Partly carved to both sides, with three riders decreasing in size downwards, the galloping horses of the top and the bottom militant warrior stepping on a running man and a beast respectively, the rider at the centre sits on a lion-like creature (vyala) which steps onto an elephant, behind each rider a bearded man with a staff. Very minor chips and short cracks. Within a frame. The brackets most probably originate from Chettinad, a town of wealthy merchants who in the 19th and early 20th century constructed large palaces in their hometown. Such brackets were used to decorate the doorways or were used in temples or processional carts. When the merchants had to give up their mansions in the 1960s and 1970s many of their architectural furnishings were sold. Dimensions Height 111 cm; width 35 cm Literature Compare very similar brackets, for instance in the Rautenstrauch-Joest Museum für Völkerkunde in Cologne, illustrated in: Ulrich Wiesner, Buddhisten Jainas Hindu, Köln 2007, cat. no. 60 and P. Pal, Indian Sculpture, Vol. 2, Los Angeles 1988, cat. no. 167 Provenance Sammlung Dr. Ludwig Jansen (1919-2020) Notes VAT: Margin scheme