Handcrafted Black Stone Veer Barbarika Archer Murti, 24in

The archer form of Khatu Shyam Ji

Before he was Shyam Baba, Barbarika was a young archer — grandson of Bhima, and the warrior the Mahabharata remembers as teen baan dhari, the bearer of three arrows. This murti holds him at that moment: bare-headed, hair loose past the shoulders, a tall bow upright at his side and exactly three arrows gathered in the other hand, a quiver at the shoulder and a slender tilak on the forehead. The count is not ornament. Three arrows were all he ever needed, and the temple at Khatu in Sikar district, Rajasthan, stands on what he chose to do with them.

Black stone, taken to a mirror polish

The piece is carved from black stone — the dense, fine-grained black granite quarried around Markapur in Andhra Pradesh, long used for South Indian temple sculpture because it holds a crisp edge that softer marbles cannot. Brought to a mirror polish, it reads as an even jet black with a reflective sheen that traces the fall of the dhoti and the long curve of the bow. There is no veining to interrupt the figure, so light does all the drawing. Rubbed instead to a satin or matte surface, the same stone turns quieter and greyer — worth settling before the block is cut.

How the murti is made

Every piece is carved to order by the master sculptors and artist families we work with in Jaipur. We design it with you first — form, stone, size, finish — then brief the sculptor and follow the work through to your door. The block is roughed to the silhouette, the lotus base and plinth are set out, and the face, hands, arrow shafts and bow limbs are finished entirely by hand; nothing on a murti's face is left to a machine. Polishing runs last, through progressive grades, until the black comes up clean and level.

Living with a 24-inch Barbarika

At 24 inches the murti sits on a home mandir shelf, a console or a low altar table without asking for floor space, and still reads clearly from across a living room. Leave a hand's width of clearance above the bow tip. Black stone holds its own against pale walls and light marble flooring, and takes a single warm lamp better than a bright overhead. A piece may already be carved — we will ask the sculptors we work with and send you photographs of the actual murti; a fresh commission runs eight to twelve weeks. If you would rather have the shish darshan form, a seated darbar murti, or this same archer at 18 or 36 inches, or in Makrana or Vietnam white marble, tell us the size and the space and we will work it out with you.