The lion and the elephant

On the ninth (lunar) day of the fortnight of the waxing moon in the month of Kartika (कार्तिक), Bengali Shakta Hindus observe Jagaddhatri Puja, a condensed version of Durga Puja. The deity at the center of the festivities is Jagaddhatri (जगद्धात्री), a four-armed form of Durga, mounted on a lion that is crushing an elephant (or just the severed head of an elephant) under its feet. In fact, the motif of a lion (or leogryph) subduing an elephant is centuries old and ubiquitous in Indic statuary. In literature, the lion is portrayed as an arch-enemy of the elephant and the only beast capable of taking down the otherwise invincible giant – and poets have used the lion-and-elephant trope again and again to describe valor and victory. The following is a somewhat fresh take on this banalized literary device.

Devanagari text:

बालाया नवसङ्गमे निपुणतां प्रेक्ष्यान्यथाशङ्किनो
भर्तुश्चित्तमवेक्ष्य पङ्कजमुखी तत्पार्श्वकुड्येऽलिखत्|
एकं भद्रमतङ्गजं तदुपरि क्रोधात् पतन्तं शिशुं
सिंहीगर्भविनिःसृतार्धवपुषं दृष्ट्वा स हृष्टोऽभवत्||

Harvard-Kyoto transliteration:

bAlAyA navasaGgame nipuNatAM prekSyAnyathAzaGkino
bhartuzcittamavekSya paGkajamukhI tatpArzvakuDye(a)likhat| 

ekaM bhadramataGgajaMtadupari krodhAt patantaM zizuM
siMhIgarbhaviniHsRtArdhavapuSaM dRSTvA sa hRSTo(a)bhavat||

– Anonymous

Loose translation: On their first night of lovemaking, the husband saw how skilled his young bride was, and started suspecting (that she might not be a virgin); realizing what was on his mind, the lotus-faced girl sketched on the wall beside (the bed) an imposing elephant and then, pouncing furiously upon the animal, a cub that had only half emerged from the womb of a lioness. He was gladdened by what he saw.

Source: 17th century Anyokti Muktaavali Section (परिच्छेद) 2 Verse 21.

I also found a slight variant of this snippet here along with its Telugu version. According to the editor, it is Verse 71 of cATu-dhArA-camatkAra-sAra (चाटुधाराचमत्कारसार), compiled by Allamaraju Subrahmanyakavi (Rajamundry: Sri-sujana-ranjani-mudraksara-sala (श्रीसुजनरञ्जनीमुद्राक्षरशाला), 1931).

Notes: The elephant is presumably a metaphor for the "eros" that the girl has mastered or the husband who is in the process of being "conquered", and the lion-cub is the girl herself. The whole scene is meant to assure the distressed husband that his wife's prowess in bed is not the outcome of training or experience but is just as natural to her as hostility towards pachyderms is to a maned feline, even when the latter is in its infancy. 

Here is one of several examples from Anyokti Muktaavali Section 2 of an infant (or fetal) lion, eager to take on a full-grown elephant, being used to metaphorize the innate heroism of a youth of royal descent:

सिंहः शिशुरपि निपतति मदमलिनकपोलभित्तिषु गजेषु|

प्रकृतिरियं सत्त्ववतां न खलु वयस्तेजसो हेतुः|| 8 || 

"A lion, even when he is a cub, leaps upon elephants that have cheeks wet with temporin – such is the nature of the high-spirited, prowess has nothing to do with age."

The word bhadramataGgaja (भद्रमतङ्गज) used here may or may not refer to the foremost of the three primary categories of elephants recognized in Indic elephant lore: bhadra (भद्र), mandra (मन्द्र) or manda (मन्द), and mRga (मृग); bhadra simply means "good". The reading mattagaja (मत्तगज) is found in the second variant mentioned above – this word describes a bull elephant in musth.