta of a bird, not for bronze figures. Option D is wrong because Kalibangan gave the ploughed field and the fire altars. Learning the site with the find is the usual way this topic is tested.

The correct answer is B, lost-wax casting. The craftsman models the image in beeswax, covers it with fine clay, heats the mould until the wax runs out through a vent, and fills the cavity with molten alloy; when the metal sets the clay is broken away, so each cast is a single original. The process is called cire perdue in French and madhuchchhista vidhana, the beeswax method, in Sanskrit texts on image making. Option A is wrong because repousse is hammering a design out from the back of a metal sheet, as in Pembarthi brass work. Option C is wrong because granulation is the soldering of tiny metal beads on to jewellery. Option D is wrong because damascening is inlaying gold or silver wire into a darker metal, the method behind Bidriware and Koftgari. Questions often ask for the French or Sanskrit name rather than the English one.

The correct answer is A, copper, zinc, tin, gold and silver. Panchaloha means five metals, and the Shilpa texts of the south prescribe this mixture for an icon that is to be consecrated and worshipped, with copper as the dominant metal and only a token quantity of gold and silver. The eastern schools of Bengal and Bihar instead used ashtadhatu, an eight-metal mixture, which is why Pala images are described by that term. Option B is wrong because iron and nickel are not used in icon casting; iron rusts and would crack the image. Option C is wrong because mercury is liquid at ordinary temperatures and cannot be cast, though it appears in some ashtadhatu recipes in small measure. Option D is wrong because brass, bronze and pewter are themselves alloys, not metals, so they cannot be the five constituents. Examiners also ask that bronze itself is copper with tin.

The correct answer is B, Chola. The workshops of the Kaveri delta produced their finest images under Chola rule, and the term Chola bronze is used for the whole class of processional icons cast in that period at centres connected with Thanjavur, Chidambaram, Tiruvarur and Tiruvenkadu. Royal women were among the chief patrons, and the queen Sembiyan Mahadevi is named in inscriptions as a donor of metal images. Option A is wrong only in degree: bronze casting did begin in Tamil Nadu under the Pallavas in the eighth and ninth centuries, but the Pallava output is smaller and stiffer, and the question asks for the peak. Option C is wrong because the Pandyas of Madurai are better remembered for temple gopurams than for bronzes. Option D is wrong because the Cheras of Kerala belong to an earlier Sangam phase and to a different craft tradition. The period and the dynasty are asked together, so fix the tenth to twelfth century with the Cholas.

The correct answer is A, Apasmara. The dwarf is Apasmara, also called Muyalakan in Tamil, and he personifies ignorance and forgetfulness; by pressing him down with the right foot while dancing the ananda tandava, Shiva shows that knowledge subdues the darkness of the mind. The whole group stands on a lotus pedestal inside a ring of flames known as the tiruvasi or prabhamandala, which represents the cosmos. Option B is wrong because Nandi is the bull mount of Shiva and is shown seated facing the sanctum, never trampled. Option C is wrong because Bhringi is a devotee of Shiva shown in the retinue, usually as a thin three-legged figure. Option D is wrong because Chandesha, or Chandeshvara, is the guardian of temple property in Shaiva temples and has a shrine of his own. The dwarf, the ring of flames and the four attributes are the four details a paper setter picks from this image.