Salabhanjika

In Buddhist sites, reliefs on stupas displayed a stylized female by a tree, typically grasping or breaking a branch as Buddha's mother Maya did.

[6] The pose of the Salabhanjika is also very similar to that almost invariably given in art to Queen Maya when she gave birth to Gautama Buddha under an asoka tree in a garden in Lumbini, while grasping a branch over her head with one hand.

[9] Prasanna Acharya – a Sanskrit scholar and the author of An Encyclopedia of Hindu Architecture, states that śālā and bhañjikā appear in verse 2.79 of the Natyashastra in the sense of "a wooden image".

[11] He concurs with Vogel and states that over the centuries, the word salabhanjika came to mean "any statue and nothing more", irrespective of the presence or absence of tree, whether female or male, in architecture or literature.

[11] Vogel, Acharya, and other scholars concur that in the arts and literature of the Hindus and Jains, the term salabhanjika has simply meant any statue on any pillar, wall, or in any hall.

[9][12][10] In the Buddhist traditions, among the renowned shalabhanjika sculptures with sal tree are found in Bharhut and at the gateways (Torana) of Sanchi Stupa near Bhopal, a World Heritage site.

[citation needed] In the Hindu traditions, among the renowned salabhanjika sculptures without sal tree are those at the 12th-century Hoysala temples of Belur, Halebidu and Somanathapura, in south-central Karnataka.