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TRIAD FIGURE, INTERIOR OF ELEPHANTA.
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† Triad Figure. Interior of Elephanta.—"The figure that faces the entrance is the most remarkable in this excavation, and has given rise to numberless conjectures and theories. It is a gigantic bust of some three-headed being, or the three heads of some being to whom the temple may be supposed to be dedicated. Some writers have imagined that it is, what they have called the Hindoo Trinity of Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva; and very strange historical conclusions have been deduced from this hypothesis. The Hindoo Trimurti, or Trinity, as it has been called, does not occupy a very remarkable place in the theology of the Brahmins; the word Trimurti means three forms, and is applied to any three-headed figure."—Elliot.
