A Man, a Tiger, a Tree: Nine Threads Linking an Indus Seal to a Living Tale

This preprint investigates a possible relationship between a recurrent narrative motif of the Mature Harappan (Indus) Civilization and the later South Asian Lubdhaka–Śivarātri tradition. A group of Indus seals and tablets depicts a human figure positioned in a tree in association with a tiger, a motif represented by multiple examples from major Indus sites. The study develops nine strands of convergent evidence: (1) the human figure positioned in a tree; (2) the tiger below or adjacent to the tree; (3) the tiger's distinctive body orientation and backward-turned head; (4) the posture of the human figure; (5) the figure's extended arm or gesture; (6) the unusual rendering of the tree and the possibility of comparison with the bilva (Aegle marmelos); (7) repetition of the human–tree–tiger composition across the Indus corpus; (8) the occurrence of the motif in a broader potentially religious or supernatural iconographic context; and (9) the historical possibility of long-term cultural and narrative transmission in South Asia. These features are compared with later forms of the Lubdhaka hunter narrative associated with Śivarātri, including the recurring complex of a hunter, a tree, nocturnal vigil, leaves, bilva, animals, and Śiva. The study does not propose that an Indus figure can simply be identified as the later Lubdhaka, nor does it assume that later textual recensions preserve an unchanged Harappan narrative. Instead, it asks whether the cumulative correspondences are sufficiently distinctive to justify investigation of possible long-term narrative continuity, transformation, recombination, or convergence. Particular attention is given to the distinction between what is directly observable in Indus iconography, what previous scholars have proposed, and what is advanced here as a new comparative hypothesis. Alternative interpretations and the limitations imposed by the undeciphered Indus script are considered throughout. The paper is presented as a hypothesis for further archaeological, iconographic, textual, archaeobotanical, and comparative investigation rather than as a definitive identification.