Archaeology of Prakṛti: Excavating the Lost Myth & Theology of the Goddess Religions

Abstract: This article stems forth from the research need, that in spite of the prolific archaeological evidence of pre-historic female figurines from Pandu Rajar Dhibi to Chandraketugarh in early Bengal, little or nothing is known about these archaic cults of the feminine. As a response, this article attempts to reconstruct the theology and myth of the religions of the archaic feminine/goddess cults, by connecting the dots between archaeological discoveries of the female figurines and the potentially corresponding scriptural sources and folk traditions, thus recovering the lost myths of such figurines. This article’s title, “Archaeology of Prakṛti” alludes to Bankim Chandra Chatterjee’s proposition that in Bengal, there is the religion and culture built around Prakṛti of Tantra and Sāṃkhya, where the first cause of creation of universe (Jagadkāraṇa), the primordial (Ādyā), eternal (Nityā), mysteriously unspeakable (Avyaktā) source of creation, i.e. Prakṛti is popularly worshipped as the Mother Goddess. This article goes beyond Sāṃkhya/Tantra to conduct type studies of the cultic figurines, by investigating relevant texts from ancient India and the lived traditions of goddess cults where archaic remnants are distinctly present, to trace the lost trajectories of myth and theology of the feminine.