This Goddess with a parrot perched on her right hand is Meenakshi. She is the presiding deity of Madurai, a city in Tamil Nadu. Meenakshi translates to ‘fish-eyed’ referring to the shape of the eye and is one of the lakshan of a woman.

Meenakshi is married to Siva and hence identified as Uma/Parvathi.

Here Meenakshi is standing in Tribanga, a graceful three-bend stance. Features to note include her left hand in Lola hasta, the Karanada makuta (crown’s shape), patterns on her waist belt and her sensuous form.

This Vigraha is about 14 cm tall and it is from Tamil Nadu. This may be dated to the Nayak period, 18th-19th century. The wear to the face suggests extended period of ritual use.

As I researched this Vigraha, I found this iconography, Uma with a parrot, is not mentioned in any of the standard classical books on South Indian Iconography (Sivaramamurthy, TAG Rao and H K Sastri). Nor did I find any pre-Vijayanagar bronzes of Meenakshi in this form. Of course, there are references to Meenakshi Sundarar’s marriage.

It looks like the parrot was added after the Vijayanagar period, and has now become a defining feature.

Note: Some of the ideas in this blog, especially regarding the development of Meenakshi’s iconography, are from my exchanges with Dr K P Ravichandran.