Mark e l

Gude
India’s Fabled City:
The Art of Courtly Lucknow
Stephen Markel, Ph.D., is the curator and department
Stephen Markel with Tushara Bindu Gude
head of South and Southeast Asian Art at the Los Angeles
County Museum of Art. Project director for this publica-
tion and its accompanying exhibition, he has also curated
numerous exhibitions and published widely on South Asian This is the first book to explore fully the opulent art and
decorative art, sculpture, and painting. refined lifestyle of Lucknow, a cosmopolitan Indo-Islamic-
European capital in northern India that flourished in the
Tushara Bindu Gude is associate curator in the South and
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Southeast Asian Art department at LACMA and co-curator
Cultural successor to the resplendent Mughal Empire
of the exhibition India’s Fabled City: The Art of Courtly
and fated to succumb to British imperial expansion,
Lucknow. She received her Ph.D. in art history from the
Lucknow was home to some of the most vibrant artistic

India’s Fabled Cit y: The Art of courtly

University of California, Los Angeles.
expression of its time, encompassing an unusually wide

Lucknow
• range of mediums. The city fostered a rare intersection of
South Asian and European traditions, as well as Persian
Muzaffar Alam is George V. Bobrinskoy Professor in
and Islamic influences, and the court of the ruling
South Asian Languages and Civilizations at the Univer-
nawabs was a showcase of sophisticated cultural diversity
sity of Chicago.
at its most magnificent.
Catherine Asher is a professor in the department of art India’s Fabled City: The Art of Courtly Lucknow
history at the University of Minnesota. includes comprehensive introductory essays by Los
Angeles County Museum of Art curators Stephen Markel
Rosemary Crill is a senior curator for South Asia at the
and Tushara Bindu Gude, and contributions by nine addi-
Victoria and Albert Museum, London.
tional scholars on multiple aspects of Lucknow’s cultural
Sophie Gordon is curator of the Royal Photograph heritage. This beautifully designed volume features more
Collection, United Kingdom. than 250 sumptuous illustrations, including oil paintings,
album paintings, illustrated historical and religious
rosie Llewellyn-Jones is an independent scholar special-
manuscripts, textiles and garments, photographs, and
izing in the history of India from the eighteenth to the
decorative art objects such as ornate metalwork, glass-
twentieth century.
ware, and jewelry. Period photographs provide an
Peter Manuel teaches ethnomusicology at the Graduate incredible architectural survey, and major essays cover
Center of the City University of New York. the literary and musical cultures of Lucknow.
A true feast for the senses and intellect, India’s Fabled
Carla Petievich , executive director of the Hoshyar
City offers an illuminating account of a uniquely luxuri-
Foundation, is professor emerita of history, Montclair
ant and dynamic culture, which lives on today as an

India’s Fabled City

State University, and visiting professor at the South Asia
emblem of a lost past while serving as a cultural model
Institute, University of Texas.
and source of national pride.
Malini roy is a visual arts curator at the British Library.

Sanjay Subrahmanyam
Indian History at UCLA .
is professor and Doshi Chair of

The Art of Courtly

Los Angeles County Museum of Art

DelMonico Books•Prestel
^
Lucknow
Delmonico front: 16. Mir Kalan Khan, Lovers in a Landscape (detail), c. 1760 –70
Printed in China · Back: 21. A Dancer Balances a Bottle, c. 1770
Pr e stel
www.prestel.com
 India’s Fabled Cit y

The Art of Courtly

Lucknow

1
 India’s Fabled Cit y

The Art of Courtly

Lucknow
Stephen Markel
with Tushara Bindu Gude

and contributions by
Muzaffar Alam and Sanjay Subrahmanyam
Catherine Asher
rosemary Crill
Sophie Gordon
rosie Llewellyn-Jones
Peter Manuel
Carla Petievich
Malini roy

Los Angeles County Museum of Art

DelMonico Books • Prestel Munich berlin London New York

2 3
4 5
 Contents Foreword
Michael Govan...................................8
Chronology......................................10

The Dynastic History of Lucknow

Stephen Markel.......................................................................................... 14

India's Fabled City: Narratives of an Exhibition

Tushara Bindu Gude.................................................................................. 24

Lucknow and European Society

Rosie Llewellyn-Jones................................................................................ 55

Hybrid Visions: The Cultural Landscape

of Awadh
Tushara Bindu Gude.................................................................................. 69

Innovations Pious and Impious:

Expressive culture in Nawabi Lucknow
Carla Petievich......................................................................................... 103

Lucknow’s Architectural Heritage

Catherine Asher....................................................................................... 121
This book was published in conjunction with the exhibition India’s Fabled City: The Los Angeles County Museum of Art
Art of Courtly Lucknow, which was organized by the Los Angeles County Museum Head of Publications: Nola Butler “A Sacred Interest”: The role of
of Art and supported in part by grants from the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Editor in Chief: Thomas Frick Photography in The “City of Mourning”
Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts. The book was made possible Editor: Joseph N. Newland, Q.E.D.
Sophie Gordon.......................................................................................... 145
in part by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Additional support for the exhibition Designer: Jin Son
and book was provided by the Southern Asian Art Council, LACMA. Supervising Photographer: Peter Brenner
Production Manager: Karen Knapp Origins of The Late Mughal Painting
Rights and Reproductions Coordinator: Cheryle T. Robertson Tradition in Awadh
Proofreader: Dianne Woo Malini Roy................................................................................................ 165
Indexer: Kathleen Preciado

Exhibition Itinerary: Of Princes and Poets in

Los Angeles County Museum of Art December 12, 2010–February 27, 2011 Copublished by the Eighteenth-Century Lucknow
Musée national des Arts asiatiques–Guimet, Paris April 6–July 11, 2011 Los Angeles County Museum of Art
5905 Wilshire Boulevard
Muzaffar Alam and Sanjay Subrahmanyam............................................ 187
Los Angeles, CA 90036
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data “This Blaze of Wealth and Magnificence”:
lacma.org
Markel, Stephen. The Luxury Arts of Lucknow
and
India’s fabled city : the art of courtly Lucknow / Stephen Markel ; with Tushara Stephen Markel........................................................................................ 199
Bindu Gude and contributions by Muzaffar Alam ... [et al.]. -- 1st ed. DelMonico Books, an imprint of Prestel Publishing
p. cm. Prestel, a member of Verlagsgruppe Random House GmbH
Textiles and Dress in Lucknow in The
Catalog issued in connection with an exhibition held Dec. 12, 2010-Feb. 27, 2011,
Prestel Verlag Prestel Publishing Ltd. Prestel Publishing
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, and Apr. 6-July 11, 2011, Musée Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries
Königinstrasse 9 4 Bloomsbury Place 900 Broadway, Suite 603
Guimet, Paris.
80539 Munich London WC1A 2QA New York, NY 10003
Rosemary Crill......................................................................................... 227
ISBN 978-3-7913-5075-2 (hardcover)
Germany United Kingdom Tel: 212 995 2720
1. Art, Indic--India--Lucknow--Exhibitions. 2. Art, Indic--India--Oudh--Exhibi- Music in Lucknow’s Gilded Age
Tel: 49 89 242908 300 Tel: 44 20 7323 5004 Fax: 212 995 2733
tions. 3. Art and society--India--Lucknow--Exhibitions. 4. Art and society--India-
Fax: 49 89 242908 335 Fax: 44 20 7636 8004 E-mail: sales@prestel-usa.com Peter Manuel............................................................................................ 243
-Oudh--Exhibitions. I. Gude, Tushara Bindu. II. Alam, Muzaffar. III. Los
E-mail: sales@prestel.de Email: sales@ prestel.com
Angeles County Museum of Art. IV. Musée Guimet (Paris, France) V. Title.
prestel.de prestel-uk.co.uk
N7308.L83M37 2010
Glossary........................................250
709.54´207479494--dc22
Printing and binding: Toppan Printing Co., Ltd., China
2010027701 Checklist of the Exhibition............252
ISBN: 978-3-7913-5075-2 Jacket front: 16. Mir Kalan Khan, Lovers in a Landscape (detail), c. 1760–70 Selected Bibliography....................262
© 2010 Museum Associates, Los Angeles County Museum of Art Jacket Back: 21. A Dancer Balances a Bottle, c. 1770
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any Page 2: 4. A Turkish Sultana (detail), c. 1810–20 Acknowledgments..........................264
form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or Pages 4–5: 157. Mir Kalan Khan, A Royal Lion Hunt at Allahabad, c. 1760–65
Lenders to the Exhibition.............266
any other information storage and retrieval system or otherwise, without written Page 6: 156. Women’s Dancing Party, c. 1780
permission from the publisher. Page 9: 118. Style of Mihr Chand, A Partridge and an Iris, c. 1765–85 Index.............................................268

6 7
Foreword
India’s Fabled City: The Art of Courtly Lucknow is the
first major international exhibition to focus exclusively on
the vibrant artistic traditions and refined cosmopolitan
culture of the northern Indian city of Lucknow, the
capital of the Mughal Empire’s province of Awadh. From
the mid-eighteenth century until the establishment of
formal British rule in India in 1858, Lucknow rose in
prominence to become a cultural epicenter. Indian artists,
poets, and courtiers migrated there in large numbers
seeking security and patronage. European artists, travel-
ers, military adventurers, and commercial and political
agents were also soon lured to the region, seduced by tales
of the wealth and largesse of its rulers and the beauty
of the city. A distinctive aesthetic vision developed in
Lucknow as a result of the dynamic interaction between
the Mughal courtly traditions and the diverse artistic
imagery introduced by the city’s many multinational resi-
dents. India’s Fabled City: The Art of Courtly Lucknow
presents the full array of artworks associated with
Lucknow, discusses the development of its hybrid artistic
traditions, and explores cultural issues within the broader
narrative of South Asian colonial history.
As with most museum projects this ambitious in
scope, India’s Fabled City: The Art of Courtly Lucknow
required a long gestation period. Project director Stephen
Markel, LACMA’s Harry and Yvonne Lenart Curator
and Department Head of South and Southeast Asian Art,
developed the Lucknow exhibition over the course of
several years by locating appropriate works of art in
collections worldwide, refining the exhibition concept
through discussions with pertinent scholars, and selecting
potential contributors to the accompanying publication.
The exhibition’s co-curator, Tushara Bindu Gude, Associ-
ate Curator of South and Southeast Asian Art, joined
LACMA in 2006. Dr. Gude fine-tuned the preliminary
selection of paintings, drawings, prints, and photographs,
recommended additions, and was principally responsible
8 9
for devising the exhibition’s themes and organization.
In turn, Dr. Markel selected the decorative art objects
and was primarily responsible for loan negotiations,
administrative matters, and curatorial decisions regard-
ing the structure and content of the exhibition publication.
Given the substantial range and diversity of the
approximately two hundred works of art in the exhibition,
Dr. Markel realized that a multilayered interpretive
approach to the material was required to do it justice.
Accordingly, the exhibition and its publication are
designed to complement rather than duplicate each other.
Whereas the exhibition is primarily arranged themati-
cally and chronologically, this beautifully illustrated
volume of historical and media-based essays by leading
international scholars covers a broad range of Lucknow’s
distinctive humanities, including its renowned literature
and music. In this way it has been possible to offer a
more nuanced interpretation of Lucknow’s rich body of
aesthetic achievements.
India’s Fabled City: The Art of Courtly Lucknow
represents the culmination of a series of important
exhibitions on later Indian art organized by LACMA’s
Department of South and Southeast Asian Art: From
Merchants to Emperors: British Artists and India
1757–1930 (1986 – 87), Romance of the Taj Mahal (1989 – 90),
and Images from a Changing World: Kalighat Paintings
of Calcutta (1999). We are proud that the Los Angeles
County Museum of Art can be ranked at the forefront of
world-class museums with the expertise essential for
presenting the extraordinary artistic and cultural tradi-
tions of legendary Lucknow.
Michael Govan
CEO and Wallis Annenberg Director
Los Angeles County Museum of Art
Chronology
Compiled by Stephen Markel
1580 Mughal Emperor Akbar (r. 1556 –1605) estab-
lishes province (suba) of Awadh.
1719–48 Reign of Mughal Emperor Muhammad Shah.
His long reign suffers numerous attacks culminating in the sack
of Delhi in 1739 and the disintegration of the Mughal Empire, but
he revives the declining Mughal aesthetic style to a refined level
throughout the humanities.
1722–39 Rule of first nawab (governor) of
Awadh, Saadat Khan Burhan al-Mulk, an Iranian Shia
appointed by Muhammad Shah. He defeats the shaikhzadas of
Lucknow, rules from temporary capital at Faizabad, and
establishes nawabi dynasty.
1739 Delhi sacked by Iranian King Nadir Shah
(r. 1736 – 47). Precipitates first of four migration waves of poets,
artists, and intellectuals to Faizabad and Lucknow in Awadh.
1739–54 Rule of Nawab Safdar Jang. Serves as
prime minister (wazir) of the Mughal Empire. Distinguished
military officer and able administrator. Formally resides in
permanent family home in Delhi (palace built by Mughal Prince
Dara Shikoh [1615 –1659]). Rules Awadh from Faizabad, but
frequently based in Lucknow as dictated by events.
1748–54 Reign of Mughal Emperor Ahmad Shah.
Short and ineffectual rule. Important painter Mir Kalan Khan
(fl. c. 1734 –70) probably migrates to Awadh during this period.
1754–75 Rule of Nawab Shuja al-Daula. Serves
as prime minister of the Mughal Empire. Serves in Lucknow first
as the deputy governor responsible for the western provinces of
Awadh. After becoming nawab, he continues to favor Lucknow as
his primary residence until signing Treaty of Allahabad in 1765,
when he shifts the Awadh capital back to Faizabad and begins
extensive building program. During his long rule an independent
style of art and culture develops in Awadh.
10
1759–1806 Reign of Mughal Emperor Shah Alam II.
Long but impotent reign. Desires but fails to restore the glory of
the Mughal Empire.
c. 1763–75 Jean-Baptiste-Joseph Gentil (1726 –1799)
in Faizabad. French military officer in Compagnie des Indes
Orientales employed by Shuja al-Daula. Major patron of Indian
painting, manuscripts, and atlases, whose collection items survive
in Paris and London libraries.
1764 Battle of Buxar (Baksar). Combined armies
of Shuja al-Daula, Shah Alam II, and the nawab of Bengal
Mir Qasim (r. 1760 – 63) defeated by greatly outnumbered forces
of the English East India Company. Establishes dominance of
the Company.
1765 Treaty of Allahabad. Lord Robert Clive (1725 –
1774) restores Shuja al-Daula to power in exchange for trade
concessions, mutual defense fund, and substantial war restitution.
c. 1771–72 English artist Tilly Kettle (1735 –1786)
engaged by Shuja al-Daula in Faizabad. Creates portraits of the
nawab and family that inspire numerous copies.
1773 First British Resident Nathaniel Middleton
appointed to Awadh court in Faizabad (serves intermittently to
1782). Numerous Residents serve until annexation of Awadh in
1856. Residents responsible for political and financial decisions
of court; nawab authority confined to administrative and
personnel matters.
1773–76 and 1780–88 Colonel Antoine-Louis Polier
(1741–1795) in Faizabad and Lucknow. Franco-Swiss military
officer and engineer in the English East India Company. Major
patron of Indian painting and manuscripts whose collection items
survive primarily in Berlin, Paris, and London. Establishes
studio headed by preeminent artist Mihr Chand (fl. c. 1759 – 86).
1775–97 Rule of Nawab Asaf al-Daula. Returns
Awadh capital to Lucknow. High period of nawabi art and
culture. Constructs Bara Imambara, including extant gateway
Rumi Darwaza, 1786 – 91; and Daulat Khana, c. 1789.
1814–37 Robert Home (1752 –1834) serves as court
artist at Lucknow. Designs royal regalia for Ghazi al-Din
Haidar’s coronation in 1819.
1775–1800 Major General Claude Martin (1735– 1827–37 Reign of King Nasir Al-Din Haidar.
1800) in Lucknow. French-born military officer in the English Scandalous reputation. Constructs only a few structures,
East India Company and Renaissance man who becomes the principally the royal observatory, 1832 – 40.
superintendent of the Lucknow Arsenal under Asaf al-Daula.
1837–42 Reign of King Muhammad Ali Shah.
Assembles extensive library and collection of technological
Constructs numerous edifices, including Husainabad Imambara,
rarities. Designs and constructs town house Lakh-i Pera,
1837–78 (serves as his tomb); and Jami Masjid, 1845 (completed
completed c. 1781; and country house Constantia (La Martinière),
by his widow).
1796 (serves as his tomb).
1842–47 Reign of King Amjad Ali Shah.
1780–82 British civil servant Richard Johnson
Brief, pious rule. Constructs Sibtainabad Imambara (also known
(1753 –1807) in Lucknow. Important patron of Indian painting,
as Chota Imambara; serves as his tomb).
whose collection survives in London.
1847–56 Reign of King Wajid Ali Shah. Great
1783 William Hodges (1744 –1797) in Faizabad and
patron of the arts. Commissions several architectural projects,
Lucknow. First British landscape and architectural artist to
principally the Qaisar Bagh Palace complex, 1848 – 52.
visit Awadh.
1856 Awadh annexed by the English East India
1784–88 (intermittently) German neoclassical
Company. Wajid Ali Shah exiled to Calcutta, where he continues
painter Johann Zoffany (1733 –1810) active in Lucknow.
as a patron of music and poetry until his death in 1887.
1797–98 Rule of Nawab Wazir Ali Khan.
1857–58 Great Uprising (also known as the Sepoy
Serves only four months before being deposed for his violent
Mutiny or Rebellion and as the First War of Indian Indepen-
anti-British views.
dence). Period of violent revolt against British colonial rule in
1798–1814 Rule of Nawab Saadat Ali Khan. northern and central India, which is forcefully repressed.
Constructs Chattar Manzil, c. 1803 (primary residence of nawabs
1858 Felice Beato (1832 –1909) arrives in Lucknow to
until completion of Qaisar Bagh in 1852); Dilkusha Kothi,
photograph the sites of important events during the Uprising in
c. 1805 (designed by Gore Ouseley); and Lal Barahdari (darbar
order to memorialize British heroism.
hall later converted to coronation hall and throne room for Ghazi
al-Din Haidar). 1858 Local minor rajas and taluqdars (wealthy Muslim
and Hindu landowners and landlords) assume nawabs’ former
1801 Richard Colley Wellesley, governor-general of
role as patrons of the arts in Lucknow.
India (1798 –1805), forces Saadat Ali Khan to cede half of
Awadh’s territory and its revenue to permanent British control.
1814–27 Rule and reign of Ghazi al-Din
Haidar, who was Nawab to 1819, thereafter King of
Awadh. Constructs Shah Najaf Imambara (serves as his tomb
and that of three wives).
11
 And after this there is morning, a new dawn, Majaz,

The twilight of Lucknow’s sorrows fades with us.

Note to the Reader

Published on the occasion of the exhibition of the same name, this
Asrar al-Haq Majaz (1911–1955)
book provides the general reader and scholarly audiences with a
historical overview and interpretive discussions of the works of art
featured in India’s Fabled City: The Art of Courtly Lucknow.
The checklist in the back of the book provides full caption
information on the objects exhibited. It is organized by the
exhibition’s themes, and checklist items are numbered consecu-
tively. These numbers are used in page references as well as in the
abbreviated checklist captions to allow for easy cross-reference.
Figures, separately numbered consecutively throughout the book,
are comparative, nonchecklist illustrations; full caption informa-
tion for these is provided with the images. The checklist is
complete and accurate as of July 28, 2010.
Indian words and names have been rendered in the roman
alphabet using various conventions, all with an eye toward
simplicity. Preference has been given to phonetic spellings and
versions familiar to English-language readers, such as the
Anglicized “Lucknow” rather than the more accurate “Lakhna’u”
or “Lakhnau.” Diacritical marks have not been used. When dates
are given in the Islamic calendar, they are preceded by AH; as
these refer to lunar years, a slash may be used to indicate
ambiguity in stating their solar/CE equivalent.
Dimensions given generally follow the order height x width x
depth. Occasional variants include: length (l) x width (w), and
height (h) x diameter (diam.).

12 13
The Dynastic History
of Lucknow
Stephen Markel

RiveRs of wealth flowed, Riches Rained down fRom the sky . . .

theRe was a pRolifeRation of pleasuRe-seeking,
an excess of mateRial wealth. 1

This evocative characterization of the abundance enjoyed in the northern Indian city of
Lucknow during its majestic heyday in the mid-eighteenth through the mid-nineteenth
centuries epitomizes its popular conception in the minds of Indians and Europeans alike.
It is also the key to understanding the motivation of myriad immigrants of diverse
occupations and nationalities who came to Lucknow seeking their fortunes and often
fame or power.
While the story of the region’s origins begins in ancient religious lore, the later his-
tory of Lucknow relevant here began in 1580, when the Mughal Emperor Akbar (r. 1556 –
1605) established the administrative province of Awadh (also known in literature by its
Sanskritized name, Avadh, and by its Anglicized forms, Oudh or Oude). Prosperous from
its bountiful agriculture, Lucknow remained an otherwise unremarkable provincial
capital and commercial center until political events in the Mughal capital of Delhi engen-
dered several waves of migration to the safety and affluence of Awadh. The first exodus
from Delhi was precipitated by its sack in 1739 by the Iranian ruler Nadir Shah (r. 1736 –
47). During the second half of the eighteenth century Delhi was also invaded by the
Sikhs, the Marathas, and the Afghan Rohillas, all of whose raids contributed to further
instability in the imperial capital. A second and a third surge of immigrants to Awadh
occurred during the rules of the nawabs (governors) Shuja al-Daula (r. 1754 –75) and
Asaf al-Daula (r. 1775 – 97), respectively. A fourth influx to Lucknow followed the occupa-
tion of Delhi in 1803 by British troops and their assumption of political control over the
weakened Mughal Empire. As a result of the emigration of many of Delhi’s leading
cultural luminaries and intelligentsia to the blossoming court of Awadh, the region
experienced a rapid rise to eminence. Constrained geographically, militarily, and politi-
cally by the growing hegemony of the English East India Company, Awadh’s rulers
ultimately turned to artistic pursuits rather than territorial acquisition to assert their
dynastic ambitions. The riches and political importance of Awadh lured supplicants from
near and far who joined the nawabs and court elite in the cultural ferment. Local minor
rajas and wealthy landholders frequently sought to curry favor from the nawabs. Numer-
ous British and Continental visitors, many of whom became long-term residents, were
also attracted to Awadh in hopes of profit for both their companies and themselves.

14 15 MaRkel : The Dynastic HistoRy of Lucknow

 Lucknow’s hereditary dynasty began in 1722 when an Iranian Shia Muslim noble
named Saadat Khan Burhan al-Mulk (r. 1722–39) was appointed the nawab of Awadh by
the Mughal Emperor Muhammad Shah (r. 1719–48). Although nominally in charge of the
region, Saadat Khan still had to conquer the local land barons who ruled Lucknow, the
shaikhzadas, in order to begin his governorship. Through able as well as devious adminis-
tration Saadat Khan consolidated his control over Awadh and secured his political base
and increasing autonomy. In 1739 Saadat Khan conspired with Nadir Shah to conquer
Delhi but died immediately before the attack, reportedly by suicide. Saadat Khan’s
2
nephew and son-in-law Safdar Jang (r. 1739–54) was then appointed the governor of
Awadh by Muhammad Shah. After Safdar Jang repulsed several military incursions, he
was rewarded by being promoted to wazir (chief minister) of the Mughal Empire. During
Safdar Jang’s long rule, Awadh enjoyed a lasting peace that enabled the development
of an independent style of art and culture.
Both Saadat Khan and Safdar Jang regarded Delhi as their permanent family home.
Consequently, they ruled Awadh from temporary quarters in a fort at Faizabad, approxi-
mately ninety miles east of Lucknow. The early nawabs and their officers often traveled
back and forth between Faizabad and Lucknow, residing in the city where current events
14. Muhammad Shah and Nadir Shah, c. 1740
Pages 14–15: 2. Muhammad Azam, Nasir al-din Haidar , c. 1830
16
1. Tilly Kettle, Shuja al-Daula, Nawab of Awadh,
Holding a Bow, 1772
dictated their attention. Faizabad was closer to the
eastern provinces of Awadh, whereas Lucknow was
centrally located and also functioned more readily as the
base of operations for activities in the western provinces.
Thus, the two cities of Faizabad and Lucknow served as
alternating seats of nawabi power and presence. 3
When Safdar Jang died in 1754, he was succeeded by
his son Shuja al-Daula as the nawab of Awadh. Shuja
al-Daula had been living in Lucknow in his capacity as
the deputy governor responsible for the western provinces
of Awadh, and after becoming nawab, he continued to
favor Lucknow as his primary residence. Like his father,
Shuja al-Daula also served valiantly and skillfully at the
Mughal court, and eventually was appointed wazir under
Shah Alam II (r. 1759–1806).
The course of Lucknow’s history changed dramati-
cally in 1764. In what proved a futile attempt to curb the
growing power of the English East India Company,
the combined but ineffectual armies of Shuja al-Daula,
Shah Alam II, and the recently deposed nawab of Bengal,
17
Mir Qasim (r. 1760–63), were decisively defeated at the
Battle of Buxar (Baksar) in Bihar, in eastern India, by
the greatly outnumbered British forces led by Major
Hector Munro (1726–1805). Shuja al-Daula shrewdly
threw himself upon the mercy of Lord Robert Clive
(1725–1774), who, unwilling to take over the administra-
tion of the vast realms of those defeated and wanting a
buffer zone against the Marathas and the remaining
Mughal Empire, restored Shuja al-Daula to power in
Awadh through the Treaty of Allahabad in 1765, this in
exchange for duty-free trade concessions throughout
eastern India and parts of present-day Bangladesh, a
mutual defense alliance funded by Awadh, and a substan-
tial war restitution of five million rupees.4 On his return
to Lucknow, Shuja al-Daula curtailed his military
aggression and relocated his capital to Faizabad. He
developed Faizabad into an important cultural center and
erected luxurious palaces and lush gardens,5 but it
served as Awadh’s capital for only another decade, until
Shuja al-Daula’s death in 1775. Shuja al-Daula’s son and
successor, Asaf al-Daula, returned the capital to Lucknow
soon after his accession, reportedly to establish his
independence and escape the interference of his mother,
the powerful widow of Shuja al-Daula, Bahu Begam.6
It was during the rule of Asaf al-Daula that the
artistic glories of Lucknow and the Awadh dynasty truly
began to flourish. Asaf al-Daula reveled in a life of courtly
splendor and strove to surpass his rival potentates, the
Nizam Ali Khan of Hyderabad (r. 1762–1803) and Tipu
Sultan of Mysore (r. 1783–99).7 He spent lavish sums on
the luxuries of royalty and built imposing palatial and
religious architecture to proclaim the magnificence of his
dynasty. Grand palaces, mosques, and mausoleums were
erected, inspired by the architectural marvels of the great
Mughals but given a European flavor through hybrid
flourishes and embellishment on the interior with numer-
ous European glass chandeliers. Asaf al-Daula and the
nawabs of Lucknow also commissioned special halls called
imambaras in honor of Shia religious leaders (imams) for
use in the Shia observance of Muharram.8
The significance of the reigns of Shuja al-Daula and
Asaf al-Daula cannot be understated. Shuja al-Daula and
his primary wife, Bahu Begam, cultivated a vibrant,
urbane culture for the Awadh court at Faizabad. Asaf
MaRkel : The Dynastic HistoRy of Lucknow
al-Daula, though neither praised during his life nor remembered by historians for any
momentous political accomplishments, nonetheless was responsible for fostering a sophis-
ticated aesthetic vision for the Awadh court at Lucknow, which in turn defined the
stylistic identity for much of the dynasty’s future artistic achievement. The two nawabs
also enabled Awadh to become a fertile environment for the arts. The prosperity and
patronage of their courts not only attracted numerous Indian painters,9 poets,10 musi-
cians, singers, and dancers 11 but also enticed many Britons and Europeans into long-term
residences while they served at court in various military or advisory capacities. These
expatriates 12 are significant in the present context because some of them became active
collectors and patrons of the arts, especially of Indian painting. They in turn attracted
various European artists to Awadh 13 who not only produced numerous portraits and other
works in western styles but also helped stimulate a dynamic cross-cultural interaction
in the arts and architecture.
After the death of Asaf al-Daula in 1797, the English East India Company (“the
Company”) quickly demanded and was accorded far greater political and economic
control over the Lucknow court. Asaf al-Daula’s chosen successor was his adopted son,
Wazir Ali Khan (r. 1797–98), but he ruled for a mere four tumultuous months before being
deposed for his violent anti-British views by Sir John Shore, the governor-general of
India (1793–97). Shore installed Asaf al-Daula’s young half-brother Saadat Ali Khan
(r. 1798–1814) as the new puppet nawab of Lucknow and forced him to sign a succession
settlement ceding control of the Allahabad Fort and committing to a substantial annual
subsidy to the British. Further concessions were imposed in 1801, when the succeeding
governor-general (from 1798 to 1805), Richard Colley Wellesley, Lord Mornington and
1st Marquis of Wellesley, forced Saadat Ali Khan to surrender even more political author-
ity and to cede half of Awadh’s territory and the considerable revenue derived from it to
permanent British control.14 Despite Saadat Ali Khan’s enfeebling loss of half his domain
and virtually all his political power—or some might say because of his great loss—he
proved a remarkable builder who transformed Lucknow’s urban landscape. He had a
broad thoroughfare constructed for European visitors so they would not have to trans-
verse Lucknow’s notorious crowded lanes, and he commissioned numerous country homes
and a palace complex built in an imposing hybrid architectural style.15
Another major chapter in Lucknow’s history opened with the accession in 1814 of
Saadat Ali Khan’s son, Ghazi al-Din Haidar, who in 1819 was officially crowned king of
Awadh; he ruled until 1827.16 In casting off the nominal yoke of Mughal subjugation to
assert his sovereignty, Ghazi al-Din Haidar proudly proclaimed the fulfillment of the
Awadh dynasty’s imperial aspirations. His assumption of an independent throne was
aggressively promoted on behalf of the Company by Francis Rawdon-Hastings, 1st
Marquess of Hastings, who was then Indian governor-general (1813–22). The long-term
practical effect of the collusion was that Ghazi al-Din Haidar and his reigning descen-
dants became entrenched in financial and political obligations that would help lead to the
complete annexation of Awadh in 1856, and eventually to the establishment of formal
British rule over India. Ghazi al-Din Haidar’s coronation was an exceedingly lavish
affair, modeled in ceremony and symbolic accoutrements upon Mughal empowerment 36. Muhammad Azam, Ghazi al-din Haidar , c. 1830

rituals, but the crown and sumptuous garments of his imperial regalia were designed in a

18 19 MaRkel : The Dynastic HistoRy of Lucknow


Fig. 1. CRown PResented to EdwaRd VII when PRince of
Wales by the TaluQdaRs of Awadh, c. 1875; India, Uttar
Pradesh, probably Lucknow; gold, enamels, pearls, emeralds,
diamonds, velvet, and cotton, 6 9⁄16 x 12 1⁄2 in. (16.8 x 32 cm); The
Royal Collection
hybrid European style by his English court artist Robert Home (1752–1834).17 Although
Ghazi al-Din Haidar expended considerable effort and expense in proclaiming his
newfound kingly status, including issuing appropriately aggrandizing coinage and
commemorative medals, he had little actual political power under the controlling over-
sight of the British Resident, who was responsible for promoting the commercial inter-
18
ests of the Company. With limited governmental responsibilities, Ghazi al-Din Haidar
was free to patronize literature and poetry, as well as commission various monuments,
including the Chota Chattar Manzil, parts of the Moti Mahal complex, and the Shah
Najaf Imambara, which serves as his mausoleum.
Ghazi al-Din Haidar was succeeded by his son Nasir al-Din Haidar (r. 1827–37). He
built only a few structures, principally the royal observatory, but is chiefly remembered
for his dalliances and avoidance of administrative responsibility. When he died childless
after being poisoned in 1837, a tragic struggle for succession ensued. Ghazi al-Din
19
Haidar’s brother Muhammad Ali Shah (r. 1837–42) was finally installed by the British
as the new king of Awadh and promptly set about restoring an effective administration
and constructing numerous edifices, including the grand Husainabad Imambara, in
which he is entombed.
Muhammad Ali Shah was followed briefly by his pious son Amjad Ali Shah
(r. 1842–47), who was succeeded by his son Wajid Ali Shah (r. 1847–56). Wajid Ali Shah
inherited a kingship that was virtually bereft of political power. In consequence perhaps,
he was a devoted practitioner and patron of the arts, especially music, dance, and poetry.
Many notable compositions were created during his reign. He also commissioned a
number of architectural projects, including a walled garden for his wife Sikander Begam.
20
His most magnificent monument was the Qaisar Bagh, an
enormous palatial complex built between 1848 and 1852.
After less than a decade of Wajid Ali Shah’s reign, how-
ever, in 1856 Awadh was annexed by the English East
India Company and the former king was banished to Cal-
cutta (Kolkata), where he continued to patronize music and
poetry, and lived, muted, in exile until his death in 1887.
Although the aesthetic glories of Lucknow declined
sharply at this time, especially after the widespread retal-
iatory destruction in 1858 following the Great Uprising
of 1857 (also known as the Sepoy Mutiny or Rebellion and
the First War of Indian Independence), sophisticated
artistic expression in the media of painting, metalware,
and jewelry, and in arts such as music and poetry, contin-
ued in Lucknow well into the early twentieth century.
Three primary sources of artistic sponsorship developed
to fill the void left by the forced departure of Awadh’s
ruler and court. The principal new arts patrons were the
local minor rajas and taluqdars, a class of wealthy Muslim
and Hindu landowners and landlords, many of whom
aspired to become gentry (179).20
A lucrative commercial market functioned as a second
form of new patronage for the artists of Lucknow. Because
of the widespread renown of the cataclysmic events of
1857–58, especially the six-month siege of the Residency,
Lucknow became a “must see” stop on tourist itineraries
for European and Indians alike (although the emotional
connotations of the sites visited certainly differed for the
two groups). Accordingly, a thriving trade in Lucknow’s
famed silver metalware and jewelry sprang up in the
city’s main market (182, p. 22).21 Popular genre paintings
and stock photographs were also presumably available.
Finally, it is not unlikely that some of the craftsmen
who produced the nawabi and subsequently royal architec-
ture of Lucknow were hired to build the many Hindu and
Jain temples of Awadh that were commissioned by the
wealthy Hindu nobles at court or by the city’s rich Jain
jewelers and merchants.22
Although but a shadow of its former resplendence, the
aesthetic legacy of Lucknow lives on in the arts and crafts
being produced there today, in cinema and music extolling
Lucknow’s once suave sophistication, and in scholarly
publications and exhibitions such as India’s Fabled City: 179. Darogah Abbas Ali, from An IllustRated
HistoRical Album of the Rajas and TaluQdaRs
The Art of Courtly Lucknow. of Oudh, 1880
21 MaRkel : The Dynastic HistoRy of Lucknow
 1 . Abul Lais Siddiqi, Lakhna’u ka Dabistan-i Sha’iri (Lahore: Urdu Markaz, Talwar Oldenburg, The Making of Colonial Lucknow, 1856–1877 (Princeton:
1955; Ph.D. diss., Aligarh Muslim University, 1942), 47, quoted in Carla Princeton University Press, 1984), 215 – 43; and Saiyid Zaheer Husain Jafri,
Petievich, Assembly of Rivals: Delhi, Lucknow and the Urdu Ghazal (New Studies in the Anatomy of a Transformation: Awadh from Mughal to Colonial
Delhi: Manohar, 1992), 21. Rule (New Delhi: Gyan Publishing House, 1998), especially “Origin and
2 . Ashirbadi Lal Srivastava, The First Two Nawabs of Awadh, 2nd ed. (Agra: Growth of Ta’alluqadari Tenures in Awadh,” 73 – 81, and “The Land
Shiva Lal Agarwala & Co., 1954), 70. Controlling Classes in Awadh—A Study of Changes in Their Composition,
1600 –1900,” 157–76.
3. In strictly chronological terms, the capital of Awadh was as follows:
Faizabad, 1722 – 54; Lucknow, 1754 – 65; Faizabad, 1765 –75; Lucknow, 21 . Wynyard R. T. Wilkinson, Indian Silver 1858–1947: Silver from the Indian
1775 –onward. Sub-Continent and Burma Made by Local Craftsmen in Western Forms
(London: W. R. T. Wilkinson, 1999), p. 126.
4. Michael H. Fisher, A Clash of Cultures: Awadh, the British, and the Mughals
(New Delhi: Mahohar, 1987), 38. 22 . See Catherine Asher’s essay in this volume.
5. Ashirbadi Lal Srivastava, Shuja-ud-Daulah, Vol. 2, 1765–1775 (Lahore: Min-
erva Book Shop, 1945), 48 – 49.
6. Richard E. Barnett, North India Between Empires: Awadh, the Mughals, and
the British, 1720–1801 (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California
Press, 1980), 105.
7. Abdul Halim Sharar, Lucknow: The Last Phase of an Oriental Culture, trans.
and ed. E. S. Harcourt and Fakhir Hussain (1975; Boulder, CO: Westview
Press, 1976), 45 – 47.
8. Muharram commemorates the Battle of Karbala in 680 and the massacre of
the third Imam, Husain, the grandson of the Prophet, whose death helped
foster a severe sectarian split within Islam. The Shias differ from the more
numerous Sunnis in that they consider an alternate historical line of
religious leaders as the true followers of the Prophet Muhammad (c.
570 – 632). Shias also do not ascribe to the authority of the Sunna, a
supplement to the Quran concerned with Islamic law. Whereas the Mughal
emperors were Sunni Muslims, the Lucknow nawabs were Shia. Under their
rule, Lucknow became the leading center of Shia learning in India and one of
the greatest in the vast Islamic world.
9. Including Mir Kalan Khan (fl. c. 1734 –70), Nidha Mal (fl. c. 1735–75), and
Mihr Chand (fl. c. 1759 – 86).
10. Especially Mirza Rafi’ “Sauda” (1713 –1780), Muhammad Taqi “Mir”
(1722 –1810), and Mir Ghulam Hasan (c. 1735 –1786).
11 . Such as Ghulam Rasool and his son Ghulam Nabi Shori “Shori Miyan” (fl. c.
1790 –1795).
12 . Most notably Major General Claude Martin (1735 –1800), Colonel Antoine-
Louis Henri Polier (1741–1795), and Jean-Baptiste-Joseph Gentil (1726 –
1799).
13. The earliest and best known of the British artists was Tilly Kettle
(1735 –1786), who was engaged by Shuja al-Daula in Faizabad from c. 1771 to
1772. Later notable European artists who worked in Lucknow for part of
their careers included Johann Zoffany (1733 –1810), William Hodges
(1744 –1797), Thomas Daniell (1749 –1840) and William Daniell (1769 –1837),
Robert Home (1752 –1834), Francesco Renaldi (1755 –c. 1799), and George
Chinnery (1774 –1854).
14. Barnett, North India Between Empires, 235 – 36.
15. Neeta Das, “The ‘Country Houses’ of Lucknow,” in Lucknow: City of
Illusion, ed. Rosie Llewellyn-Jones (New York: Alkazi Collection of
Photography; Munich: Prestel, 2006), 170 – 89, figs. 93 –110.
16. Even though from this point onward the sovereigns of Awadh technically
reigned as kings rather than ruled as governors, the “nawabi period” is
generally defined as continuing until the annexation of Awadh in 1856.
17. See Fisher, A Clash of Cultures, pp. 120 – 41; and Michael H. Fisher, “The
Imperial Coronation of 1819: Awadh, the British, and the Mughals,” Modern
Asian Studies 19:2 (1985): 239 –77.
18. British Residents, who functioned as the English East India Company’s
political agents in situ, were first posted at the Awadh court during the rule
of Shuja al-Daula. Originally intended to advise the court on foreign and
economic policies, the Residents’ authority increased over time, until they
determined virtually all governmental matters (apart from purely adminis-
trative decisions) and rivaled the nawabs in prestige and even pomp. See
Fisher, A Clash of Cultures; and Michael H. Fisher, “The Resident in Court
Ritual, 1764 –1858,” Modern Asian Studies 24:3 (1990): 419 – 58.
19. Sharar, Lucknow, 56 – 58.
20. For historical studies of the taluqdars, see Thomas R. Metcalf, Land,
Landlords, and the British Raj: Northern India in the Nineteenth Century
(Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1979), especially Left: 182. Ewer with Coriander
“The Taluqdari Style of Life: A Leisured Aristocracy,” 341–75; Veena Flower Pattern, c. 1860

22 23 MaRkel : The Dynastic HistoRy of Lucknow

India’s Fabled City:
Narratives
of an Exhibition
Tushara Bindu Gude

And after this there is morning, a new dawn, Majaz,

The twilight of Lucknow’s sorrows fades with us.
Asrar al-Haq Majaz (1911–1955) 1

The visual culture of Awadh, from the time of its emergence as an independent nawabi
state in the mid-eighteenth century through the aftermath of the Uprising in the mid-
nineteenth century, encompassed a rich variety of artistic forms, styles, and practices.
These were reflected in architecture, traditional courtly paintings, decorative arts, and
textiles, as well as landscapes, portraits, and photographs by Indian and European
artists working for elite patrons in the region. Many such artworks circulated far beyond
the political boundaries of the kingdom. Varied collections were taken to England and
Europe by travelers and by officials and merchants of the various East India Companies,
while paintings, prints, and, later, photographs of Lucknow exposed the city to distant
eyes. The region and its arts were thus refracted through many diverse lenses which are
considered throughout this exhibition.
India’s Fabled City: The Art of Courtly Lucknow examines the full range of artistic
traditions associated with the region of Awadh, encompassing subjects that have never
before been the focus of a major museum exhibition. An extraordinarily sophisticated and
ethnically diverse community flourished in the Awadhi capitals of Faizabad and Lucknow
during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The region’s cosmopolitan culture and its
complex political, social, and cultural histories—as many of the essays in this volume
make clear—prevent any easy or simplistic approach to the presentation of its arts. In
order to do justice to these complexities, as well as present the visual material in a
manner that is at once comprehensible to a general audience, of value to a scholarly one,
and of interest to both, the exhibition is organized along several intersecting narrative
lines that allow for a consideration of stylistic developments in Awadh’s arts as well as
related issues of identity, hybridity, colonialism, memory, and nostalgia. While such
issues are also addressed in this publication, its various essays—many of which are
focused on particular media—are intended to complement, rather than duplicate, the
organization and emphases of the exhibition.
The “fabled” city that is the focus of this investigation was known for many extraor-
dinary things, including the richness of its Urdu poetry. While such poetry was but one

24 25 Gude : NaRRatives of an exhibition

 facet of Lucknow’s elegant literary culture, the story of
the city—a place that promised the fulfillment of desire
and fantasy—reverberates remarkably with the imagery
of many Urdu verses extolling the seductive allure of one’s
beloved. Much of this poetry, furthermore, addresses
love’s attendant sorrows so that disappointment, anguish,
heartbreak, and cruelty are also among its subjects. 2 The palace here was the abode of light.
Whether we are referring then to Lucknow’s South Asian
and Persian residents and immigrants or to European,
especially British, expatriates and travelers, the multifac-
eted expressions contained in the region’s poetry provide
apt metaphors for the ambiguous and complex political
and social relationships which shaped Lucknow’s history
and culture.
That memories of cities themselves could inform
poems of great eloquence is suggested by several verses
that bracket the history of Lucknow from the time of its
emergence as a North Indian cultural capital to its 1856
annexation by the English East India Company. From the
mid-eighteenth century until the establishment of formal
British rule in India in 1858, Faizabad and then Lucknow
had eclipsed Delhi to become the cultural center of
northern India. Artists, poets, and courtiers flocked to
Awadh as Delhi suffered a long period of unrest that
began with Nadir Shah’s sack and plunder of the imperial
Mughal capital in 1739. One of these poets, Muhammad
Taqi “Mir” (1722 –1810), migrated to Lucknow in 1782 and
wrote nostalgically of what he perceived to be his forced
estrangement from Delhi:
Far better than Lucknow
were the ruins of Delhi:
Would that I had died back there
than let my madness lead me here!3
Several of Mir’s younger contemporaries shared his view
that Lucknow could never rival the magnificence, cultural
or otherwise, of their beloved native city. Other Delhi-
4
bred poets, however, came to appreciate the particular
charms of the Awadhi capital. Mir Hasan (1727–1787), for
instance, appears to have modeled the city in Sihr al-
22. Layla and Majnun, and KhusRau and ShiRin, c. 1775
Bayan (The Mirror of Eloquence), his famous 1784 – 85
masnavi, after Lucknow itself:
Pages 24–25: 56. PRocession of Ghazi al-Din Haidar
thRough the StReets of Lucknow (detail), c. 1820
26
How to tell you about the extent of the city?
It is like Isfahan, as good as half the world. . . .
Its whiteness, wonderful to look at, is such,
That it seems the bricks have turned into marble.
How should I describe the grandeur of the fort?
The mountain seems to droop on seeing its height.
Luxury and splendour always flourished there.5
A little more than seventy years later, the last king of
Awadh, Wajid Ali Shah—a renowned poet who wrote
under the name Akhtar—expressed his exile from Awadh
in the following words:
Father, I am leaving my home;
Four bearers are lifting my palanquin;
My house is becoming foreign to me.6
Utilizing imagery recalling a new bride’s farewell to her
parental home or the raising of a corpse upon a funeral
bier, Wajid Ali Shah poignantly couched his forced
departure from the beloved city of his birth in terms of
loss and death.7
Poetry, such an important feature of Lucknow’s
culture, thus provides India’s Fabled City with an evoca-
tive narrative structure against which the history of
the region and its arts are anchored. Some segments of
the exhibition are organized chronologically in order to
chart—against this poetic narrative—Lucknow’s cultural
emergence, flowering, and destruction following the 1857
Uprising. The introduction to the exhibition is titled
“Hybrid Visions” and consists of a few key artworks,
dating from the mid-eighteenth through the mid-
nineteenth centuries, suggesting the multiple perspectives
that informed Lucknow’s history, culture, and legacy.
The exhibition’s first main section, “The Nawabs of
Awadhas Sovereigns and Heirs to Mughal Glory,”
describes Awadh’s relationships to Mughal Delhi, which
are crucial for understanding both the sources of the
region’s various artistic traditions and the forms through
which the nawabs expressed their sovereignty well into
the nineteenth century. Several eighteenth-century
Mughal and Awadhi paintings document the manner in
which the region’s cultural preeminence was initially built
upon the dissolution of the imperial capital and the
27 Gude : NaRRatives of an exhibition
 emigration of imperially trained artists. Awadh’s rulers
articulated a continuum between the Mughals’ and their
own rule through the collecting of imperial manuscripts
and the adoption of other Mughal prerogatives. New styles
as well as the innovative treatment of subject matter—as
in composite illustrations of Persian and South Asian
romances, perhaps not surprising given the importance of
poetry among Awadhi elites—were soon formulated in the
kingdom (22, p. 26; 23).
The next three areas of the exhibition explore various
thematic subjects through which the development of the
Awadhi style is assessed, particularly in portraiture,
architecture, and courtly decorative arts. These sections
also examine the nature of artistic and cultural interac-
tion at Lucknow in the years before the Uprising. The
first of these, for instance, “The Nawabs of Awadh as
Patrons,” consists primarily of portraits that serve to
introduce Awadh’s rulers—from Shuja al-Daula to Wajid
Ali Shah—as well as highlight their patronage of various
artists who flocked to India in the late eighteenth century
in the wake of significant political gains made by the East
India Company. Tilly Kettle was one of the first profes-
sional British artists to travel to India, and spent a year in
Faizabad in about 1771–72. Several of his portraits were 13. PoRtRait of a EuRopean Woman, early 17th century

copied by Indian artists, as were other works by subse-

quent European painters at Awadh (1, p. 17; 31, p. 239; 122,
p. 178; 154, p. 180). In certain ways, these Awadhi copies
of various paintings and prints can be seen to continue are juxtaposed here in order to examine their differing
earlier artistic practices in which painters at the Mughal approaches to the depiction of the built environment and
court assimilated and experimented with the styles and their underlying sensibilities. The range of the latter is
subject matter of European artworks (13; 4, p. 31). conveyed by the picturesque aesthetic of William Hodges
Although European-style portraiture was thus a signifi- and Thomas and William Daniell, the topographic
cant feature of Awadh’s artistic history, here it is explored interest of amateur British military artists, the tradi-
in relation to more traditional manners of depiction, tional approach of Indian artists—as conveyed, for
which continued to find royal favor even after the advent instance, in Jean-Baptiste Gentil’s Palais Indiennes—and
of photography. the stylistic synthesis evident in later Indian panoramas
Photographs by both Indian and European practitio- and watercolors by artists such as Sita Ram (107, p. 30).
ners are featured in several sections of the exhibition, Because the bulk of the surviving visual documentation
23. Attributed presenting complementary and conflicting images of for Lucknow’s architecture consists of late-nineteenth-
to Faizullah,
A Composite Lucknow. They join drawings, watercolors, and prints in century photographs, several examples are brought
of Scenes
fRom PeRsian
the fourth section, “The Allure of Faizabad and Luck- together to illustrate the city’s major religious and
LiteRatuRe
now,” where they collectively present a vision of the secular monuments. The various styles of these buildings
Entitled
“LoveRs and landscape, architecture, and other sights of Awadh (34, reflect the multiple sources—Mughal, indigenous, and
Beloved,”
c. 1765 35, p. 34). Indian and European works of art especially European—that were brought to bear upon the region’s

28 29 Gude : NaRRatives of an exhibition

107. Sita Ram, GeneRal Claude MaRtin’s House Constantia
Set in Its PaRk at Lucknow, 1814 –15

architecture. A similar range of styles can be seen in Lucknow’s decorative arts tradi-
tions, several examples of which are gathered together in the fifth section of the exhibi-
tion, “Courtly Opulence in Awadh.” 4. A Turkish Sultana, c. 1810 –20

The cumulative effect of Lucknow’s built environment was described with awe,
and some derision, by Honoria Lawrence in 1843:
lying before us. Is this a city in Oudh? Is this the capital of a writing on Muslim India.12 The British decision to annex
Gilded domes surmounted by the crescent—tall, slender pillars, lofty colonnades, half-grecian looking
semibarbarous race, erected by a corrupt, effete, and degraded the province of Awadh was legitimized in large part by
houses of several stories high with pillars, verandas and windows, iron railing and balustrades (entirely
dynasty? I confess I felt inclined to rub my eyes again and again.9 both official pronouncements and sensationalistic
foreign in this country), cages of wild beasts and brilliant birds, gardens, fountains and cypress trees . . .
make a confused and very dazzling picture. . . . Here the sight-worthiness of the place consists not in accounts of debauched nawabi rule.13
any one building but in the architectural groups, the long vistas or arches, domes and minarets, the Both Lawrence’s and Russell’s observations reflect While colonial political machinations are not the
glittering crowds, the whole bewildering mixture of Europe and Asia and the air of wealth which despite nineteenth-century orientalist constructions of India, as focus of this exhibition, the culture of colonialism and its
bad taste and inconsistency, altogether comes nearer to anything I have seen to realize my early ideas is evident in the former’s equation of Lucknow with the effects on nineteenth-century assessments of Awadhi art
of the Arabian Nights and Lala Rookh.8 romanticized East—both in literary translation (One and architecture inform its approach to some degree.
Thousand and One Nights) and in imagination (Thomas Notions similar to those expressed by Lawrence, Russell,
Similar sentiments were echoed some years later in My Indian Mutiny Diary, written
Moore’s 1817 poem Lalla Rookh)—as well as the latter’s and others—regarding various realms of artistic activ-
by the Irish war correspondent William H. Russell:
mention of “a corrupt, effete, and degraded dynasty” as ity—persisted well into the twentieth century.14 Rosie
the architects of the “fairy-city.” 10 In contrast to these Llewellyn-Jones has noted that the most negative assess-
A vision of palaces, minars, domes azure and golden, cupolas, colonnades, long facades of fair perspective
in pillar and column, terraced roofs—all rising up amid a calm still ocean of the brightest verdure.
incredulous descriptions of Lucknow, other observers ments of nawabi architecture were directed toward those
Look for miles and miles away, and still the ocean spreads, and the towers of the fairy-city gleam in its noted the “squalid poverty” and “wretched habitations” of buildings that were stylistically unique in either their
midst. Spires of gold glitter in the sun. Turrets and gilded spheres shine like constellations. There is Lucknow’s “swarming population.” As is well known, the
11
particular presentation of disparate European architec-
nothing mean or squalid to be seen. There is a city more vast than Paris, as it seems, and more brilliant, language of oriental despotism informed much British tural elements or their commingling of European and

30 31 Gude : NaRRatives of an exhibition

South Asian traditions. European critics, seeing miscegenation in the building styles
with which they were most familiar—and thus readily able to criticize—never once
considered the parallels between Western pastiches of oriental exotica and the nawabi
refashioning of European architectural forms. As Europeans became familiar with more
traditional South Asian architecture, Lucknow’s buildings also came to be compared
unfavorably with the Mughal monuments of Delhi and Agra. Increasingly through the
nineteenth century, the perceived decadence of Awadh’s architecture came to be inter-
preted as a sign of its rulers’ self-centered, weak, and depraved moral characters. The
confusion that might have been occasioned by contradictory and shifting foreign atti-
tudes to Lucknow’s hybrid arts recalls a verse by the Lucknow poet Khwajah Haidar Ali
Atish (1777–1847):
On the chess-board of love
Where the heart
Squares off against the Beloved
I’m bewildered into checkmate.16
of estates, and the collecting of Indian artworks. Martin’s
massive country mansion and tomb, Constantia (or La
Martinière), is the European visual equivalent of the
nawabs’ own architectural “excess.”
The households of Polier and Martin included their
Indian wives and their Anglo-Indian children—as was
the case for many, mostly British, men in India prior to
15
the early-nineteenth-century hardening of colonial
policies and attitudes toward Indian and European social
and sexual interactions (Fig. 2). 18
Such relationships are
not without a certain degree of controversy or ambiguity.19
Both Polier and Martin were highly cognizant of their
own cultural identities within the increasingly British-
dominated arena where they amassed their great for-
tunes; both wished to return, ultimately, to their native
Europe. When Polier finally departed Lucknow, he left
his two Indian wives behind.20
Maya Jasanoff has noted the different ways in which
Polier and Martin pursued wealth and prestige at Luck-
now. Polier fashioned himself socially as a European
orientalist while privately he lived as a Mughal nobleman.
Martin, on the other hand, emulated the elevated status
of a European aristocrat. One of the means through
which both men effected their self-transformations was
through the collecting of art.21 While Martin acquired
many Indian items, his primary interests lay in European
artworks, decorative objects, and scientific inventions,
many of which he also supplied to Nawab Asaf al-Daula.22
His Enlightenment-era interests were also reflected in his
vast collection of natural history specimens and drawings

Although they were severely constrained politically through the course of the early
nineteenth century, Llewellyn-Jones writes that it is perhaps “No wonder that the
response of the last three nawabs was to withdraw into the more familiar world of Muslim
culture, for it must have seemed to them that any action would bring British criticism
from one quarter or another.” 17
European engagement with the city was not always characterized by the harsh
judgments that came to be heaped upon Lucknow, as is demonstrated by two of the
middle sections of the exhibition. If the examination of early Awadhi painting traditions,
portraiture, architecture, and decorative arts indicates some of the ways the nawabs
proclaimed a sovereign identity—articulated over the course of their rule through the
integration of Mughal, Iranian Shia, and European visual and cultural codes—other
works suggest the ways that European émigrés to Lucknow styled their lives in similarly
hybrid fashion. In the late eighteenth century especially, a remarkable degree of accul-
turation appears to have accompanied the interactions that took place in Lucknow
between its Indian and European residents, and these are examined in the sixth section
of the exhibition, “A Cosmopolitan Culture.” The most famous record of this period is
Johann Zoffany’s Colonel Mordaunt’s Cock Match, 1784 – 86, in which a lively group of
competitors and spectators includes Nawab Asaf al-Daula, the commander of his body-
guard, Colonel John Mordaunt, the nawab’s minister Hasan Reza Khan, Company
officials such as John Wombwell, the Swiss-born military adventurer Colonel Antoine-
Louis Polier, and the Frenchman Major General Claude Martin (105, p. 66; Fig. 34,
p. 228). Polier’s and Wombwell’s adoption of Indian dress and habits are portrayed
individually in other paintings, by Indian artists (106, p. 68; Fig 26, p. 180; fig. 35,
p. 230). These two men appear together with Martin in yet another Zoffany painting,
which depicts a gathering at Polier’s home and hints at the various pursuits that must Fig. 2. Johann Zoffany (1733 –1810), Boulone, Bibi of Colonel (Later
have engaged many like men in late-eighteenth-century India—the employment of Indian Major-GeneRal) Claude MaRtin, Fishing with MaRtin’s Adopted
Son James MaRtin; India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1786; oil on canvas,
servants, the commissioning of European oil paintings, the constructing and maintaining 24 x 30 in. (61 x 76.2 cm); La Martinière College, Lucknow

32 33 Gude : NaRRatives of an exhibition

 116. Mihr Chand, Venus, c. 1773 –76

top: 34. After Emily Eden, The Nawab of Awadh’s

Hunting Cheetahs and Their CaRetakeRs, 1844

left: 121. Mihr Chand, Nilgai, c. 1770 –76

bottom: 35. After Emily Eden, The Nawab of Awadh’s
Hunting Dogs and Falcons with Their CaRe-
takeRs, 1844 Right: 150. Mihr Chand, A Female HeRmit with Two
Ascetics befoRe a Hut, c. 1765 –73

34 35 Gude : NaRRatives of an exhibition

(110).23 Polier, conversely, invested considerable energy in the acquisition of Persian and
Sanskrit manuscripts as well as Mughal, Deccani, and Awadhi paintings (116, 121, 150,
p. 35; 118, p. 9). Several folios from Polier’s various albums are included in the seventh
section of the exhibition, “European Patrons and Collectors,” where they join paintings
acquired by other visitors to Faizabad and Lucknow, such as Jean-Baptiste Gentil (141,
p. 39) and Richard Johnson (133, 134, p. 39; 136). Clear artistic relationships between a
few of their paintings suggest the elite and interconnected worlds of these late-eighteenth-
century orientalists (152, 153). Paintings that once belonged to Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke
of Wellington, whose eight years of service in India were spent largely in the South,
indicate the broader market in which Lucknow paintings were circulating by the centu-
ry’s end (158, 159, p. 38). It is in this section that the distinctive painting styles of Awadhi
artists—many known by name—are explored. While such collections speak to colonial-
ism’s role in both the dispersal of Indian royal collections and the formation of national
European ones, this selection particularly highlights the direct European patronage of left: 152. A Game of Polo, c. 1785

Indian court artists.

Right: 153. Ram Sahai, A Game of Polo, c. 1770

136. Patak Chand, Raja Anand Dev and Raja DhRub Dev,
c. 1770

110. Spoonbill, c. 1780

36 37 Gude : NaRRatives of an exhibition

left: 158. The LoveRs Elope, c. 1800

Right: 159. ShiRin DiscoveRs the Body of FaRhad,

c. 1800
133. Mir Kalan Khan, A PRincess Watching a Maid
Killing a Snake, c. 1770

top: 141. Shuja quli Khan and a Woman on a TeRRace,

c. 1760

bottom: 134. Style of Mir Kalan Khan, A EuRopean

PRincess, c. 1770

38 39 Gude : NaRRatives of an exhibition

 This world of activity at Lucknow was nearing its end by the time of Claude Martin’s
death there in 1800. Having strategically inserted themselves at Awadh when Shuja
al-Daula was nawab, the British rapidly gained military and political ascendency in the
region during the following years, and the opportunities for such intercultural explora-
tions gradually ceased to exist. We may evoke the potential threat of the situation in the
late-eighteenth century through reference, once again, to the imagery of Urdu poetry,
particularly those verses in which the beloved is cast in the role of a stealthy hunter:

I worry about the nightingales

Now that spring has come:
The hunter pitches camp
Right outside the garden.24

It would take many more years before the British finally deposed, in contrived and
illegal fashion, the last king of Awadh. One year later, in 1857, Indian soldiers and their
local supporters at Lucknow joined the spreading North Indian rebellion against the
East India Company. By the time the rebellion was suppressed in 1858, it had entered the
British popular and artistic imagination; this is explored through photography and
paintings in the eighth section of the exhibition, “The Great Uprising of 1857: European
Visions.” Few paintings by British and European artists document the aggressions
directed at the city or its pillage (175, 176).25 Other works, such as Thomas Jones Barker’s
1859 history painting The Relief of Lucknow, 1857—based on the sketches of Swedish
artist Egron Lundgren, the only European artist present in India during the Uprising—
indicate the ways in which the rebellion was memorialized in terms of masculine British

above: 175. William Simpson, View of the Qaisar Bagh

in Lucknow, 1864

left: 176. William Simpson, the Shah Najaf, 1861

oveRleaf: 171. Thomas Jones Barker, the Relief of

Lucknow, 1857, 1859

40 41 Gude : NaRRatives of an exhibition

42 43 Gude : NaRRatives of an exhibition
valor and heroism (171, pp. 42–43).26 Louis William Desanges’ paintings from his Victoria
Cross series—which were displayed for many years in the Crystal Palace and photo-
graphically reproduced for public consumption—include several portraits of British
soldiers at Lucknow.27 One of these, entitled Thomas Henry Kavanagh VC (1821–1882)
Being Disguised as a Native during the Indian Mutiny at Lucknow, 9th November 1857,
1859 – 62, presents a later, darker side of the European adoption of Indian dress (174).
Kavanagh’s assuming the clothing of an “Oriental” allowed him to escape the besieged
British Residency in November 1857 in order to guide Sir Colin Campbell’s relief forces
into Lucknow. According to one popular retelling of this episode, when Campbell’s forces
came under fire from Indians at the Sikander Bagh (Secundra Bagh):

They forced their way in, and, maddened with resistance and the memory of Cawnpore, they showed no
mercy; the bayonet did its deadly work till all was still, and two thousand of the mutineers were piled
together in one gory mass as a monument of our vengeance. Humanity shudders at the remembrance of
above: 174. Chevalier Louis-William Desanges, Thomas
such a scene, but the murderers of helpless women and children at Cawnpore deserved no quarter.28 HenRy Kavanagh VC Being Disguised as a Native
duRing the Indian Mutiny at the Siege of
Lucknow, 9 November 1857, 1859 – 62
A number of European, mostly British, women were residing in various enclaves of
left: 173. Abraham Solomon, The Flight fRom
northern India by the mid-nineteenth century. Caught in the Uprising, their plights— Lucknow, 1858

underscored by fears of their sexual violation by Indian rebels—were also the subject of
Bottom: 172. Frederick Goodall, Jessie’s DReam (The
several Victorian-era paintings (173).29 The public appetite for stories of the Uprising and Relief of Lucknow), 1858

eventual British victory was fed by various photographers as well as by popular songs,
performances, and myths such as those describing Jessie Brown’s sonorous dream of bag-
pipes in advance of Lucknow’s relief by a Scottish regiment (172).30 The role of British
women in the racial estrangement and segregation between Indians and Europeans was
considerable, but the shock of the Uprising itself would forever alter British racial
attitudes and policy in South Asia. Following the rebellion’s suppression, large parts of
Lucknow were razed, both as a punitive expression of British power and in an effort to
secure and regulate the city.31 The gulf that came to separate two increasingly distant
worlds is evoked by the much earlier verses of Shaikh Qalandar Bakhsh Jurat (1748 –1810):

Now you don’t let me throw myself down even on the dust of your street. Alas!—and what
carpets you used to spread out for my sake!

Now you rub out the very name of love from your heart and make me weep—and you used to
read poetry with me, while your tears flowed.32

The poet Mir Babar Ali “Anis” (1802 –1874) lamented the fate of Lucknow, which in 1858
was ruined and bereft of its rulers:

The leaf of the World’s Book has overturned in an instant.

Why, O Heavens?
For what rapture has Time exacted this revenge?
Not only has a class of Lucknow been toppled,
O Anis! There is also a revolution in Poesy’s kingdom.33

44 45 Gude : NaRRatives of an exhibition

That Lucknow was not left utterly barren of artistic patronage and creativity, however,
is indicated in the exhibition’s ninth section, “Post-Uprising Artistic Production at
Lucknow,” which includes artworks largely commissioned by its prosperous Hindu and
Muslim landowning and merchant classes in the late nineteenth century. One of these
landowners, or taluqdars, Raja Man Singh, organized the festivity depicted in a painting
that appears in the concluding portion of the exhibition, “Legacy of Glory: Lucknow
in the Popular Imagination.” Through the course of the Uprising, Man Singh shifted his
allegiances between the competing factions, an indication of the ways in which British
victory was achieved with native assistance. On the British side by the Uprising’s end,
he was rewarded with considerable properties and powers. In early 1859 Man Singh
threw a banquet for Colin Campbell at Lucknow, to which Egron Lundgren was invited.
Lundgren’s painting of the event illustrates that even at this time the legendary female
entertainers of Lucknow were still to be found in the city (189, pp. 52–53). His memoirs
describe in enchanted detail the dancers and their performance:

The cloth of her attire is of incandescent colours and like the veil threaded with gold and silver, the
borders replete with pearls and precious stones . . . the neck and arms too bear sparkling ruby trinkets,
and when she coyly, almost furtively now and then exposes her foot or calf, a gold anklet is seen around
her shin. She has rings in her ears and her hair is swept up and plaited across her skull, and decorated at
the front with a brilliant ornament of rose diamonds and silver depicting two fishes rampant, kissing.
Her entire forehead is concealed by a large flashing diamond gew-gaw, the radiance of which is nonethe-
less dimmed by the fire that burns in her eyes. . . .

. . . the dancer slinks to and fro with panther steps . . . , raises her eyes to the heavens before closing them Above: 193. FoRehead ORnament, c. 1870;
194. Pair of eaRRings, c. 1870
to smack her lips together, and sings verses from a sleepy lullaby, sways beneath her veils, stretches out
her arms, writhing like a serpent in paradise until her act is over, and another girl, more supple even Right: 195. Finger Ring, c. 1870

than her, more effervescent and serpentine, and who can blush at will, takes her place and sways to and
fro in her turn, shimmering as an airy feather, as diaphanous as a phantom.34

Lundgren’s painting joins several other works—eighteenth- and nineteenth-century

Indian and European paintings, textiles and jewelry (191, 193, 194, 195, 196, 197), nine-
teenth-century Indian photographs, and the imagery of twentieth-century Indian films
(201, p. 48) —that are brought together here in order to examine the impact of Lucknow’s
refined and highly romanticized courtesan culture upon the city’s legacy.
Although the term for these courtesans, tawaif, is inclusive of a range of female
performers, their highest ranks consisted of well-educated and exquisitely mannered
women who were employed by Lucknow’s elite classes for musical and dance perfor-
mances, poetry recitals, and the teaching of social etiquette. Respected tawaifs were even
employed to sing and recite poetry at Lucknow’s Shia religious assemblies.35 They were
depicted by many European and Indian artists in paintings and photographs that stand
in rather stark contrast to imagined views of wives and consorts in the protected domes-
tic spaces of the zenana, images that belie the latter women’s sometimes considerable Left: 197. Nose ORnament,
19th century
political influence (185, 186, p. 49; 187, 188, p. 48). Negative perceptions of the importance
Center: 196. Hand ORnament,
of women and feminine themes in the courtly culture of Lucknow significantly affected 19th century
British and Indian assessments of the city well into the twentieth century.36 Satyajit
Right: 191. Hair ORnament,
Ray’s famous 1977 film The Chess Players (Shatranj ke Khilari), which presents the c. mid-19th century

46 47 Gude : NaRRatives of an exhibition

Top: 187. Attributed to Nevasi Lal,
Two Nautch GiRls Dancing the
KuhaRwa befoRe a Nobleman and
His CouRtieRs, c. 1780

Bottom left: 188. Tilly Kettle,

An Indian Dancing GiRl with a
Hookah, 1772

Bottom Right: 201. Vasudeo,

designer, film poster, UmRao Jaan,
1981

Top: 186. Attributed to Nevasi Lal,

Noblewomen Playing Chess,
c. 1780 –1800

Bottom: 185. AcRobats PeRfoRm-

ing on a TightRope, c. 1785

48 49 Gude : NaRRatives of an exhibition

annexation of Awadh through an indictment of its ruling elites, provides one examination
of the discourse that set British masculinity in opposition to Indian effeminacy. Other 37
films of the postcolonial era that are set in Lucknow—for example, Chaudhvin ka Chand
(1960), Pakeezah (1971), and Umrao Jaan (three versions: 1971, 1981, and 2006)—con-
sciously recall the city’s rich and cultivated history through the person of the tawaif.
Such films are important for understanding the development of a Bollywood trope—
inspired in large part by the city of Lucknow—that links courtesans indelibly with
urbane Muslim culture.38 These can be contrasted with stereotyped filmic representations
of chaste and idealized Hindu womanhood. The former, in their reference to the shared
precolonial courtly history of northern India, also speak eloquently to memories of “the
unpartitioned homeland of the people of al-Hind.” 39
Recollections of Lucknow’s past are what inspired, in part, the words of the poet
Majaz with which this essay opened. His verse expressed the hopes of a progressive Urdu
poet for the future of the city in the years surrounding India’s Independence. For a
number of reasons, the city would never achieve the same prominence it enjoyed in
precolonial, or even pre-Partition years. India’s Fabled City: The Art of Courtly Lucknow
was organized to convey some sense of Lucknow’s extraordinary history and aesthetic
achievements as well as its unique place within the imaginative visual discourses of
colonialism, national identity, and cultural memory.
1. Quoted in Mushirul Hasan, From Pluralism to Separatism: Qasbas in Colonial Awadh (New Delhi: Oxford University
Press, 2007), 46. I thank Carlo Coppola for sharing with me his research on Majaz.
2. See Carla Petievich, Assembly of Rivals: Delhi, Lucknow, and the Urdu Ghazal (New Delhi: Manohar, 1992).
3. Ibid., 30. See Carla Petievich’s essay in this volume for further discussion of poetry at Lucknow, including its poets from
Delhi.
4. Ibid., 30 – 31.
5. Quoted in Anna A. Suvorova, Masnavi: A Study of Urdu Romance, trans. M. Osama Faruqi (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2000), 112 –13. For a discussion of the poem’s evocation of the city, see 110 – 33.
6. Peter Manuel, Thumri in Historical and Stylistic Perspectives (Delhi: Motilal Banarasidass, 1989), 20.
7. Ibid.
8. Quoted in Rosie Llewellyn-Jones, A Fatal Friendship: The Nawabs, the British, and the City of Lucknow (New Delhi:
Oxford University Press, 1985), 200 –201.
9. March 3, 1858. William Howard Russell, My Indian Mutiny Diary, ed. Michael Edwardes (London: Cassell, 1957), 57– 58.
It should be noted that Russell’s account attempts to give an honest and fair account of the uprising and of British
conduct in India.
10. Emily Eden had earlier described, in terms similar to those of Lawrence, a royal garden at Lucknow: “Such a place! The
only residence I have coveted in India. Don’t you remember where in the ‘Arabian Nights,’ Zobeide bets her ‘garden of
delights’ against the Caliph’s ‘palace of pictures?’ I am sure this was ‘the garden of delights!’ [Emily Eden, Up the
Country: Letters Written to Her Sister from the Upper Provinces of India (London: Virago, 1983), 62]. See also, in a letter
written to Fanny Parks from Lucknow, a description of Nasir al-Din Haidar’s wives as “creatures of the Arabian tales,“
one of them “so beautiful, I could think of nothing but Lalla Rookh in her bridal attire” [Fanny Parks, Wanderings of a
Pilgrim in Search of the Picturesque, During Four and Twenty Years in the East; with Revelations of Life in the Zenana,
Vol. 1 (1850; reprint New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal, 1999), 88].
11. Quoted in Veena Talwar Oldenburg, “Nawabi Lucknow: Through Western Eyes,” in Veena Talwar Oldenburg, ed.,
Shaam-e-Awadh: Writings on Lucknow (New Delhi: Penguin, 2007), 13 –14.
12. Thomas Metcalf, Ideologies of the Raj, The New Cambridge History of India III.4 (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1994), 6 – 9. Metcalf further notes (171–77) that perceptions of India’s dirt, filth, and disease—to which some
observers alluded in their descriptions of Lucknow—also contributed to the ideology of difference which informed British
colonial attitudes and policy in India.
13. Rosie Llewellyn-Jones, Engaging Scoundrels: True Tales of Old Lucknow (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2000),
65 – 66. See also the account of Sir William H. Sleeman, Resident at Lucknow from 1849 to 1856. Although Sleeman
advised against the annexation of Awadh, his reports to Lord Dalhousie provided some of its justification [Maj. Gen.
W. H. Sleeman, A Journey through the Kingdom of Oude, 1849 –1850, with Private Correspondence Relative to the
Annexation of Oude to British India, 2 Vols. (1858; reprint New Delhi: Asian Educational Services, 1995)]. The more
sensationalistic accounts include William Knighton’s The Private Life of an Eastern King, first published in 1855
50
[The Private Life of an Eastern King, Together with Eliju Jan’s Story, or The
Private Life of an Eastern Queen (London: Oxford University Press, 1921)].
14. See, for instance, Percy Brown’s characterization of Awadhi architecture as
indicative of stagnation and “tawdry pretence” [Indian Architecture: The
Islamic Period (Bombay: Taraporevala, 1942), 122 –23]; Phillip Rawson’s
comments on the shallowness of late Mughal painting styles, including that
of Lucknow [Indian Painting (Paris: Pierre Tisné, 1961), 116]; and Basil
Gray’s remarks on the lifeless and superficial character of Lucknow painting
[Douglas Barrett and Basil Gray, Painting of India (Geneva: Albert Skira,
1963), 114].
15. Llewellyn-Jones, A Fatal Friendship, 236 – 41.
16. Quoted in Petievich, Assembly of Rivals, 55.
17. Llewellyn-Jones, A Fatal Friendship, 234.
18. For a study examining various dimensions of these interracial relationships,
see Durba Ghosh, Sex and the Family in Colonial India: The Making of
Empire (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006).
19. Some of these controversies are expressed in an exchange between Pankaj
Mishra and William Dalrymple: Pankaj Mishra, “More Trouble Than It Is
Worth,” Common Knowledge 11.3 (2005): 432 – 44; and William Dalrymple,
“Assimilation and Transculturation in Eighteenth-Century India: A
Response to Pankaj Mishra,” Common Knowledge 11.3 (2005), 445 – 85.
20. Martin’s decision to remain in Lucknow, rather than return to Europe, was
prompted in part by Polier’s murder in France in 1795. It also appears to
have been influenced by his own fears of losing his wealth to European
taxation. [Rosie Llewellyn-Jones, A Man of the Enlightenment in Eighteenth-
Century India: The Letters of Claude Martin 1766–1800 (Delhi: Permanent
Black, 2003), 315; and Rosie Llewellyn-Jones, A Very Ingenious Man: Claude
Martin in Early Colonial India (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1992),
204 – 5].
21. Maya Jasanoff, Edge of Empire: Lives, Culture, and Conquest in the East,
1750 –1850 (New York: Knopf, 2005), 45 –114. See also Sanjay Subrahman-
yam, “The Career of Colonel Polier and Late-Eighteenth-Century Oriental-
ism,” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, Series 3, 10.1 (2000): 43 – 60.
22. See the 1801 inventory of Martin’s estate, British Library, Oriental and
India Office Collections, Bengal Inventories, Vol. 1, no. 75.
23. For one such collection of his paintings, see Rosie Llewellyn-Jones et al.,
The Lucknow Menagerie: Natural History Drawings from the Collection of
Claude Martin (1735–1800) (London: Hobhouse, 2001).
24. By Atish, quoted in Petievich, Assembly of Rivals, 162.
25. A painting by Lundgren (1815 –1875), who for some time in 1858 accompanied
the reporter William Russell, also documented the looting of the Qaisar
Bagh. For information on Lundgren, see Sten Nilsson and Narayani Gupta,
The Painter’s Eye: Egron Lundgren and India (Stockholm: Nationalmuseum,
1992); and Sten Nilsson, “Egron Lundgren, Reporter of the Indian Mutiny,”
Apollo n.s. 92:102 (1970): 138 – 43. William Simpson traveled to Lucknow in
November 1860, after the rebellion had long since been suppressed [Mildred
Archer, Visions of India: The Sketchbooks of William Simpson 1859–62
(Oxford: Phaidon, 1986)].
26. J. W. M. Hichberger, Images of the Army: The Military in British Art,
1815–1914 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1988), 59 – 63; and
Joseph A. Kestner, “Victorian Military Painting and the Constructing of
Masculinity,” Victorian Literature and Culture 24 (1996): 51– 54.
27. Hichberger, Images of the Army, 63 –70. Joany Hichberger, “Democratizing
Glory? The Victoria Cross Paintings of Louis Desanges, Oxford Art Journal
7:2 (1984): 42 – 51.
28. S. O. Beeton, Our Soldiers and the Victoria Cross: A General Account of the
Regiments and Men of the British Army and Stories of the Brave Deeds which
Won the Prize “For Valour” (London: Ward, Lock, and Tyler, 1867), 230.
Beeton’s book was written for young boys. The mention of Cawnpore
(Kanpur) references the 1857 massacre there of some 200 European women
and children. A depiction of Kavanagh in Indian dress was also painted by
Egron Lundgren [Nilsson, “Egron Lundgren,” 139].
29. A good deal of recent literature treats the subject of these women and the
imagery they inspired: Pamela Gerrish Nunn, Problem Pictures: Women and
Men in Victorian Painting (Hants, UK: Scolar, 1995), 73 – 93; Alison Blunt,
“The Flight from Lucknow: British Women Travelling and Writing Home,
1857– 8,” in James Duncan and Derek Gregory, eds., Writes of Passage:
Reading Travel Writing (New York: Routledge, 1999), 92 –113; Alison Blunt,
51
“Embodying War: British Women and Domestic Defilement in the Indian
‘Mutiny,’ 1857– 8,” Journal of Historical Geography 26:3 (2000): 403 –28;
Alison Blunt, “Spatial Stories under Siege: British Women Writing from
Lucknow in 1857,” Gender, Place, and Culture 7:3 (2000): 229 – 46; Claudia
Klaver, “Domesticity under Siege: British Women and Imperial Crisis at the
Siege of Lucknow, 1857,” Women’s Writing 8:1 (2001): 21– 58; and Julia
Thomas, Pictorial Victorians: The Inscription of Values in Word and Image
(Athens: Ohio University Press, 2004), 125 – 43.
30. Projit Bihari Mukharji, “Jessie’s Dream at Lucknow: Popular Memorializa-
tions of Dissent, Ambiguity, and Class in the Heart of Empire,” Studies in
History n.s. 24:1 (2008): 77–113.
For a full discussion of developments in the city in the immediate post-
31.
Uprising years, see Veena Talwar Oldenburg, The Making of Colonial
Lucknow, 1856–1877 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984).
32. From a longer ghazal by Jurat, quoted in D. J. Matthews and C. Shackle,
An Anthology of Classical Urdu Love Lyrics (London: Oxford University
Press, 1972), 72.
33. Quoted in Oldenburg, ed., Shaam-e-Awadh, 98.
34. Quoted in Nilsson and Gupta, The Painter’s Eye, 127–28.
35. The cultural roles of courtesans, both in pre- and post-colonial India, as well
as at Lucknow, are explored in several studies: Doris M. Srinivasan,
“Royalty’s Courtesans and God’s Mortal Wives: Keepers of Culture in
Precolonial India,” in Martha Feldman and Bonnie Gordon, eds., The
Courtesan’s Arts: Cross-Cultural Perspectives (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2006), 161– 81; Regula Burckhart Qureshi, “Female Agency and
Patrilineal Constraints: Situating Courtesans in Twentieth-Century India,”
in Feldman and Gordon, The Courtesan’s Arts, 312 – 31; Adrien McNeil,
“Tawa’if, Military Musicians, and Shi’a Ideology in Pre-Rebellion Lucknow,”
South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies n.s. 32:1 (2009): 46 – 62; and
Veena Talwar Oldenburg, “Lifestyle as Resistance: The Case of the
Courtesans of Lucknow,” in Violette Graf, ed., Lucknow: Memories of a City
(New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1997), 136 – 54.
36. See Michael H. Fisher, “Women and the Feminine in the Court and High
Culture of Awadh, 1722 –1856,” in Gavin R. G. Hambly, ed., Women in the
Medieval Islamic World: Power, Patronage, and Piety (New York: St. Martin’s
Press, 1998), 489 – 519.
37. The film was based on the 1924 short story, of the same title, by the Hindi
writer Munshi Premchand. For discussions of the film, see Vinay Lal,
“Masculinity and Femininity in The Chess Players,” Manushi 92 – 93 (1996):
41– 50; Darius Cooper, “The Representation of Colonialism in Satyajit Ray’s
The Chess Players,” in Wimal Dissanayake, ed., Colonialism and Nationalism
in Asian Cinema (Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press,
1994), 174 – 89; and Suranjan Ganguly, “Poetry into Prose: The Rewriting of
Oudh in Satyajit Ray’s The Chess Players,” The Journal of Commonwealth
Literature 30 (1995): 17–24.
38. Usamah Ansari, “‘There Are Thousands Drunk by the Passion of These
Eyes.’ Bollywood’s Tawa’if: Narrating the Nation and ‘The Muslim,’” South
Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies n.s. 31:2 (2008): 290 – 316.
39. Mukul Kesavan, “Urdu, Awadh, and the Tawaif: The Islamicate Roots of
Hindi Cinema,” in Zoya Hasan, ed., Forging Identities: Gender, Communi-
ties, and the State (New Delhi: Kali for Women, 1994), 244 – 57.
Pages 52–53: 189. Egron Lundgren, Nautch EnteR-
tainment by Man Singh in Honor of LoRd Clyde,
the Commander-in-Chief, 1859
Gude : NaRRatives of an exhibition
52 53 Gude : NaRRatives of an exhibition
 Ros i e Lle w e lly n -Jon es

Lucknow and European Society

Imagine for a moment that the court of Lucknow had forbidden Europeans from entering Awadh. How would this
have affected the development of the city? Firstly, we would have much less visual evidence. There would be none of
the iconic portraits of the nawabs by Company-school painters, or of Lucknow itself as it emerged from the forest
banks along the river Gomti to become a shining city of polished stucco and brass domes. Nor would we have the
extraordinary photographic panorama by a Frenchman taken about 1850, before the Uprising/Mutiny and British
revenge changed the city forever. Secular buildings would have been unremarkable, a cluster of courtyard houses
(havelis) around a medieval fort, instead of the exuberant series of royal dwellings with their Palladian-style
mansions. The Qaisar Bagh, the last palace complex, would not have existed in anything like its built form, had it
not been for the European buildings that had gone before it. In particular, it was Constantia, the baroque palace
tomb of the Frenchman Major General Claude Martin which gave the Qaisar Bagh its statues, Grecian columns,
and quadrant-arched gate tops. There would have been no sober British Residency with its bungalows and Ban-
queting Hall.
Perhaps the nawabs would not have indulged themselves with so many purchases of European goods, and
they would certainly not have been persuaded into buying expensive astronomical equipment for the royal observa-
tory, or even an iron bridge over the Gomti, which was sent out, in sections, from England. English steam engines
would not have powered the garden fountains or the fish-shaped pleasure boats. Lucknow would have been saved
from many rogues and rascals who preyed on the rich city, including the English East India Company officials as
well as the so-called adventurers. More importantly, that “fatal friendship” which developed between the court and
the Company would not have happened and the princely state of Awadh might well have survived until India’s
Independence in 1947.

54 55 Llewellyn-Jones : Lucknow and EuRopean Society


Page 54: Fig. 3. Johann Zoffany (1733 –1810), Colonel
Antoine-Louis Polier with His FRiends Major-
GeneRal Claude MaRtin, John Wombwell, and
the ARtist; India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1786 or
1787; oil on canvas, 54 x 72 1⁄2 in. (137 x 183.5 cm); Victoria
Memorial Hall, Kolkata
By the time of Shuja al-Daula’s death in 1775, the nawabi dynasty was already under
a heavy financial obligation to the English East India Company, which was becoming a
political force while at the same time maintaining its mercantile role. It was the extraor-
dinary wealth of the nawabs which attracted the Company and the majority of Europeans
who flocked to the city during its heyday. All hoped to profit in some way from their
proximity to unlimited riches. In the early 1800s, Shuja al-Daula’s son, the Nawab
Saadat Ali Khan, was estimated to have an annual net income of over a million pounds
sterling once all his expenses had been paid. It was land revenue, funneled in from
Awadh’s fertile countryside, that funded the capital city and its extravagant lifestyle.
The English East India Company was among the first to realize and then to exploit
the nawabs’ wealth. A British Resident was appointed to the court in 1774 while it was
still at Faizabad, some ninety miles east of Lucknow. The task of Nathaniel Middleton,
and his successor John Bristow, was to cement “the Friendship between the Company
and the Vizier [Shuja al-Daula] and the obtaining of large Sums of Money said to be due
from him.” And this unfortunately set the pattern for most European interaction with
1
the nawabs during the next eighty years. It would be difficult to single out many, if any,
foreigners who went to Lucknow for purely altruistic reasons, and who didn’t hope to get
nawabi money through wages (often ridiculously high), bribes, gifts, commissions,
property, and other goods in kind. Europeans were employed by the nawabs in a wide
variety of occupations—there were coachmakers and coachmen, grooms, gunsmiths,
astronomers, cobblers, cooks, librarians, English tutors, jockeys, jugglers, musicians,
letter writers, and interpreters, as well as army officers. Some remained for all of their
working lives and received a pension when they retired. Others served briefly, like the
aristocratic Ambrose Pierre Antoine, Chevalier de L’Etang, who was in charge of the
royal stables at Versailles before the French Revolution, and who took up a similar post
in Lucknow, was dismissed after only a year, because his employer, Saadat Ali Khan,
said he was mistreating the horses.
Europeans were not, of course, alone in seeking work and opportunities in Lucknow.
Other groups of foreigners included Armenians, Iranians, Afghans, Chinese, and people
from Iraq, which was then part of Turkish Arabia. But Europeans, and particularly the
British, formed the most influential group, not only because of their political hold over
the nawabs, but because these same nawabs were fascinated by the European artifacts
offered for sale, by European art, architecture, furnishings, mechanical toys, and, to
only a slightly lesser extent, by the Europeans themselves.
There is a charming account by Mrs. Elizabeth Plowden, a British officer’s wife, of
the friendly relations with the Nawab Asaf al-Daula and his ministers during the spring
of 1788. Her husband, Captain Richard Plowden, had commanded the nawab’s body-
2
guard, and the Plowdens thoroughly enjoyed a season of entertainments in Lucknow.
They went as guests with the British Resident’s family to watch an elephant fight hosted
by the nawab, in a house overlooking the river. (The elephants fought on the opposite
bank.) A breakfast of tea, toast, and passion fruit was served, and the visitors were
entertained by nautch dancers and a “set of Mimics,” one of whom “emulated a Monkey
exceedingly well.” The chief minister, Hasan Reza Khan, was a breakfast guest at the
Plowdens’ house, and he also attended a dinner in the British Residency one February
56
evening. It must have been a grand occasion, for the
nawab was there too, with six of his relatives, and another
minister, Haidar Beg Khan. The Resident played the
harpsichord and Elizabeth Plowden, at the nawab’s
request, sang a Persian song for him. During the follow-
ing days there were nawabi fireworks parties on the river,
puppet shows, acrobats, and a pantomime on the palace
terrace, which was beautifully decorated with swags of
roses and jasmine bound with silver thread. (Mrs.
Plowden’s keen eyes often picked up details that male
writers thought too trivial to mention.)
The Plowdens also visited Claude Martin and
admired his collection of medals and newly arrived prints
from England. Martin was an avid collector, so much so
that his town house, later named Farhat Bakhsh, was
described as a “perfect Museum.” He was a Frenchman,
who had deserted from the army of the Compagnie des
Indes in 1760 and joined that of the English East India
Company when he saw it would be the victor in the battle
for South India. Although Martin lived in Lucknow for
twenty-five years, he was never truly accepted into
English society there partly because he was French, and
because he came from a working-class background.
Snobbery was rampant among British society, heightened
by the comparatively small number of people far from
home, with too little to do, and prone to gossip. Certainly
Martin was regarded as a slightly comical figure, speak-
ing imperfect English, boastful, and someone who tried to
win favors with extravagant gifts to powerful Company
officers (111).3
Few of Martin’s contemporaries appreciated him, yet
he was an extraordinarily talented man, a true polymath 111. Pair of Silver-BaRreled Pistols PResented by
Claude MaRtin to Lt. Col. Alexander Ross in
who could turn his hand to many things. He farmed December 1786, c. 1786; detail below
indigo on his Najafgarh estate near Cawnpore (Kanpur),
managed the nawab’s armory, cast cannon and bells,
experimented with electricity, constructed and flew
hot-air balloons, exported goods to Europe, acted as
banker and moneylender to many, including the nawab,
and was an inspired amateur architect. He was also the
richest European in India of his era, another fact which
probably did not endear him to his contemporaries, who
were themselves out to make as much money as they
could. The fact that Martin had made (most of) his
fortune by his own hard work was overlooked. It is true
57 Llewellyn-Jones : Lucknow and EuRopean Society
 that he did sell European goods to Asaf al-Daula at grossly inflated prices, but others,
including some British Residents, did the same. Martin had a superior set of contacts
whom he sent on buying sprees for luxury European goods, shipped via Calcutta. In
attitude Martin was a product of the European Enlightenment, demonstrated by the
books in his extensive library, his rational treatment of the peasants on his estate, his
irreligious beliefs, and his philanthropy. He bequeathed Constantia, completed after
his death (109), as a school for children of “any religion.” Its architectural influence on
later European buildings by the nawabs was immense. The statues along Constantia’s
parapets, molded by Indian craftsmen from local clay, were copied extensively and appear
on buildings, including the Qaisar Bagh, in post-Uprising photographs. The nawabs
clearly found no conflict with any Islamic strictures that frowned on the representation
of living forms. Also much copied were Martin’s distinctive octagonal towers, which
occur in later nawabi buildings, like the Alam Bagh palace and the Khurshid Manzil.
In fact, the Scottish engineer who built the Khurshid Manzil for Saadat Ali Khan also
copied the moat that had originally surrounded Martin’s town house, and which was
filled from the Gomti.
109. F. Frith & Co.; Francis Frith, La MaRtinièRe, 1870s
58
Given the attitudes towards Martin, it was not
surprising that his real friends were European, rather
than British. Colonel Antoine-Louis Polier was born in
Switzerland, and the two men first met in Faizabad, at
Shuja al-Daula’s court. Later Polier established his
household in Lucknow, at a place he named Polierganj,
although its location has not been identified. Another close
friend was General Count Benoit de Boigne, born at
Chambery, then in independent Savoy. Both Polier and de
Boigne pursued careers mainly outside Lucknow, but the
three friends had much in common, including harems of
women. In this they were not alone—the majority of
unmarried European men in eighteenth-century India
took local wives or mistresses, known as bibis. Martin had
seven young Indian and Anglo-Indian mistresses, includ-
ing Boulone, his favorite, and Girl Sally, who was only
thirteen when she entered his household. De Boigne had
three Indian wives, one of whom he abandoned in En-
gland, and he left the other two poorly provided for in
India. On his return to France, Polier left all three of his
wives in Martin’s care. Elizabeth Plowden wrote that
after a pleasant dinner with Martin, she went into his
zenana to see Polier’s family. Few Europeans at the end
of the eighteenth century commented on the habit of
keeping Indian mistresses, or marrying Indian women,
because it was so universal. The bibis of European men
were treated in the same way as upper-class Muslim
women, that is, they were kept hidden from view and did
not mingle socially with men (Fig. 2, p. 33). Close relation-
ships with them gave the men insights into local culture
and customs, as well as language. Both Martin and Polier
dictated letters in Persian, the court language used for
formal correspondence until the death of the last nawab
in 1887.
The children of these mixed marriages were described
as “country-born” or “East Indian.” (The term “Anglo-
Indian,” used here for convenience, was not adopted until
the twentieth century.) A considerable number of Anglo-
Indian families are recorded in Lucknow. Their names
indicate the provenance of their founders—Catania,
Braganza, Duhan, Johannes, Sangster, Sinclair, Rotton,
Qui(e)ros, Nazareth, Campagnac, Delmerick, Deverinne,
and more. Unlike the transient European population,
these families lived in the city, generation after genera-
59
tion, and married among themselves, so that each family
tree weaves in and out of the others in a complicated
pattern.4 These are not names usually associated with
Lucknow’s European society, even where the founder
member was a Spanish nobleman (Don Joseph Chamois
de Quiros Chevalier), an Irish trader (James Duhan), a
French soldier (Major Jacques Maximilian Deverinne), or
an enterprising Englishman (Richard Rotton). The
majority of these families led respectable, industrious
lives, although when they did get into trouble their mixed
ancestry was cited in a disparaging way. Some were
shopkeepers, some invested in indigo, others were soldiers,
engineers, armament dealers, and painters. The commu-
nity adapted itself to changing circumstances, taking up
different occupations when necessary. In general though,
these families became poorer during the nineteenth
century. The initial fortunes made by the founders were
used up by their descendants, so that by the annexation of
Awadh some were existing on a pittance.
One such family was that of J. Munro Sinclair, from
Edinburgh. He arrived in Lucknow in 1822 to work for
King Ghazi al-Din Haidar, as “Civil Engineer to his
Majesty,” having been recommended by the Marquis of
Hastings. He was initially on a salary of 1,500 rupees a
month and in charge of the nawab’s fireworks, which were
spectacular set-pieces that took weeks to prepare. Sinclair
married and had a large family, described as “East
Indian.” Three sons served in the nawab’s army. On his
death in 1845 he left his house to his daughter Charlotte,
but her only income was from a pension of twenty rupees
a month from the nawab. Even this ceased on annexation,
and she had to borrow money to save herself from starva-
tion. Similarly John Sangster, whose father and grand-
father had both worked for Asaf al-Daula, ended up
stealing from beggars in the poorhouse.
It was, however, the more colorful Europeans that
one usually associates with courtly Lucknow. Some were
connoisseurs and patrons, both of visiting European
artists and local painters. (Claude Martin, who commis-
sioned a series of natural history drawings from Indian
artists, imported thousands of sheets of English draw-
ing paper, and “Chinese crayons” for his painters.)
Tilly Kettle was the first European artist in India, and
significantly, after completing a number of portraits in
Llewellyn-Jones : Lucknow and EuRopean Society
 the south, he traveled to Faizabad. Here, at court, during
the winter from 1771 to 1772 he painted Shuja al-Daula and
his numerous sons, portraying them at full length, as regal
figures (28, p. 229). Kettle’s decision to visit Faizabad
was to have important consequences. If he had not been
successful with his commissions from Shuja al-Daula,
then other Western artists would not have followed him.
As it is, we can re-create something of the city and its
inhabitants from the work of European painters, encour-
aged by Kettle’s example. The fact that some of them,
having hoped for fat commissions from the nawabs found
that actually getting their fee could take years and many
applications did not seem to deter them. At one point, in
the summer of 1786, there were no less than four promi-
nent artists in residence at Lucknow—Ozias Humphry,
Johann Zoffany, Charles Smith, and Thomas Longcroft
(50). These men not only painted the nawabs, their
ministers, and Europeans, but took sketchbooks, pencils,
and probably a camera obscura out into the city, creating
highly detailed images of the palaces, the mosques, the
magnificent gateways, and the river, with its animal-
headed pleasure barges. Captain Robert Smith’s eight-
part panorama, drawn in 1832, near the Daulat Khana
palace, captures the spacious grandeur of this area,
developed by Asaf al-Daula and embellished by his succes-
50. Thomas Longcroft, Gateway to Palace, Lucknow, 1798
sors (53, pp. 142–43).5 Two Englishmen, Robert Home
and George Duncan Beechey, were successively employed
as court artists, and Home not only painted Ghazi al-Din
Haidar but designed the crown for his coronation, his
coronation robes, and his furniture.
In the break-up of the Mughal Empire, exquisite
Indian paintings, illuminated manuscripts, and priceless
books became available for sale and European collectors
in Lucknow snapped them up (127, p. 63; 132, p. 62).
Richard Johnson was appointed Assistant British Resi-
dent in 1781, and although he lived in Lucknow for
only eighteen months, he was able to amass an outstand-
ing collection of Mughal paintings (135, p. 63; 137, 138,
p. 62). The fact that he was nicknamed “Rupee Johnson”
and was a deeply corrupt and arrogant man probably
had a lot to do with it. Polier built up a large collection
of over five hundred Persian and Arabic manuscripts,
and is shown seated with one of them open at his elbow
in the well-known painting by Zoffany, which includes

60 61 Llewellyn-Jones : Lucknow and EuRopean Society

 left: 137. Mohan Singh, StoRy of
the Elephants and Rabbits,
c. 1770

Right: 138. Mohan Singh, StoRy

of the Elephants and Rabbits,
c. 1770

Below: 132. Palace GaRden in a

River Landscape, c. 1785

left: 135. Bahadur Singh, PoRtRait of a Mufti, c. 1775

Right: 127. Shah Jahan, c. 1780

62 63 Llewellyn-Jones : Lucknow and EuRopean Society

 Claude Martin, John Wombwell, the Company’s accoun-
tant, and the artist himself (Fig. 3, p. 54). A close friend
to the Nawab Saadat Ali Khan was the aristocratic
Englishman Sir Gore Ouseley, who also collected illus-
trated Mughal manuscripts.
Ouseley was one of the Europeans commissioned by
the nawabs to erect their Lucknow houses in “the Euro-
pean taste” and he complied by supervising the construc-
tion of Dilkusha Kothi, south of the city (82). This was a
close copy of Seaton Delaval, a house in Northumberland,
on England’s northeast coast, which was designed by the
architect and dramatist Sir John Vanbrugh. Because
Dilkusha was based on an English country house, it could
not easily fulfill the requirements of a Muslim court,
where the women needed separate quarters from the men.
As a result, Dilkusha was modified from its original plan,
but it was never really used, apart from overnight stays
by the nawab or his European friends. It was almost
destroyed by some unspecified catastrophe after 1857 and
is in ruins today. The fact that other similarly commis-
sioned “European” buildings have been demolished, or so
poorly maintained as to become ruinous, shows that
superficial Europeanization in Lucknow, no matter how
convincing it appeared to Europeans, had no deep or
lasting roots in the make-up of the city. Other European-
designed buildings were commissioned from the ubiqui-
tous Claude Martin (Bibiapur, Barowen, and probably
Asafi Kothi), from Captain Marsack (an unidentified
house), from Captain Duncan McLeod (Khurshid Manzil)
and from Colonel Polier, who was briefly court architect
to Asaf al-Daula.
82. Samuel Bourne, Dilkusha Kothi, 1855 – 66
There was considerable interaction between some of
the nawabs and some favored Europeans, and with it the
opportunity for the latter to exploit the former. (It didn’t
seem to work the other way around, apart from some
disgruntled employees who said the nawabs owed them
money.) But at the same time, the nawabs themselves
seemed remarkably open to exploitation. The fondness,
particularly of Asaf al-Daula, for European trinkets was
legendary. He paid ridiculously high prices for goods that
were commonplace in the West. He also indulged his
European favorite, Colonel John Mordaunt, the illegiti-
mate son of the Earl of Peterborough, who was sent by the
Company as an aide-de-camp. Mordaunt was soon estab-
64
lished by the nawab in a large, comfortable house, with
adjoining bungalows, a well, and “an extensive garden
planted with the choicest Trees,” which the Colonel had
uprooted from the Plowdens’ garden. The lively painting
by Zoffany entitled Colonel Mordaunt’s Cock Match—
which inspired several copies—shows the relationship
(which some think was homosexual) between the two men,
at a favorite entertainment (Fig. 38, p. 228; 105, p. 66).
After Mordaunt’s death, from fever in 1790, the nawab
was said to have cried like a child at his funeral.
King Nasir al-Din Haidar left himself open to
criticism when he employed George Harris Derusett, the
“barber of Lucknow,” to manage his social life and then
the royal household. Nasir al-Din Haidar was the most
Anglophile of the nawabs, a weak ruler and a man with
a playboy reputation. No significant buildings were
erected during his reign, and, symbolically, his own tomb
remains unfinished. But he enjoyed his short life to the
full, orchestrated for a few years by his Irish hairdresser.
Reinventing himself and changing his name from
Quigley, Derusett was soon put in charge of the nawab’s
pleasure boats, which sailed up and down the Gomti, and
the bridges which crossed the river.6 He was responsible
for fitting up the pinnace the Sultan of Oude in magnifi-
cent style, with teak planking, velvet drapes, looking-
glasses, and four dozen bottles of brandy. Put in charge
of the nawab’s wardrobe, he established a tailor’s shop
where his elaborate European costumes were made. Next
Derusett was employed as superintendent of the palace,
where he oversaw the French chef, and purchased food
and drink for the royal kitchens. Scandalous stories of
drunken, debauched parties, orchestrated by the barber,
with the nawab “attired in the dress of an European
lady!” soon reached the British Resident’s ears, but he
was unable to do more than report the “shocking indecen-
cies” to the governor-general. Derusett made money
from goods and services bought on the nawab’s behalf,
and soon learned that the best way to get his bills paid
was to present them when Nasir al-Din Haidar was
drunk. He was not the kind of European who added luster
to Lucknow society, but he was not untypical in retiring
from the court with a fortune. Others had done the same,
though perhaps with more finesse.
To conclude, how fluid were the barriers between
65 Llewellyn-Jones : Lucknow and EuRopean Society
 European and Indian society in Lucknow? Was there a
genuine crossover of culture? A copy of a now-vanished
painting by Zoffany shows Colonel Polier seated on the
veranda of his house. He is wearing a white angarkha
under a gold brocade coat, and a gem-studded turban.
His flowing mustache is worn in the style introduced by
the nawabs, of a fashionable Persian gentleman. He is
watching three dancing girls who seem to be explaining
the finer points of rhythm to him. A hookah is by his
side, and in the background are female musicians and
servants (106, p. 68). The idea of the “white mughals,”
Europeans who adopted Indian dress and habits, is borne
out by a number of portraits and descriptions from
Lucknow. John Wombwell, the Company accountant, is
pictured relaxing in native dress, a welcome change, one
imagines, from his usual restrictive clothes (Fig. 35,
p. 230). As we have seen, Europeans kept harems of
women, which they certainly would not have done at home.
There was a genuine appreciation of Indian literature,
art, and music by these men, who brought with them, by
the late eighteenth century, a curiosity about the natural
world and the flora and fauna around them.
In return, at least two rulers of Awadh were
described, or painted, wearing European clothes. Saadat
Ali Khan had an English admiral’s uniform, a regimental
dress, and a Protestant parson’s outfit which he used to
105. Colonel Mordaunt’s Cockfight, after a Painting
surprise guests. He also had a selection of wigs. Nasir
by Johann Zoffany, c. 1800
al-Din Haidar wore the more conventional dress of a
fashionable Regency buck, with tight white trousers and
a fitted blue jacket. From the 1780s, with the building of
the Daulat Khana, the nawabs lived in European-style
palaces, surrounded by European furniture and paintings
and enjoying European luxuries. Some enjoyed listening
to western music, played by bandsmen, pianists, and
bagpipers. When they went out they were driven in
coaches imported from England. Europeans were invited
by them to Indian festivals, including the spring celebra-
tions (Basant) and Eid. The nawabs attended Christmas
parties at the Residency, but this was as far as religious
recognition went. There were very few cases of conversion,
and Muslim women in the harems of European men were
not urged to become Christians. One or two European
women converted to Islam, notably Mary Angela Short,
who became Sultan Mariam Begam when she married
66
Ghazi al-Din Haidar. There was also Biddy Timms,
an Englishwoman who married Hassan Ali, a professor
of Persian and Hindustani at the Company’s military
academy in Surrey. As Mrs. Meer Hassan Ali she spent
twelve years in Lucknow and wrote a fascinating account
of Muslim life there called Observations on the Mussul-
mauns of India. Among Anglo-Indian families it was
more common to slip from one religion to the other and
children would sometimes have both Christian and
Muslim names.
The presence of Europeans in nawabi Lucknow
undoubtedly enhanced the city, both physically and cul-
turally, while the earlier nawabs themselves led the way
in eagerly embracing the European style. But there was
a distinct change during the later years of the nawabi
period. As the financial demands of the East India
Company increased, pressure was put on Awadh’s rulers
to reform their administration. Reports on their moral
failings were sent to the governor-general in Calcutta,
particularly by Sir William Sleeman, Resident for much
of Wajid Ali Shah’s nine-year reign. The love affair with
the West was over. Wajid Ali Shah deliberately retreated
into a more familiar world of Urdu poetry, Indian dance,
drama, and the arts, although his new Qaisar Bagh
Palace was recognizably a series of European-inspired
vistas. Certainly Lucknow would have been poorer
without the input from Europe. But at the same time it
might have avoided the tragedy of annexation in 1856
followed by the Uprising a year later.
1. Bengal Secret Consultations 28 December 1774, India Office Records,
British Library, quoted in Rosie Llewellyn-Jones, A Fatal Friendship: The
Nawabs, the British, and the City of Lucknow (Delhi: Oxford University
Press, 1985), 88 – 89.
2. Diary of Mrs. Elizabeth Plowden, in Mss Eur C 149 Misc. Papers of Richard
Chicheley Plowden, India Office Records, British Library.
3. For an account of Claude Martin’s life, see Rosie Llewellyn-Jones, A Very
Ingenious Man: Claude Martin in Early Colonial India (Delhi: Oxford
University Press, 1992); and A Man of the Enlightenment in Eighteenth-
Century India: The Letters of Claude Martin 1766–1800 (Delhi: Permanent
Black, 2003). For Martin’s letter to Lt. Col. Ross, to whom he gave the
pistols illustrated, see A Man of the Enlightenment, 98.
4. For a recent study of Lucknow’s Anglo-Indian community, see Malcolm
Speirs, The Wasikadars of Awadh (Delhi: Rupa & Co., 2008).
5. This panorama, now in the Victoria & Albert Museum, Prints and Drawings
Department, is reproduced in Lucknow, City of Illusion, ed. Rosie Llewellyn-
Jones (New Delhi: Alkazi Collection of Photography; Munich: Prestel, 2006),
38 – 39.
6. For more on Derusett, see Rosie Llewellyn-Jones’s chapter “The Barber of
Lucknow,” in Engaging Scoundrels: True Tales of Old Lucknow (Delhi:
Oxford University Press, 2000), 65 – 85.
67 Llewellyn-Jones : Lucknow and EuRopean Society
 T u s h a ra B i n du Gu de

Hybrid Visions: The Cultural

Landscape of Awadh

The cosmopolitan natures of the successive Awadhi capitals of Faizabad and Lucknow, especially the interactions
between their Indian residents and European visitors, have received considerable scholarly and novelistic atten-
tion. Such interactions are fabulously recorded in the arts—in paintings such as Johann Zoffany’s Colonel
Mordaunt’s Cock Match, 1784 – 86, or Colonel Antoine-Louis-Henri Polier Watching a Nautch, 1782 – 88, by an Indian
artist after Zoffany (Fig. 34, p. 228; 106, p. 70) —as well as in various histories, memoirs, and bodies of correspon-
dence. The imagery, impressions, and judgments contained in these sources follow, in large part, the shifting
political realities of the province. Yet the term “hybrid” that is so often used to describe the arts of Awadh, in
particular reference to the Indian assimilation of European styles and influences as well as the European adoption
of Indian lifestyles and pursuits, reflects these realities only partially. Awadh’s arts—though certainly affected by
the encounters between Indian and European artists and patrons—were also shaped by other types of histories,
relationships, and processes.
In this essay I address some of the complexities of artistic production in Faizabad and Lucknow through
a consideration not only of the meeting that took place there between East and West but also of Awadh’s provincial
Mughal history and its ruling dynasty’s own Persian Shia ancestry. Following on the discussion contained in my
introduction to the exhibition, which situates Awadhi art within the spaces of history and memory, I am here
interested in an exploration of Awadh as a place of artistic invention. My approach is informed in many ways by
recent studies concerning the geographical dimensions of art history which are apparent in, for instance, our

68 69 Gude : The CultuRAl Landscape of Awadh


Top: Fig. 4. Attributed to Chitarman, Muhammad Shah
with CouRtieRs; India, c. 1730; opaque watercolor and gold on
paper, page 18 ⁄ x 15 ⁄ in. (46.2 x 38.5 cm), image 16 ⁄ x 13 ⁄
1 8 1 8
(41 x 34.4 cm); Bodleian Library MS Douce Or.a.3, fol. 14 r
bottom: 5. Saadat Khan BuRhan al-Mulk, and Safdar
Jang, 1750– 60
Page 68: 106. Colonel Antoine-Louis HenRi Polier
Watching a Nautch, c. 1786 – 88
references to regional Indian styles and in discussions of
artistic centers, peripheries, and the exchanges between
them. Such considerations are especially relevant to
1
Awadh. From the mid-eighteenth through the mid-nine-
teenth centuries, the region’s distinct cultural contours
were defined—by its various inhabitants and observers—
in relation to Delhi, Iran, and Europe. The impact of the
last named has tended to overshadow the role of imperial
Mughal art and indigenous traditions in the mediation
of Awadh’s hybrid artistic forms. The importance of both
Delhi and Shia Iran to nawabi conceptions of kingship
are also reflected in several hybrid Awadhi works.
Awadh encompassed a cultural region of great
antiquity but was first designated as a distinct adminis-
trative province during the thirteenth century under the
Delhi Sultanate. It continued to be recognized as such—
though its exact geographical boundaries are unclear—
under successive waves of Muslim rule. The history with
2
which this essay is concerned begins with Awadh’s
incorporation, in 1580, into the dominions of the Mughal
Emperor Akbar (r. 1556 –1605) and thus into a political
relationship that would greatly influence the aspirations
and cultural activities of Awadh’s later rulers. Akbar’s
3
court historian Abul Fazl described the province in
favorable terms, but Awadh appears to have figured
somewhat remotely in the concerns of this emperor and
his immediate successors. By the late eighteenth century,
4
however, Awadh had emerged as a prosperous agricul-
tural and trading region as well as an important strategic
asset to an empire then facing threats from aggressive
regional powers. It was for these reasons as well that it
would also be drawn into the commercial and expansion-
ist designs of the English East India Company. 5
That Awadh was oriented artistically toward the
Mughals is well known. The political relationship
6
between Awadh and Delhi is given expression in such
paintings as Muhammad Shah with Courtiers, c. 1730,
attributed to the artist Chitarman, in the Bodleian
Library, Oxford (fig. 4). Among the four men surround-
1 8 12
ing the centrally seated Mughal emperor is Saadat Khan
Burhan al-Mulk, who is identified by an inscription above
the fan held across his right shoulder. Saadat Khan was
appointed governor (subedar) of Awadh in 1722. Although
his appointment was initially intended as a rebuke—for
Awadh’s extractable revenues were then far less than
those of his previous subedari of Agra—Saadat Khan
managed to control various local rebellions and double the
province’s remittances to Delhi. For this achievement
Muhammad Shah bestowed upon him the title Burhan
al-Mulk (“Proof of the Realm”).7 Virtually the same
likeness of Saadat Khan appears in a roughly contempo-
raneous Mughal painting depicting the nobleman with
Muhammad Shah, now in the British Library, London, as
well as in later works that were executed in Faizabad.8
In one such painting from Faizabad, for instance, the
familiar figure of Saadat Khan appears yet again,
although in this instance he is shown seated with his
nephew, and son-in-law, Safdar Jang (5). The exact date
of the painting is unknown; however, its formal proper-
ties—compositional symmetry, setting, and color pal-
ette—firmly link it to paintings of Muhammad Shah’s
atelier, from which a number of artists are known to have
migrated to Awadh following the Persian sack of Delhi in
1739 and the emperor’s death in 1748. The historical
interest of this painting lies in the emerging political
configuration that it documents, for Saadat Khan named
Safdar Jang as his deputy governor and, in doing so,
became the first Mughal subedar to designate his own
successor. Although this appointment was subject to the
approval of the emperor, it was one of several crucial
steps, as the historian Richard Barnett has shown, in the
establishment of regional autonomy by various provincial
Mughal governors during the eighteenth century.9 Safdar
Jang’s own instincts for political survival, by which he
gained the offices and power to exploit imperial weakness,
led to the further expansion of Awadhi territory and its
consolidation as an independent dynastic state.
The late-Mughal history of Awadh was paralleled in
other provinces where painting schools that were at first
dependent upon the Mughal idiom went on to develop their
own distinctive styles. We may, for instance, compare
late-eighteenth-century paintings from Awadh with
contemporaneous works from Murshidabad and Farrukh-
abad, and easily comprehend their individual stylistic
characteristics. The Los Angeles County Museum of Art’s
painting of a prince hunting with cheetah (26, p. 72)
can be dated in the years prior to 1764, as it is inscribed
on the verso with this date as well as the initials of

70 71 Gude : The CultuRAl Landscape of Awadh

Above: 26. PRince Hunting with Cheetah, 1764 or earlier

Right: 25. Attributed to Muhammad Faqirullah Khan,

A PRincess and Her Companions Enjoying a TeRRace
Ambiance, c. 1760 –70

William Fullarton, a Company surgeon who was stationed in Bengal and Bihar between
1744 and 1766. Its style—reflected particularly in the finely stippled faces with sharply
delineated eyes and the short figural proportions—is typical of works produced in
Murshidabad, capital of the eastern provinces of Bengal, Bihar, and Orissa, during the
rule there of Mir Qasim Khan (1760 – 63).10 The painting A Princess and Her Companions
Enjoying a Terrace Ambiance (25) belongs to a relatively small group of works from
Farrukhabad, an area of Awadh that was for some time in the eighteenth century under
Indo-Afghan rule. A yellow palette and figural type consisting of rather long-legged
figures with faces marked by full cheeks and sharp noses and chins is common to paint-
ings produced there between 1760 and 1770. In Murshidabad and Farrukhabad, as at
Faizabad and Lucknow, the emergence of regional painting styles can be linked with
strong local patronage and the availability of talented artists. The exchange of visual
vocabularies between Delhi and its provinces as well as among the provinces themselves
was effected by the movement of artists and patrons during these tumultuous years.
Thus, Farrukhabad painting derives largely from the Lucknow work of the imperially
trained artist Faqirullah.11 Delhi-trained Lucknow artists are also thought to have
contributed to the Murshidabad style under Mir Qasim.12
At least one of the reasons that much work remains to be done on these and other
provincial Mughal styles lies with the fact that their distance—in geographical, tempo-
ral, and visual senses—from the Mughal imperial center at the height of its power led to

72 73 Gude : The CultuRAl Landscape of Awadh

their early characterization as weak offshoots. No less a scholar than Ananda K.
Coomaraswamy, for instance, proclaimed of late Mughal painting that “nothing of
importance is later than Muhammad Shah and hardly anything of supreme excellence
later than about 1640.” 13 Much the same sentiment was expressed earlier by Percy Brown,
who claimed: “On the break-up of the Mughal court at Delhi, and the transfer of power to
Lucknow and Hyderabad, the Mughal school . . . went to pieces, with the results that
many examples of a degraded art were produced.”14 When, in the late eighteenth century,
Indian painting came to increasingly admit European influences, it was destined to
become a “stagnant reflection” of western art.15
While we no longer accept such judgments, they provide a useful vantage point from
which to examine the arts of Awadh, a region described by Barnett and other scholars as
existing “between empires,” that is, between the declining Mughal power and the rising
British colonial one. The eighteenth century, when these historical changes occurred, was
once viewed as a period of severe disruption and revolutionary change in South Asia.16
It is not difficult to see how this view is reflected in the opinions of Coomaraswamy and
Brown, wherein painting in the Mughal provinces occupies a position inferior to those
normative art forms—Mughal and European—against which it was judged. Much recent
scholarship, however, indicates the historical processes of the eighteenth century to have
been rather more evolutionary in character, with provinces such as Awadh maintaining
important continuities with the Mughal imperium and its forms of rule. It is with this
7. A Royal Encampment Scene, c. 1780 – 85
in mind that we may begin to explore the nature of hybridity in Awadh’s art, for if such
hybridity is considered to be one of its hallmarks, then its sources, precedents, and
deployment bear closer examination.
While regional political independence was built upon the dissolution of imperial
control, the cultural authority of the Mughals was remarkably long-lived.17 Thus, the
emblematic practices of Mughal kingship and authority were re-created in various
successor states. Both Saadat Khan and Safdar Jang considered Delhi to be their
principal place of residence, and neither one erected any permanent buildings in Awadh.18
Later Awadhi rulers, known by their title of nawab, literally “deputy” or “vice-regent/
governor,” increasingly viewed themselves as hereditary regional rulers but were nonethe-
less conscious in their emulation of the Mughals, whom they continued to nominally
recognize as overlords into the early nineteenth century. The British Museum’s painting
A Royal Encampment Scene, dating from about 1780 – 85, imaginatively depicts a vast
camp, the royal enclosure of which is constructed of tents in a red color normally reserved
for imperial use (7).19 Such temporary and movable settlements had been a feature of
Mughal campaigns since the sixteenth century and are variously rendered in imperial
manuscripts such as the Akbarnama (8, 9). Historical sources from the late eighteenth
century indicate that certainly by the time of Asaf al-Daula, the Awadh nawabs had
adopted an imperial manner in both the substance and scale of their regional tours and Left: 8. Jagan (composition) and Asir
(painting), Akbar Is EnteRtained
hunting expeditions. The wealth of the nawabs permitted comparable spectacles—visual by His Foster BRother Azim Khan
at Dipalpur , c. 1590 – 95
demonstrations of dominion—that involved numerous guests, hundreds of transport
Right: 9. Jagan (composition), Sur
elephants and pack animals, thousands of soldiers, and a bewildering number of servants, Das (painting), and Madhav (faces),
entertainers, and staff to supply a party’s every need over a period as long as two or Akbar Is EnteRtained by His
Foster BRother Azim Khan at
three months.20 Dipalpur , c. 1590 – 95

74 75 Gude : The CultuRAl Landscape of Awadh

 Royal pursuits were among the most common subjects
of Indian courtly paintings. What makes A Royal
Encampment Scene unique is the precision with which
the artist rendered the scene according to the rules of
single-point perspective. It is one of several paintings
associated with the patronage of Colonel Antoine-Louis
Polier, a Swiss-born soldier and engineer who lived in
India for thirty years, many of which he spent in Awadh.
Comparable scenes, of architectural monuments and
courtly gardens, were rendered for Polier by the artist
Mihr Chand (fl. 1759 – 86) and his workshop. The British
Museum painting was originally presented by Polier to
the artist Ozias Humphry. Polier gave an album contain-
ing similar paintings to Lady Coote, wife of the English
East India Company officer Sir Eyre Coote (156, p.
184). 21
His own album of such views is today in the
collection of the Museum für Asiatische Kunst, Berlin.
Scholars have noted that the paintings appear to repre-
sent a particular development, under strong European
influence, from slightly earlier Awadhi works. These are
22
Above: 184. AcRobats PeRfoRming on a TightRope
for a Women’s Dancing PaRty, c. 1780 – 85
Left: 21. A Dancer Balances a Bottle, c. 1770
76
represented by several exuberant terrace scenes, such as
one in the Chester Beatty Library, Dublin, A Dancer
Balances a Bottle, c. 1770, which can be attributed to the
artist Faizullah or a close follower (21).
In its vision of receding terraces, waterways, and
enclosed gardens, the Dancer painting does indeed
prefigure the treatment in the British Museum Encamp-
ment Scene and related works. Viewing the turn toward
a more scientifically rendered perspective solely in terms
of an increasingly dominant Europeanized aesthetic,
however, obscures our understanding of the many artistic
sources available to Indian painters and the particular
uses to which they were adapted. The Dublin painting, for
instance, derives certain stylistic features from earlier
6; Mughal paintings that must have been known to artists
working in Awadh.
Patronage of the arts was one of the most visible ways
in which the nawabs expressed their roles as inheritors
of Mughal power, a task greatly facilitated by the influx
of talent to Faizabad and Lucknow during the late
77 Gude : The CultuRAl Landscape of Awadh

Figs. 5, 6. Attributed to the Kashmiri Painter, Shah Jahan
Visits the ShRine of Khwaja Muin Al-Din Chishti at
Ajmer ; India, Mughal Empire, c. 1656; opaque watercolor and
gold on paper, left image 14 3⁄ 8 x 10 1⁄ 8 in. (36.6 x 25.8 cm), right
image 13 7⁄ 8 x 8 7⁄ 8 in. (35.2 x 22.4 cm); The Royal Collection
RCIN1005025, folio 205B–A
eighteenth century. Paralleling the migrations from Delhi was the outward flow of
imperial manuscripts and paintings, many of which were acquired by the nawabs and
other collectors in Awadh. One of the most famous of these acquisitions was the Padshah-
nama manuscript, an illustrated history of Shah Jahan’s reign (1628 – 58), which was
in the possession of Asaf al-Daula by 1776 –77. The Dublin painting, and several others
23
like it, display landscape conventions that recall various folios of the Padshahnama in
their conceptualization of pictorial space and their attention to distant details. In outdoor
scenes, for instance, the Padshahnama artists combined the formal requirements of
courtly portraiture with the desire for naturalism through their illusionistic rendering of
landscapes that recede through the middle and upper parts of the pictures, as in the two
folios illustrating Shah Jahan’s visit to the shrine of Khwaja Muin al-Din Chishti at
Ajmer (Figs. 5, 6). Walled cities and fortresses were often rendered from a bird’s-eye
78
viewpoint, while various figures and activities were
scattered across layered and ever-more-distant hills.24
Much the same approach is taken in A Dancer Balances a
Bottle, where the primary activity occurs across the lower
part of the picture. Although the hilly landscapes of the
Padshahnama have been replaced by neat rows of pavil-
ions and gardens, every receding plane is punctuated by
minutely rendered figures. In the far distance, a for-
tress—a schematic rendering that recalls the images of
Daulatabad or Udgir in the Padshahnama—is besieged
by cannon. We might also consider the compositional
balance evident in the Dublin painting, asserted much
more strongly in the Polier paintings, as late expressions
of the formal symmetry codified in the jharoka (balcony)
scenes of the Padshahnama.
It is, of course, unclear whether the Padshahnama
itself was the direct source for Awadhi works of this type.
Its landscape conventions were developments after the
Flemish “world landscapes” that were adapted for Mughal
painting as early as the late sixteenth century and would
have been available to later Indian painters through a
range of works.25 However, ambitious landscape and archi-
tectural vistas of this type are unknown from the reign of
10. Attributed to Mihr Chand, Khwaja Muin al-Din Chishti,
Muhammad Shah and his immediate successors, suggest- c. 1770
ing that the Awadhi painters of such works were cre-
atively responding to older models as well as new stimuli
and patronage. The Awadhi interest in imperial painting
of the Shah Jahan period has been recognized by Milo also examine the uses to which Awadhi artists applied
Beach, who notes that such revivals—which occurred in their refinements of such techniques as linear perspective.
other areas as well—were given distinctly local shapes. 26
It should be noted at the outset that these paintings of
Another Faizabad painting of about 1770 in the Chester architectural monuments such as the Red Fort and Jami
Beatty Library, for instance, depicts Khwaja Muin al-Din Masjid at Delhi and the Taj Mahal at Agra (130, 131,
Chishti, the thirteenth-century Sufi shaikh considered by p. 80) are of a decidedly different sort than the later
the Mughals to be the spiritual source of their authority architectural studies by Indian artists that are usually
(10). The painting clearly continues the tradition of associated with European patronage in India.28 The
naturalistic portraiture perfected in Shah Jahan’s time, latter, which also illustrate important Mughal monu-
although the artist—perhaps Mihr Chand—has seated ments, rarely adopt the high aerial view common to many
the shaikh beneath an early variation of the scalloped of the Polier paintings. In the Awadhi painting of the
archway that is encountered as a framing device in many Jami Masjid, this positioning allowed the artist to provide
Awadhi portraits and figure studies. 27
unobstructed frontal views of the most important features
Returning to the British Museum Encampment Scene of the mosque complex: the entrance into its vast court-
(7, p. 75) and comparable paintings, such as the architec- yard and the mosque itself. Although differing from
tural vistas now at the Museum für Asiatische Kunst, we traditional Indian paintings that frequently depict
might consider their relationships to earlier traditions and buildings from multiple vantage points in order to stress
79 Gude : The CultuRAl Landscape of Awadh

Top: 130. Attributed to Mihr Chand, Jami Masjid, Delhi, c. 1773 –76
Bottom: 131. Attributed to Mihr Chand, Taj Mahal, c. 1773 –76
80
Fig. 7. FoRtification of Shuja Al-Daula at Faizabad; India, Uttar
Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1774; watercolor on paper, 18 5⁄ 32 x 55 19⁄ 32 in. (46.5 x 142.5 cm);
Bibliothèque nationale de France, Est., Rés. Od. 63-Ft- 6, fol. 23 (Collection Gentil)
their constituent parts and functions, the artist here
achieves a similar goal. Setting the mosque complex
29
within a receding cityscape is an innovative turn, yet one
that is so idealized as to reinforce the structure, symme-
try, and order of the Jami Masjid. A similar elevated
viewing position, in addition to subtle shifts from a strict
linear perspective, allowed the artist of the Taj Mahal
painting to render the river view of the tomb complex in
such a way as to fully reveal the triple-arched and -domed
side mosques while presenting the tomb in frontal view.
Although he appears to have worked either from memory
or a secondary source (judging from the general misun-
derstanding of the tomb’s upper structures), here again,
symmetry and order—fundamental features of the site’s
plan—are stressed.
Although later Awadhi artists adopted the oblique
views of such monuments favored by European artists
working in a picturesque mode, paintings reflecting a
traditionally Indian way of seeing architecture—as
described by Giles H. R. Tillotson—continued to be
produced alongside them well into the nineteenth cen-
tury. The differences between these competing depic-
30
tions of architecture can be illustrated through a
comparison of William Hodges’s drawing of about 1783
depicting part of Shuja al-Daula’s palace at Faizabad and
a painting of the same structure, dating from about 1774,
by an Indian architect in the employ of the French
81
military adventurer Jean-Baptiste Gentil (45, p. 82; Fig.
7). The Indian painting belongs to a series of twenty-four
architectural studies commissioned by Gentil and largely
focused on Delhi. It shows a frontal, symmetrical view
divorced from contextual surroundings. Other paintings
from the set, which include some ground plans, reveal
similar preferences.31
By the time of Hodges’s visit to Faizabad, Asaf
al-Daula had moved his court to the city of Lucknow,
although his mother, Bahu Begam, continued to maintain
a considerable presence at the former Awadhi capital.
Hodges was clearly impressed by the elegance and scale of
the palace, describing the public audience hall as richer
than its counterpart at Lucknow, a fact he deduced from
its decaying decoration. His memoirs describe the palace
as a vast and desolate complex within a city containing
the “remains of many handsome buildings.” 32
Hodges was appreciative, often admiring, of Indian
architecture and recognized its fundamentally different
cultural origins from classically inspired European
traditions. His various writings also reveal an awareness
of contemporaneous European political and intellectual
discourses, so that his descriptions, written and visual,
translate the Indian built landscape through a language
of empire, oriental despotism, and picturesque aesthetics.
Hodges writes, for instance, that at the end of his tour
to Faizabad: “I could not help viewing with a melancholy
Gude : The CultuRAl Landscape of Awadh

45. William Hodges, A View of PaRt of the Palace
of the Late Nawab Shuja al-Daula at Faizabad,
c. 1783
48. Thomas Daniell and William Daniell, Gate of the
Lal Bagh at Faizabad, 1801
82
concern the miserable appearance of all the territories
which were under the absolute direction of Mussulman
tyrants.” The text accompanying his aquatints of the
33
Faizabad palace describes the structure raised by Shuja
al-Daula as “certainly the most splendid monument of
the arts in Hindostan at the time: it occupies a large
tract of ground, and is in many parts very beautiful.” He
adds, however:
The great buildings in Hindostan raised by the Mogul chiefs, their
palaces in particular, are subject to a revolution not known in other
countries; for it is a principle among the great men of that country
to leave the house of their fathers to ruin and decay, and to establish
one for themselves, bearing their own name; as, in the present
instance, the present Nabob of Oud, Asoph ul Dowlah, on the demise
of his father, left Fizabad, and fixed the Government at Lucknow,
where he has raised a monument of barbarous magnificence.34
Accordingly, Hodges’s drawing of the Faizabad
palace emphasizes its ruinous state. Vegetal growth
appears on the chattri at the left edge of the drawing,
while a large piece of the fortified embankment appears to
topple away at the right. The diagonal composition,
offering an oblique view of the building from the river,
was employed by Hodges in several of his drawings. This
conventionally picturesque approach allowed the artist to
de-emphasize the symmetry of much Indian architecture.
Fig. 8. Thomas Daniell (England, 1749 –1840) and William
Daniell (England, 1769 –1837), The Punj Mahalla Gate,
Lucknow, from ORiental SceneRy, PaRt 3, plate 3;
England, 1801; aquatint in color on paper, 16 1⁄2 x 23 5⁄ 8 in. (42 x
60 cm); The British Library, London, X432 /3(5)
83
Geoff Quilley observes that it also highlighted a build-
ing’s grandeur—note how Shuja al-Daula’s palace ascends
from the banks, its roof chattris silhouetted against the
sky—while drawing attention to their “elegiac ruination
and abandonment.” 35
Not all European landscape artists visiting India
depicted Awadhi monuments in the same manner as
Hodges. The various paintings and aquatints of Thomas
and William Daniell, who traveled through India between
1786 and 1794, reveal similar aesthetic concerns, although
their works from Faizabad and Lucknow—which they
visited in 1789 —are less insistent in representing its
buildings as ruins (48; 49, pp. 124–25; Fig. 8). They were
followed by other amateur and professional artists whose
visual descriptions of Lucknow evoke the grandeur of a
city that had then become a magnet for fortune-seekers of
all nationalities. Their impact upon Indian artists in
Awadh, however, appears to have been minimal. As late as
the reign of Wajid Ali Shah, for instance, Indian art-
ists—and presumably their Indian patrons as well—pre-
ferred a vision of architecture that revealed a building as
completely as possible rather than from a single point of
view. The circa 1850 – 56 painting of Awadh’s last ruler
carried in procession through his palace complex of the
Qaisar Bagh reveals the persistence of this Indian way
of seeing (fig. 9).
Fig. 9. Wajid Ali Shah of
Awadh in the QaisaR bagh;
India, c. 1850 – 56; opaque
watercolor and gold on paper,
27 3⁄ 8 x 37 1⁄2 in. (69.5 x 95.3 cm);
Private collection
Gude : The CultuRAl Landscape of Awadh
54A. Lucknow fRom the Gomti, 1826

An interesting comparison—which again highlights the different concerns of Indian

and European artists and patrons while also addressing Lucknow’s hybrid architecture
and its Shia history—can be drawn from two extraordinary panoramic landscapes of
Lucknow. One of these, dating from 1826 or earlier, was presumably made for the same
British visitor whose handwritten notes identifying the buildings accompanied the scroll
into the collection of the Yale Center for British Art.36 He describes the structure recog-
nizable as the Shah Najaf as the “New Imam Barah—built by his present Majesty”
(54A). The Shah Najaf Imambara was commissioned by Ghazi al-Din Haidar. In the Yale
panorama, the main shrine is depicted within its boundary walls; the gilded and fes- Top: 54B, C. Lucknow fRom the
Gomti, 1826
tooned dome is clearly visible beyond the main entrance gateway. The artist employed
European-style perspective in his depiction of this and several other buildings, many left: 164. Felice Beato, BARa
Chattar Manzil with the King’s
presented obliquely as they must have appeared from the Gomti River. The scroll is, in FISH-SHAPED Boat, 1858

fact, a fairly accurate topographical representation of Lucknow as viewed from the Gomti
and a valuable guide to buildings that have since disappeared. To the left of the Shah
Najaf, for instance, is the small shrine—few traces of which now remain—known as the
Qadam Rasul, which was erected by Ghazi al-Din to house a venerated impression of the
Prophet Muhammad’s footprints.
The scroll unrolls from right to left and is inscribed with various place names. Begin-
ning with the stone bridge, the complex of religious buildings near the Macchi Bhawan
Palace are identified as the Shah Pir Muhammad Masjid, the old Jami Masjid, and the
Bara Imambara (54B). The central portion of the scroll is particularly interesting in
depicting the riverine buildings that would eventually become incorporated into the Bara
Chattar Manzil Palace complex. The Farhat Bakhsh, Major General Claude Martin’s
former home, which was purchased by Saadat Ali Khan, is clearly depicted. To its right is
a European-style “folly” that was mirrored by a similar structure erected on the opposite
bank of the river. In between these two buildings, in the middle of the river, stood an
octagonal pavilion known only from late-nineteenth-century photographs which show it
reduced to a single story (54, 164).37 Other notable structures appearing in the scroll

84 85 Gude : The CultuRAl Landscape of Awadh

54D. Lucknow fRom the Gomti, 1826

Top: 163. Felice Beato, PanoRama of Lucknow,

Taken fRom the BARa ImambaRa (detail), 1858
include the British Residency and the Moti Mahal Palace, completed during Ghazi
Bottom: Fig. 10. Felice Beato (Greece, 1832 –1909),
al-Din’s reign. A domed structure rising behind one of the palace building’s walls—and Two-paRt PanoRama of the Husainabad

now long since gone—may be the famous “moti-” or “pearl-”like dome for which this royal ImambaRa (detail); India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow,
1858; Albumen prints, 9 1⁄2 x 22 3⁄ 8 in. (24 x 56.7 cm); The
complex was known (54D). Behind the last structure of the Moti Mahal stands the
38
Alkazi Collection of Photography

Khurshid Manzil, the European-style house with moat and towers built by Saadat Ali
Khan; three towers are visible in this scroll.
The artist of the Yale scroll attempted to depict an accurate view of the city for his
European patron. This concern, in addition to the style of the painting, is typical of the
many “Company-school” works—so-called for their obvious adaptations to European
visual tastes—that depict Indian architectural monuments. The style, of course, came to
Muhammad faqirullah khan, a princess and her compan-
be utilized in a variety of paintings for Indian patrons as well. It is for one such patron ions enjoying a terrace ambiance, circa 1760–70, EX.2361.177

that a panorama of about 1848 now in the British Library was likely to have been made,
for its visual concerns and pictorial techniques are somewhat different from those in the
Yale panorama.39
This later panorama depicts a royal procession of Muhammad Ali Shah, the primary
figures of which are unfinished but visible through their faint pencil outlines. The
procession unfolds across several sheets of paper pasted together and presents the short
journey from the Husainabad Imambara complex to the Bara Imambara. That the artist
attempted to represent the architecture along this avenue accurately can be seen by
comparison with Felice Beato’s 1858 panoramic photographs showing both the Husaina-
bad Imambara and the view from the Bara Imambara complex (fig. 10, 163). In both
of these, the low-lying structures, including the enclosed building just outside the
Husainabad Bazaar gateway—with its corner towers reminiscent of Saadat Ali Khan’s
Dilkusha Kothi and the west facade towers of Ghazi al-Din’s Darshan Bilas—can be
seen (55H, p. 88). While these secondary buildings are depicted as if in passing, the artist
has taken a completely different approach to the illustration of the Shia monuments.
Their depictions are informed by European techniques of perspective—evident in the
oblique views of various buildings and gateways. In showing the various parts of each
complex as if experiencing them individually, however, the artist was also conditioned by

86 87 Gude : The CultuRAl Landscape of Awadh

55. Unfinished PanoRama of
Lucknow fRom the Reign of
Muhammad Ali Shah, c. 1848
55E
63. John Edward Saché, Husainabad
Bazaar Gateway, c. 1867
88
55D 55C 55B
55H 55G
more traditional, painterly ways of depicting architecture
in India. The procession begins in the forecourt of the
Husainabad Imambara, an interior view of its west gate
visible in the distance (55A). The south gate of the fore-
court, through which one enters the main area of the
complex, appears next. This is followed by a complete
image of the interior court as taken in by an observer
having just passed through the south gate and scanning
the court from west to east. It includes the mosque
located in the northwest corner, the tomb of Zinat Algiya,
89
55A
55F
the reflecting pool, the imambara, and the jawab, the
building placed opposite the tomb for the sake of architec-
tural symmetry (55B–E). Somewhat abruptly—and
perhaps indicating a missing section of the scroll, which
may have included an exiting view of the south gate—the
east gate of the forecourt appears (55F). This is followed
by a view of its exuberant east facade, the image of which
is familiar to us from photographs dating from the later
nineteenth century (55G, 63). The buildings of the Bara
Imambara are depicted in similar fashion. Both the outer
Gude : The CultuRAl Landscape of Awadh
 55J 55I

55N 55M 55L 55K

and inner facades of the great Rumi Darwaza are shown (55I, J), as well as the monu-
mental gateways marking the second and third courts (55K, L). Finally, the Asafi Masjid
and the Imambara are revealed, belying the fact that their immense scales prevent such
an inclusive view from being captured in photographs assuming a similar viewing
position (55M, N). 40
Many imambaras (Urdu, “House of the Imam”) were built in Lucknow during the
reign of the nawabs and speak to the Twelver or Imami Shia orientation of Awadh’s
Muslim elites. We must recall that Saadat Khan originally came to India from Nishapur,
Iran, where the ruling Safavid dynasty had propagated Twelver Shiism in the establish-
ment of their own state. Shia beliefs are generally distinguished from those of Sunni
Muslims by their insistence that the descendants of Ali,
the Prophet’s cousin and son-in-law, were his rightful
successors. Twelver Shias hold the view that Ali, as the
first Imam, was followed by eleven descendants. The third
Imam, Husain, who was killed in the year 680, is espe-
cially revered, while the twelfth and last Imam is believed
by Shias to have disappeared into a mystical realm from
which he will return at some future date. As such, many
orthodox Shias from the late ninth century onward
insisted that the absence of the Hidden Imam precluded
the institutionalization of religious authority, whether
through the leading of Friday congregational prayers or
the declaration of jihad by any person or by the state.
Shias in India were largely outnumbered by Sunni
Muslims, but Iranian nobility professing the faith were
nevertheless able to rise through the ranks of the Mughal
administration, as did Saadat Khan. While the establish-
ment of a Shia state was not a factor in his or his immedi-
ate successors’ early bids for regional independence, their
consolidation of authority was built upon wresting control

90 91 Gude : The CultuRAl Landscape of Awadh

 This identity, which was rooted in the Awadhi rulers’
ancestral ties to Shia Safavid Iran, was assiduously
maintained by the nawabs through their marriage
alliances and administrative appointments. It was also
44
expressed through architectural monuments that repli-
cated important Shia shrines in Sunni Iraq. One of these,
the Shah Najaf Imambara of Ghazi al-Din Haidar—men-
tioned above in the context of the Yale panoramic scroll—
was intended to replicate the shrine of Imam Ali in Najaf,
though it bears little resemblance to the model but for its
single dome and square plan. The Kazmain Karbala,
45
erected by a nobleman in the service of Muhammad Ali
Shah, is a copy of the sixteenth-century Al-Kadhimiya
Masjid in Baghdad, a two-domed structure housing the
tombs of the seventh and ninth Imams (69). “Karbala”
refers to the name of the battlefield in Iraq where
Husain—the third Imam— was slain, and such struc-
tures further underscore the Shia orientation of Luck-
now’s Muslim nobility. The karbalas at Lucknow were
used for burials as well as for the interring of taziyas—
model replicas of Husain’s tomb—at the end of the
Muharram mourning procession.46 From the late eigh-
teenth through mid-nineteenth centuries, Awadhi support
for the Iraqi shrine cities and their clergies—following
upon the practice of Safavid monarchs—was also
expressed through generous donations of gifts and money
from Lucknow’s nobility and rulers.47
While the cultural identity and religious affiliation of
the nawabs were directly addressed through the built
environment of Lucknow, the sovereignty of the Awadhi

Fig. 1 1. The MuhaRRam Festival: Asaf al-Daula, Nawab

of Awadh, Listening at Night to the Maulvi Reading
fRom the ScRiptuRes; India, 1795; watercolor on paper, 16 1 ⁄ 2
x 21 1⁄2 in. (42 x 54.5 cm); The British Library Add.Or.3230

of Awadh from local elites, both Sunni and Hindu.41 Increasing nawabi wealth and power
through the latter half of the eighteenth century attracted many additional Shias to the
region, as well as religious converts. Shias, however, never constituted more than a small
percentage of Awadh’s urban population.42
Structures accommodating the public mourning rituals of Muharram, the month in
which the martyrdom of Imam Husain is commemorated, had been erected in India since
the sixteenth century. Lucknow’s Bara Imambara, built by Asaf al-Daula between 1784
and 1791, remains the largest monument of its kind, its particular configuration and
form revealing the nawab’s assertion of political autonomy and religious piety. The latter
was also commemorated in several Company-style paintings depicting Asaf al-Daula’s
personal participation in the mourning rituals held at his complex (fig. 11). Hussein
Keshani has noted that the Bara Imambara’s integration into the administrative center
of the Macchi Bhawan Palace, the Asafi Masjid’s visual parallels to Delhi’s Jami Masjid,
the synthesis of both Mughal and vernacular architectural forms in the imambara
building, and the liberal deployment throughout of the fish emblem that was adopted as
the Awadhi royal insignia, all point to the importance of the complex in visually affirm-
ing Lucknow as Asaf al-Daula’s new capital.43 The construction of the Asafi Masjid was
integral to this effort as it was built in response to pressure from Asaf’s court and Usuli
theologians to establish a Shia Friday congregational mosque. Thus, the Bara Imambara 69. Darogah Abbas Ali, Kazmain KaRbala, from The
Lucknow Album: Containing a SeRies of Fifty
complex was also an assertion of the Awadh regime’s cultural and religious identity. PhotogRaphic Views of Lucknow, 1874

92 93 Gude : The CultuRAl Landscape of Awadh

rulers was also proclaimed in other meaningful ways. The nawabi interest in collecting
European artworks and objects, for instance, was noted disparagingly by many contem-
poraneous observers. Natasha Eaton has suggested that the acquisition of European
items on such a magnificent scale was, however, an act of resistance as such activities
boldly proclaimed the nawabs’ control of their state’s financial resources. These collec-
tions were also a traditional prerogative of Indian kings, whether Hindu or Muslim,
demonstrating their access to, and possession of, worldly goods and rarities. The works of
British portrait artists were incorporated into indigenous rituals of kingship; they were
given away as gifts, and were also presented alongside the many exotic and ordinary
wares that filled the royal display spaces known as aina khanas (glass houses).48
From the late eighteenth through the mid-nineteenth centuries, the political power of
Awadh’s nawabs was increasingly threatened by the English East India Company. Yet,
various assertions of sovereignty continued to be made. Eventually, the rituals and
emblems associated with European kingship came to be superficially inscribed upon a
fundamentally Mughal- and Shia-oriented Awadhi throne. A remarkable painting by
Robert Home, court artist at Lucknow from 1814 to 1837, commemorates the 1819 corona-
tion of Ghazi al-Din Haidar as the padshah, or king, of Awadh (fig. 12). It captures the
visible trappings of this unprecedented proclamation of sovereignty, which drew its
authoritative symbols from Mughal and European traditions, and based its claims of
legitimacy upon the Awadh dynasty’s Shia ancestry. 49 Home was responsible for design-
ing much of the coronation paraphernalia, including the impressive gem-studded golden
throne, surmounted by an umbrella, upon which Ghazi al-Din sits in the painting. The
opulence of the throne, umbrella, and canopy—all constructed of precious materials—
was perhaps intended to evoke the famous Peacock Throne of Shah Jahan, which had
been seized in Delhi as plunder by Nadir Shah.50 As can be seen in the painting, however, Hazrat Abbas. Its completion was punctuated by a British
Ghazi al-Din’s crown and clothing were European in origin, reflecting his efforts to also gun salute, the playing of “God Save the King,” and the
situate his sovereign claims within a widening sphere of British dominion. The British, Mughal courtly custom of exchanging articles of tribute
in fact, encouraged Ghazi al-Din’s coronation as they wished to undermine continuing and honor.51
Mughal claims to power in northern India. The Awadh rulers had, up to this point, A painting on three panels in the Victoria and Albert
always nominally acknowledged their subordination to the Mughal throne, issuing coins Museum depicting Ghazi al-Din in procession through
bearing the name of the reigning emperor and having his name read in the Friday Lucknow with a number of British and Indian guests,
Left: 2. Muhammad Azam, Nasir al-din Haidar , c. 1830
mosque services, among other things. By declaring himself padshah, Ghazi al-Din family members, and attendants may have been intended
Right: Fig. 12. Robert Home, Ghazi Al-Din Haidar, King
directly challenged the traditional authority of his, by then, largely powerless overlord. to record one aspect of the coronation day’s events (63, of Awadh, Receiving TRibute; India, c. 1820; oil on canvas,
His sovereignty could not simply be asserted symbolically, but had to be substantively pp. 96–97). Later images of Ghazi al-Din as well as of 95 x 61 1⁄2 in. (241.3 x 156.2 cm); The Royal Collection, on loan
to Victoria Memorial Hall, RCIN408019
legitimated. This was achieved through demonstrating that his family’s Shia genealogy his successors repeat much of the regal imagery first
gave them a claim to power equal to that of the Mughal dynasty. Tracing their descent, in captured in Robert Home’s painting. An oil portrait of
part, from the seventh Imam, Musa al-Kazim, the Awadhi rulers viewed themselves as Awadh’s first king, painted around 1830 by the Indian
the true rulers of the Muslim community. Their authority rested with the Imams whose artist Muhammad Azam, was likely based upon an earlier
teachings could be interpreted by the Shia theologians known as mujtahid. Accordingly, painting by Home and depicts the king in his distinctive
Ghazi al-Din’s coronation included the participation of an appointed mujtahid—who coronation crown (36, p. 15). A similar crown and ermine-
placed the European-style crown upon his head—and occurred on October ninth, the day trimmed robe with jeweled collar are included in Muham-
Shias believe Muhammad appointed Ali as his successor and the first Imam. The cere- mad Azam’s portrait of Nasir al-Din Haidar, also
mony—which included the British Resident and numerous Company officials—was thought to have been based on an as yet unidentified
preceded by a procession to Lucknow’s most important Shia shrine, the Dargah of European model (2).

94 95 Gude : The CultuRAl Landscape of Awadh

56. PRocession of Ghazi al-Din Haidar thRough the
StReets of Lucknow, c. 1820

96 97 Gude : The CultuRAl Landscape of Awadh

 The appeal of the coronation regalia and emblems and
their importance to Awadhi conceptions of kingship in
subsequent reigns is also illustrated through two manu-
scripts associated with the patronage of the region’s last
king, Wajid Ali Shah. The pages of Wajid Ali Shah’s
Divan, a collection of his poetry dated 1849 – 50 and now
in the Khalili collection, London, is adorned with the
king’s distinctive coat of arms, which was a variation of
the one designed for Ghazi al-Din Haidar.52 The latter
was the first of its kind for an Indian ruler and appeared
on the coins and commemorative medals struck in Ghazi
al-Din’s name and in direct effrontery to the Mughal
emperor. The Divan also contains on its opening page a
portrait of Wajid Ali Shah, wearing the now familiar
European crown and robes and seated upon the corona-
tion throne (39). In this instance the portrayal has been
interpreted through the lens of traditional South Asian
manuscript painting. While the impact of European
artistic styles is expressed through the frontal portrait,
treatment of space, and slight modeling, the painting
differs from European works in its more direct emphasis
on Wajid Ali Shah’s kingly nature as indicated, for
instance, by his nimbus. A similar depiction appears in
the Ishqnamah, another collection of poetry written by
Wajid Ali Shah and dated to the same year as his Divan.
The Ishqnamah details the life and loves of the king,
whose coronation in the presence of the British Resident
is depicted in one of its later folios. The manuscript also
contains paintings recording the succession leading to
40. Wajid Ali Shah as a PRince with SaRfaRaz Mahal
Wajid Ali Shah’s coronation, as he was descended from and a Female Attendant, from the Isqhnamah,
Muhammad Ali Shah, the brother of Ghazi al-Din dated 1849/50 (AH 1266), folio 263v

Haidar. Accordingly, and in keeping with Mughal tradi-

39. Wajid Ali Shah
EnthRoned, from a divan,
dated 1849 – 50
tion whereby the emperors’ Timurid genealogy and links
to their predecessors were recorded in many a painting,
the Ishqnamah contains scenes of Wajid Ali Shah’s
investiture as a prince by his grandfather and his desig-
nation as heir-apparent by his father, Amjad Ali Shah.
Episodes from Wajid Ali Shah’s life as a king are distin-
guished in the manuscript images by the presence of the
European crown on the ruler’s head. A few paintings
speak to the continuing Shia presence at court, as in a
folio depicting Wajid Ali Shah granting several petitioners
leave to travel to Karbala and one in which he bestows
honorific robes upon recent Shia converts. The manu-
53
script provides a fascinating glimpse of Awadhi royal
tastes and prerogatives in the mid-nineteenth century.
Several of the images depict Wajid Ali Shah, dressed in
rich Lucknowi costume, ensconced within rooms filled
with European furniture and paintings (40). Some depict
him in settings that reveal the Europeanized aesthetic of
Lucknow’s palace architecture. And others recall the
courtly scenes familiar from earlier painting traditions,
the king leaning against a bolster while seated on a
carpet with his consort, or appearing on an appropriately
decorated outdoor terrace.

98 99 Gude : The CultuRAl Landscape of Awadh

 Despite its many extraordinary paintings which
attest to the blending of courtly artistic traditions and
precedents with nineteenth-century Lucknowi visual and
royal culture, Mildred and W. G. Archer described the
Ishqnamah manuscript quite disparagingly in a 1955
publication:
The paintings reveal the tawdry Europeanized palace to which
the journals and memoirs constantly refer. We see the garish stucco
building with its shoddy woodwork and frescoes, its carpets,
furniture and wall-lamps in the worst British taste. The rooms
are decorated with Indian portraits and British sporting prints,
and the ruler of Oudh, now a king with a golden halo, is portrayed
throughout his regal routine avidly seeking with monotonous
regularity the tedious company of unhappy women.
The style of the painting is even more revealing. . . .
The original Lucknow manner which had still persisted under
Asaf-ud-Daula is now dead. . . . In this volume the pleasures of the
zenana, its feasts, music, dancing, and embracings, formerly
portrayed with voluptuous line and fevered colour, are now so feebly
rendered that dignity is lost and nothing remains but a sense of
all-pervading squalor.54
We have returned, it seems, to the subject with which
this essay began, the measure of Awadh’s art by Mughal
and European standards and the need for a more compre-
hensive understanding of its hybrid visual culture. As the
Ishqnamah and the other paintings discussed in this essay
indicate, the cultural interactions which were brought
together in the creation of a unique Awadhi aesthetic can-
not be discussed solely in terms of a stylistic shift from
an imperial Mughal-derived style to a heavily European-
ized one. Many artistic precedents and new influences
were mediated by a court and clientele whose cultural
identities were far more complex than the terms “provin-
cial Mughal” or “Company style” might suggest. As a
Shia dynasty ruling over a largely Sunni and Hindu
population, the rulers of Awadh cultivated an image of
rule that reflected their Mughal inheritance and their own
distinctive religious heritage. Eventually they came to also
incorporate the symbolic language of European kingship.
The pictorial languages and styles which were employed
by Awadhi artists from the late eighteenth through the
nineteenth centuries likewise reflect the adaptation of
various influences to a distinctly Indian vision.
100
1. See Thomas DaCosta Kaufmann, Toward a Geography of Art (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 2004); and Thomas DaCosta Kaufmann and
Elizabeth Pilliod, eds., Time and Place: The Geohistory of Art (Hants, UK:
Ashgate, 2005).
2. Richard B. Barnett, North India Between Empires: Awadh, the Mughals, and
the British 1720–1801 (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California
Press, 1980), 18 –19; Michael H. Fisher, A Clash of Cultures: Awadh, the
British and the Mughals (New Delhi: Manohar, 1987), 28 –29.
3. The Mughal administrative configuration of the province was maintained in
large part until the twentieth century. [Barnett, North India Between
Empires, 19 –20; Saiyid Zaheer Husain Jafri, Studies in the Anatomy of a
Transformation: Awadh from Mughal to Colonial Rule (New Delhi: Gyan,
1998), 30 – 31.]
4. Abu’l-Fazl Allami, A-in-i-Akbari, Vol. 2, trans. H. S. Jarrett (1927; Delhi:
Low Price, 2001), 181– 90. Jafri notes (Studies, 17) that through the
seventeenth century, for instance, few high-ranking Mughal noblemen held
posts in Awadh and no Mughal monuments were erected there.
5. Rudrangshu Mukherjee, “Trade and Empire in Awadh, 1765 –1804,” Past &
Present 94 (1982): 85 –102.
6. Visual expressions of the political relationship between the emperors and
provincial governors are found in architecture, painting, decorative arts, and
textiles, as discussed in the various essays in this volume.
7. Barnett, North India Between Empires, 25 –26.
8. In the British Library painting of c. 1725 (Johnson album 4, no. 4), which is
unfinished, Saadat Khan holds a fan in his right hand, as in the Bodleian
example, although his left hand grasps a document. [Toby Falk and Mildred
Archer, Indian Miniatures in the India Office Library (London: Sotheby
Parke Bernet; Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1981), 108 – 9, 421, cat. 163.] A
portrait of Saadat Khan with an attendant, in the Chester Beatty Library,
Dublin (Ms. 69.7), attributed to an artist working in Faizabad, c. 1770,
nearly replicates the stance of the above-mentioned works, although the fan
has been replaced with a sword [Linda York Leach, Mughal and Other Indian
Paintings from the Chester Beatty Library (London: Scorpion Cavendish,
1995), 2:693 – 94, cat. 6.333]. A drawing of Saadat Khan in the Museum of
Fine Arts, Boston (14.861), is remarkably similar to the Dublin work and
may precede it in date, as the latter reveals a cursory treatment of shadows
that appears in provincial Mughal paintings in the mid-1760s [Ananda K.
Coomaraswamy, Catalogue of the Indian Collections in the Museum of Fine
Arts, Boston, Part VI, Mughal Painting (Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University Press, 1930), 66, cat. CXLIX, pl. LVIII; J. P. Losty, “Towards a
New Naturalism: Portraiture in Murshidabad and Avadh, 1750 – 80,” in After
the Great Mughals: Painting in Delhi and the Regional Courts in the 18th and
19th Centuries, ed. Barbara Schmitz (Mumbai: Marg, 2002), 38, 44 – 45].
9. Barnett, North India Between Empires, 21, 27. Precedents for Saadat Khan’s
autonomous governance had been established by his predecessors in the
region who appointed their own administrators and also began to fundamen-
tally alter the ownership rights of land revenues. [John F. Richards, The
Mughal Empire, The New Cambridge History of India I.5 (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1993), 275 –76.]
10. For discussions of various aspects of the Murshidabad painting style and its
development, see Robert Skelton, “Murshidabad Painting,” Marg 10.1 (1956):
10 –22.
11 . See, e.g., Leach, Mughal and Other Indian Paintings, 2:685 – 87, 706.
12 . Skelton, “Murshidabad Painting,” 18.
13. Coomaraswamy, Catalogue, 13.
14. Percy Brown, Indian Painting Under the Mughals, A.D. 1550 to A.D. 1750
(Oxford: Clarendon, 1924), 178 –79.
15. Coomaraswamy, Catalogue, 11. Coomaraswamy was, in fact, quoting Percy
Brown’s condemnation of Indian artists copying European paintings and
techniques (Brown, Indian Painting, 179).
16. P. J. Marshall, “Introduction,” The Eighteenth Century in Indian History:
Evolution or Revolution, ed. P. J. Marshall (New Delhi: Oxford University
Press, 2003), 1– 52.
17. Barnett, North India Between Empires, 40.
18. Ibid., 34, 43n1.
19. Stuart Cary Welch, India: Art and Culture 1300–1900 (New York: Metropoli-
tan Museum of Art, 1985), 252 – 56.
20. Rosie Llewellyn-Jones, Engaging Scoundrels: True Tales of Old Lucknow 37. For additional photographs, see Rosie Llewellyn-Jones, ed., Lucknow: City of
(New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2000), 8 – 9. Abu Talib describes some Illusion (New York: Alkazi Collection of Photography; Munich: Prestel,
of dangers of these expeditions as well as their toll on local villages. [Abu 2006), figs. 122 and 123.
Talib, History of Asafu’d Daulah, Nawab Wazir of Oudh, Being a Translation 38. Banmali Tandan, The Architecture of Lucknow and Its Dependencies,
of “Tahfzihu’l Ghafilin,” A Contemporary Record of Events Connected with his
1722–1856: A Descriptive Inventory and an Analysis of Nawabi Types (New
Administration, trans. W. Hoey (1885; Lucknow: Pustak Kendra, 1971), Delhi: Vikas, 2001), 90 – 91.
36 – 38, 57.]
39. Mildred Archer has noted a watermark of 1846 on the paper used for the
21 . Joachim K. Bautze, ed., Interaction of Cultures: Indian and Western scroll. [Company Drawings in the India Office Library (London: Her
Painting, 1780–1910, The Ehrenfeld Collection (Alexandria, VA: Art Services Majesty’s Stationary Office, 1972), 164 – 65, cat. 129].
International, 1998), 253. Eight of the ten paintings in the album, now in the
40. For a discussion of the view of these two structures in this scroll and its
collection of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, depict architectural
evidence for the early appearance of the monuments, before the late-
or landscape views.
nineteenth-century construction of their conjoined platform, see Hussein
22 . Raffael Dedo Gadebusch, “Celestial Gardens: Mughal Miniatures from an Keshani, “Architecture and the Twelver Shi’i Tradition: The Great
Eighteenth-Century Album,” Orientations 31:9 (2000): 72.
Imambara Complex of Lucknow,” Muqarnas 23 (2006): 219 – 50.
23. The manuscript was presented by Asaf al-Daula to the governor-general of 41 . Juan R. I. Cole, Roots of North Indian Shi’ism in Iran and Iraq (Berkeley and
Bengal, Sir John Shore (Lord Teignmouth), who in 1799 presented it to Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1989), 36 – 44.
George III. [Milo Cleveland Beach and Ebba Koch, King of the World: The
42 . Keith Guy Hjortshoj, “Kerbala in Context: A Study of Muharram in
Padshahnama, An Imperial Mughal Manuscript from the Royal Library,
Lucknow, India,” Ph.D. diss., Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, 1977, 68 –79.
Windsor Castle (London: Azimuth, 1997), 13, 158.]
43. Keshani, “Architecture and the Twelver Shi’i Tradition,” 227– 33, 237– 42.
24. Ebba Koch, “The Hierarchical Principles of Shah-Jahani Painting,” in
Beach and Koch, King of the World, 137– 41. 44. Michael H. Fisher, “Political Marriage Alliances at the Shi’i Court of
Awadh,” Comparative Studies in Society and History 25:4 (1983): 593 – 616.
25. Ibid., 138.
45. Najaf was one of the cities visited by Sayyid Dildar Ali Nasirabadi, who
26. Milo Cleveland Beach, “The Padshahnama and Mughal Historical
played an important role in the establishment of Shia theological scholarship
Manuscripts,” in Beach and Koch, King of the World, 125 –26.
in Awadh. [Cole, The Roots of North Indian Shi’ism, 61– 66.]
27. See, for instance, the San Diego Museum of Art’s c. 1775 – 80 portrait of
46. For a general discussion of the imambara and karbala complexes at
Shuja al-Daula (1990.413) [Edwin Binney, 3rd, Indian Miniature Painting
Lucknow, and their roles in Muharram rituals, see Neeta Das, “Lucknow’s
from the Collection of Edwin Binney, 3rd: The Mughal and Deccani Schools
Imambaras and Karbalas,” in Lucknow Then and Now, ed. Rosie Llewellyn-
(Portland: Portland Art Museum, 1973), 125, cat. 101]; the Chester Beatty
Jones (Mumbai: Marg, 2003), 90 –102; and Peter Chelkowski, “Monumental
Library’s slightly later portrait of Shuja al-Daula, c. 1780 (64.21) [Leach,
Grief: The Bara Imambara,” in Llewellyn-Jones, Lucknow: City of Illusion,
Mughal and Other Indian Paintings 2:699, cat. 6.343]; and the Boston
101–11.
Museum of Fine Art’s c. 1773 portrait of a woman (2001.136) [Joan
Cummins, Indian Painting: From Cave Temples to the Colonial Period 47. Juan R. I. Cole, “‘Indian Money’ and the Shi’i Shrine Cities of Iraq,
(Boston: Museum of Fine Arts, 2006), 205, pl. 113]. 1786 –1850,” Middle Eastern Studies 22:4 (1986): 461– 80.
28. The painting depicting the Red Fort at Delhi (MIK I 5005, fol. 11) is 48. Natasha Eaton, “Critical Cosmopolitanism: Gifting and Collecting Art at
illustrated in Gadebusch, “Celestial Gardens,” 69, fig. 1. A similar painting is Lucknow, 1775 – 97,” in Art and the British Empire, ed. Tim Barringer, Geoff
in the collection of the British Library (Add.Or.948) [Falk and Archer, Quilley, and Douglas Fordham (Manchester, UK: Manchester University
Press, 2007), 189 –204.
Indian Miniatures, 160 and 446, cat. 343]. A later copy is in the Royal
Ontario Museum, Toronto (924.12.143) [Milo C. Beach, Reflections of India: 49. Michael H. Fisher, “The Imperial Coronation of 1819: Awadh, the British,
Paintings from the 16th to the 19th Century (Toronto: Royal Ontario Museum, and the Mughals,” Modern Asian Studies 19:2 (1985): 239 –77.
1979), 32, cat. 31]. 50. Ibid., 260.
29. For a discussion of the differences between Indian and European approaches 51 . Ibid., 255 – 57, 261– 65.
to the depiction of architectural monuments in late-eighteenth- and
early-nineteenth-century India, see G. H. R. Tillotson, “Painting and
52 . For a discussion of this manuscript, see Stephen Vernoit, Occidentalism:
Islamic Art in the 19th Century, The Nasser D. Khalili Collection of Islamic
Understanding Mughal Architecture,” in G. H. R. Tillotson, ed., Paradigms
Art, 23 (New York: Nour Foundation in association with Azimuth Editions
of Indian Architecture: Space and Time in Representation and Design
and Oxford University Press, 1997), 134 – 35, cat. 76. The coat of arms is
(Richmond, Surrey, UK: Curzon, 1998), 59 –79.
discussed in Fisher, “The Imperial Coronation,” 255; and, in the present
30. Ibid.
volume, in Stephen Markel’s essay.
31 . One painting of the series, inscribed “Malab [Mahtab] Bague. Jardin que fit 53. For a brief description of the manuscript and its contents, see Muhammad
faire Alemgir dans l’intérieur du palais pour ses femmes à Dely,” attempts Isa Waley, “Islamic Manuscript in the British Royal Collection,” Manuscripts
an aerial view while utilizing a rudimentary perspective to render the of the Middle East 6 (1992): 5 – 40.
receding side walls of the enclosed garden. The main architectural elements
54. Mildred and W. G. Archer, Indian Painting for the British, 1770–1880
of the garden are depicted frontally while the garden and central pool are
(London: Oxford University Press, 1955), 62 – 63. The Archers mistakenly
depicted from a bird’s-eye perspective, a combination of views typical of
identify the date and subject of the manuscript, calling it an 1826 visual
many Indian paintings. This painting and a few others from the series are
record of Ghazi al-Din Haidar’s reign.
illustrated in Jean-Marie Lafont, Chitra: Cities and Monuments of Eigh-
teenth-Century India from French Archives (New Delhi: Oxford University
Press, 2001), pls. 46 – 50.
32 . William Hodges, Travels in India During the Years 1780, 1781, 1782, and
1783 (London: the author, 1793), 104.
33. Ibid., 107.
34. William Hodges, Select Views in India Drawn on the Spot in the Years 1780,
1781, 1782, and 1783 (London: n.p., 1785 – 88).
35. Geoff Quilley and John Bonehill, eds., William Hodges, 1744–1797: The Art of
Exploration (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2004), 158.
36. It was previously in the collection of the book collector Major John Roland
Abbey. [Life in England in Aquatint and Lithography, 1770–1860, Architec-
ture, Drawing Books, Art Collections, Magazines, Navy and Army, Panora-
mas, etc., from the Library of J. R. Abbey (London: Curwen, 1953), cat. 500.]
101 Gude : The CultuRAl Landscape of Awadh
 Car l a Pet i ev i c h

Innovations Pious and Impious:

Expressive Culture in Nawabi Lucknow

When the nawab of Awadh, Asaf al-Daula, “ran away from home” in 1775 because of strong differences
between himself and his mother and grandmother, the court (darbar) and culture (tahzib) that he established
in Lucknow were to become the stuff of legend. This description of Faizabad in the 1760s suits the development
of Lucknow as well:

Shuja’ al-dawla, Bahu Begam and Sadr-al-Nisa [Asaf al-Daula’s parents and grandmother] developed a distinguished court culture
in Awadh, particularly in their capital of the time, Faizabad. Awadh’s economic, cultural and political efflorescence made it the
premier “successor-state” to the Mughal Empire in north India. The Awadh court poured its wealth into patronage of almost all the
high arts—particularly architecture, dance, music, painting, poetry and Shi’i religious scholarship and ritual performances.1

Detailed information on the court at Faizabad is extremely limited. By contrast we know a great deal about
Lucknow. Of all the high arts into which wealth was poured we are particularly concerned here with the expres-
sive forms of literature and, to a lesser extent, performance genres. Indeed, the two are not really separate.

Lucknow in English, Lucknow in Urdu

English discussions of Lucknow have focused on Awadh’s political encounter with the British, which increased
dramatically from the middle of the eighteenth century till the annexation of Awadh in 1856. These narratives
generally trace the shift of political power away from Indian rulers and toward the British, for in them the

102 103 Petievich : Expressive Culture in Nawabi Lucknow


Page 102: 22. Layla and Majnun, and
KhusRau and ShiRin (detail), c. 1775
British are telling their own story. The extensive cultural interactions and exchange
between Indian and European actors at the Lucknow court are often told as the stories of
the nawabs’ fascination for all things European,2 though of course the fascination was
mutual. Who can say whether the Occident was more exotic, or the Orient? 3 The voyeur-
ism ran in both directions.
One of the most notorious (and entertaining) works in this connection is the English-
man William Knighton’s account of the court of King Nasir al-Din Haidar.4 Historians
view the work as largely fictitious,5 but in the 1855 preface to its second edition Knighton
attests to its utter facticity. I present his apologia in detail, for it encapsulates very well
the gist of Lucknow as it appears in English sources:
I have adhered simply to the truth, and have endeavored solely to describe the inner life of the palace as
I found it. Much there was that was strange—much there was that was horrible about that life; I witnessed
many scenes which I could not describe without offending conventional propriety; but, in all that the
reader will find recorded, exaggeration has been strictly guarded against . . . this book has not been
written with any political object. That Oude is one of the most miserably-governed countries under
heaven, is no secret; and that it would be a blessing to its numerous inhabitants were the Indian govern-
ment to do for it what it has so well done for the Punjab, every one will admit. I have not written a
political disquisition but merely a personal narrative; and therefore the state of the country is but
incidentally alluded to in the following pages.
My task is done.6
Knighton’s “faction” makes for more entertaining reading than the drier accounts of
revenue collection and troop movements, to be sure. But the Lucknow of the English
language is by and large a very different place from the Lucknow of Urdu, which is the
present focus. The Lucknow of Urdu—and by this we mean not just the language and
literature of Urdu but the entire culture connected with it—this Lucknow is a city in
glorious cultural efflorescence, featuring all the achievements in art, architecture, and
literature described in the opening quotation.
The philosophy of rulership is significant here. Indo-Muslim rulers engaged in con-
spicuous consumption as a deliberate policy. Knighton suggests that this sort of opulence
offended conventional sensibilities; but whose? The British understood it as a poor admin-
istrative choice on the part of the nawabs. English language sources reflect a British
understanding of “responsible rulership” that was more oriented toward fiscal policies of
military spending and revenue collection. Such policies would, of course, have benefited
the British far more than the people of Awadh, which the nawabs (and the Mughals before
them) certainly understood. Indians trained by the British also tend to be dismissive of
7
the very nawabs (and, later, kings) who appear in Urdu sources as heroic patrons of the
arts. The British wished to see Indian rulers collect land revenues and turn them over to
the British to pay off war indemnities, or to support garrisons of British soldiers in
Indian cities. But Asaf al-Daula and his successors were well aware that lavish cultural
patronage created political authority in addition to stimulating the economy of Awadh.
Thus in Urdu we have the very famous and popular saying “Jis ko na de maula, us ko de
Asaf al-Daula” (He to whom God does not give, to him will Asaf al-Daula give); whereas
English sources tell us about Asaf’s corpulence, effeminacy, and general unfitness to rule.
104
From Delhi to Lucknow
The Asaf al-Daula of Urdu built his new capital as a cultural center (markaz) to rival
Mughal Delhi—with little or no regard for British opinion—for the Mughals had set the
standard for Indo-Muslim culture. Thus, rivaling them and emulating them, the Awadh
nobility intermarried with Mughal nobility, including the emperor’s family.8 Alongside the
artists seeking asylum from the disruptions of Delhi in the latter half of the eighteenth
century came Mughal nobility of all kinds, too.9 The nawabs were eager to host such
Mughal princes as Sulaiman Shikoh, who proved to be excellent bargaining chips in the
perennial negotiations that took place between recalcitrant servants and their erstwhile
(and still nominal) imperial overlords.
For their part, the refugee princes enjoyed substantial allowances and were expected
to behave like kings, as it perpetuated their own aura of majesty. Poets as well were
accustomed to leading quasi-nomadic lives in search of patronage, and these erstwhile
Dihlavis (residents of Delhi) were delighted to continue on, in Lucknow, as clients of
refugee Mughal royals. They could count on taking recourse in the Awadh rulers should
their primary patrons’ circumstances diminish. As for the displaced Mughals, their role
as patrons ameliorated their status as clients of former minions.
There were, in other words, compelling political reasons to encourage lavishness, and
to make it the central characteristic of the “vibrant, distinctive Lucknowi aesthetic”
which this exhibition showcases. It lent force to the city’s growing reputation as “the
place to be.”
Poetry: Arabic to Persian to Urdu
Poetry was the form in which the Quran came down to the Prophet Muhammad and for
this reason it has been especially valued in the Islamicate. Arabic, the language of the
Quran, remained the premier language of scientific knowledge, or ilm. However, over time
the preeminent language of literature (adab) came to be Persian. Its importance in India
never disappeared, even during periods which saw great developments in regional lan-
guages.10 In Lucknow Persian continued to be held in high esteem. To ascribe knowledge
of Persian and Arabic to anyone, but especially to a poet, was to designate that person
learned; conversely, to suggest that someone was deficient in either was to diminish their
intellectual stature, no matter what their achievement in Urdu.11
Thus, while Urdu poetry self-consciously emulated Persian models, conscious
attempts were also made to elevate it to the same level of sophistication. The literati paid
great attention to the incorporation of Persian lexical items into Urdu and to the ascrip-
tion of gender to Persian, Arabic, and Turkish nouns.12 This process, known as islah-i
zaban (literally “correction of language”), was understood to be a necessary part of the
process of elevating Urdu to the requisite level as a language of belles lettres. The rela-
tionship between the two was ambivalent, admiring, and competitive, as we see in the
following verse by the Urdu master Mushafi (Ghulam Hamdani “Mushafi,” 1750 –1824):
Mushafi, put Persian on the shelf:
Now is the time for Hindavi [Urdu].
105 Petievich : Expressive Culture in Nawabi Lucknow
 Mushafi farsi ko taq pe rakh
Ab hai ashaar-e Hindavi ka rivaj
Urdu poets in Lucknow experimented with many forms of vernacular expression,
including the largely non-Muslim devotional poetry of Awadhi and the idiom of secluded
women (see below). Such engagement beyond the realm of Indo-Muslim courts was
following a practice that had long been in place in India.13 In Lucknow the most (in)
famous such expression was known as rekhti (about which more later). Let us turn first,
however, to the most revered of Lucknow’s cultural innovations.
Piety, Shia Imaginary, and Marsiya
The nawabs were very conscious of their Safavid Iranian heritage and new developments
in art marked this legacy especially in celebrations of Shiism. Various aspects of Muhar-
ram celebration were elaborated to new degrees. King Nasir al-Din Haidar extended
Muharram celebrations from ten to thirty days, inventing new rituals to commemorate
the birth of all Shiism’s imams.14 Matam processions drew admiring crowds from all over
the city to empathize with the self-flagellators, and to offer them water as they made their
way along the procession route in the hot sun.
Patrons encouraged the compositions of marsiya, elegiac poetry on the betrayal and
martyrdom of Imam Husain and his followers at Karbala (in 680). Karbala is arguably
the central event in Shiism,15 for it marked the point at which the Muslim community
divided and the descendants of Ali became a permanent (and persecuted) minority.
Marsiyas were typically recited in gatherings (majalis) during the mourning month of
Muharram, and served to reinforce Shia communal identity as much as any other ritual.
Put baldly, marsiyas are recited to induce weeping in their audience. To shed tears is
part and parcel of a ritual enacted for the purpose of obtaining religious virtue.16 The
ability to transport the elegy’s audience to a state of tears testifies to the marsiya-poet’s
(and the reciter’s) skill. To attain this state through empathy and identification with the
martyrs is a sign of virtue rather than resignation.17 And it was Lucknowi poets of the
nineteenth century who set the standard by which mourning elegies are measured ever
since. They were known to employ a “somewhat maverick use of symbols as influenced by
their environs on the subcontinent. Such usages were especially encouraged by the rulers
of . . . Awadh.” 18
The two greatest names in marsiya-goi (marsiya composition) were those of the
contemporaries and rivals Mir Babar Ali “Anis” (1802 –1874) and Mirza Salamat Ali
“Dabir” (1803 –1875). Hyder observes that the history of Urdu literature “simply cannot be
written” without mention of these two masters. Both poets bore noble literary pedigrees,
19
which was also important in this sociocultural milieu. Both were prolific and much-
20
celebrated in the Lucknow of their time, but posterity has favored Anis with greater
longevity and popularity. His marsiyas are valued for their combination of emotional
verisimilitude and their elegance of language. Their battlefield scenes are thought to have
raised the elegy to epic proportions. For an embattled community such as the Shias this
was tremendously powerful. The great story of Shiism transcended its minority position
106
within the Islamicate, and appealed not only to non-Shias but to non-Muslims as well.
The tragedy could be felt by all, but the heroism of Husain and his followers inspired all
Lucknowis, who had inherited—but did not much perpetuate—a martial tradition.21 In
the lines below, excerpted from one of Anis’s best-loved marsiyas, the dawn of Husain’s
doomsday breaks, and he calls his followers to arms:
When the sun had passed its nightly journey
and dropped the dawn’s veil to reveal her radiant face,
The Lord of the goblet-shaped sky beheld the heavens and
turning to his companions, the Noble One cried,
“Our time has come! Give praise to God,
Arise and fulfill your duties to Dawn.
Yes, warriors! This is our day of trial and strife,
from here will flow the blood of Muhammad’s line!”
While the grandeur and pathos of Anis’s language is largely lost in translation, the
following lines evoke the desperate condition of Husain’s clan, surrounded as they are by
the enemy army and cut off from water in the heat of the desert summer:
Baqir lies crumpled somewhere on the ground,
Sakina lies in a faint somewhere else;
This is the summer—this heat and this thirst—
the moon-faced children cry themselves into fretful sleep.
Where can the famished women convey them to safety?
What fault of theirs has brought upon them
this incessant storm of arrows—
(surely it cannot be) the fault of the young ones,
parched as they are, pining for but a cool breeze?
Urdu as a Language of Erudition and Elaboration: Lakhnawiyat
Patrons prized versatility highly, and the sense of possibility seems to have been limitless.
Poets were encouraged to work within the full range of “classical” genres;22 but they were
particularly prolific in the lyric ghazal form. They began to incorporate Persian construc-
tions and a great deal of Persian vocabulary into their Urdu ghazals, always with an eye
to infusing the new literature with greater elegance and refinement. This refinement,
delicacy of sensibility, elaboration, and versatility are all part and parcel of that distinc-
tive quality people call Lakhnawiyat, or “Lucknow-ness.”23
One example of the elaboration favored by poetic masters came in the number of
verses (known as shers) that they might compose for a single ghazal. The length of lyric
poems grew to twenty-five or more, whereas pre-nineteenth-century ghazals had tended to
run to five, seven, or nine shers.24 The length of poetic lines also grew, so that more
complicated meters were favored over shorter ones.
At the same time, Lakhnawiyat’s elegance of expression centered around nazakat, or
delicacy. An example of nazuk khayali (delicacy of thought) in imagery can be seen in the
following sher by the great Lucknow ustad, Khwaja Haidar Ali Atish (d. 1838):
107 Petievich : Expressive Culture in Nawabi Lucknow
 How futile,
my breath rising up from my breast
only to stick to my lips:
It’s no good to tarry
when one’s goal remains remote.
A ke sine se labon par dam atakta hai abas
Therna achha nahin jab ho irada dur ka 25
The delicacy here is in the image rather than in refined vocabulary. The poet uses the
narrator-lover’s sigh to symbolize his dire state overall, but the tone is restrained. The
sigh fails to achieve full expression, dying on his lips. It conveys both desire and lack of
fulfillment, which is the state of the lover himself at his own death. The ghazal audience
understands that to die while still striving for fulfillment in love is the ultimate achieve-
ment of the lover (ashiq). Thus, failure subtly becomes success.
The poet Shaikh Imam Bakhsh “Nasikh” (d. 1838), Atish’s contemporary and rival,
was known as “the Imam of Lakhnawiyat.” A good example of Lakhnawiyat in Nasikh’s
poetry is:
My breast is the eastern horizon
Whence the wounded sun of Separation rises:
The dawn of Doomsday breaks
Through the rend in my collar.
Mira sina hai mashriq aftab-i dagh-i hijran ka
Tulu-i subh-i mahshar chak hai mere gariban ka
The elegance of this expression lies in its euphony, its cadence, its Perso-Arabic vocabu-
lary, and Persianized phrasing. The achievement of the verse lies in its bundling of
imagery on top of all that. While the working of the language and its effect can’t really be
translated, the imagery can be explicated. Night is the high time of both Separation’s
pain and the anxious anticipation of union. Dawn is the time of both disappointment and
release. Nasikh has managed to layer them both into an image of simultaneous agony
and triumphant catharsis.26
Lakhnawiyat as ExcesS
One person’s refinement can be another’s excess, and this has been the source of detrac-
tors’ criticism of Lakhnawiyat. In Urdu literary criticism (all of which postdates Luck-
now’s political and cultural demise in 1856), this perceived overelaboration was called
“paying homage to language” (riayat-i lafzi), but it carried the sense of “indulgence in
verbiage” and suggested that elaboration was taken to extremes well beyond good taste.
The critique was extended to Lucknow’s culture overall. It is perhaps the first word we see
when critics speak of Lucknow’s decadence, and it is not an accident that many of these
critics are themselves identified with Delhi.
This was not the case in its time, as the reader will have surmised from the foregoing
discussion, when there was no sense of exaggeration having outer limits. Perhaps ironi-
108
cally, plenty of Lucknowis are actually happy to embrace the label of decadence, though
they might use another term for the oft-invoked British label of effeminacy.27 They would
not do so if their beloved city’s so-called decadent tehzib were not based on nazakat.
Lucknowi politesse has been amply lampooned in anecdotes and twentieth-century litera-
ture such as Munshi Premchand’s famous short story, “The Chess Players” (Shatranj ke
khilari), which was made into a lush film by Satyajit Ray in 1977. In North India and
Pakistan just about everyone knows the joke relating how two Lucknowi gentlemen took
so much time insisting that the other board a train first that it eventually departed,
leaving them both behind on the railway platform. But there is always an overlay in such
parody, for even non-Lucknowis admire refinement and good manners.
Delhi vs. Lucknow
Such appreciation was quite muted, however, during the late eighteenth century, as
émigrés expressed a preference for their abandoned home (Delhi) over Lucknow. We can
see it in the following nostalgic rubai (quatrain) by the émigré poet Mushafi, one of the
great ustads of the early generation of refugees:
Lord, you’ve robbed me of my city
Brought and sat me in this wilderness:
What can there be between me and these Lakhnavis?
Dear God, what have you done to me?
Yarab shahr apna yun chhuraya tu ne
Virane main mujh ko la bithaya tu ne
Main aur kahan yih Lakhnau ki khilqat
Ae vae kya kiya khudaya tu ne 28
There were also less delicate expressions of contempt, and the most famous source of
these was the great Delhi ustad Mir Taqi “Mir” (1722 –1810). Though he spent the last
thirty years of his life in Lucknow he never really reconciled himself to his loss of Delhi.
There exists an anecdote about him that is so famous as to be almost cliché. It features
Mir requesting that a fellow traveler (a Lucknowi) on a stagecoach not speak to him lest
his language be compromised during the course of the exchange. And note the contrast in
tenor from Mushafi’s rubai (above) when Mir remarks nostalgically on the move from
Delhi to Lucknow:
Far better than Lucknow the ruins of Delhi:
Would that I had died back there
than let my madness lead me here!
Kharaba Dilli ka dah-chand bahtar Lakhnau se tha
Wahin ae kash mar jata sarasima na ata yan 29
Perhaps Mir’s most devastating critique comes in an equally famous dismissal of the
Lucknowi poet Jurat’s ghazals, which he calls “not poetry, but descriptions of kissing and
licking” (chumachati).
109 Petievich : Expressive Culture in Nawabi Lucknow
 Urdu as a Language of Play, Mockery, Invention: Rekhti
Among all the literary innovations in Lucknow perhaps the most notorious was a new
style in which Jurat sometimes composed, called rekhti.30 It was deliberately transgressive
of established poetic norms, and Mir’s devastating comment about chumachati might
logically have been occasioned by a recitation of rekhti.31 Certainly its identity has come
close to “chumachati” in popular imagination. As we saw in the earlier expression by
Atish, ghazal poetry took itself very seriously, and poets sincerely subscribed to the notion
that the loftiness of their ideas and expression was ennobling. Though written almost
exclusively in ghazal form, rekhti parodied the ghazal by deliberately discoursing on very
different themes. Outrageous in diction, rekhti pushed the boundaries of what could be
expressed in lyric form. Whereas the creation of images was at the core of the normative
ghazal, rekhti was all about the idiom in which it was expressed. Largely playful in tone,
rekhti poets were at pains, it often seemed, to flaunt its un-loftiness. With apologies,
again, for what is lost in translation, here is an example from the oeuvre of Saadat Yar
Khan “Rangin” (1756 –1834 /35):
Don’t flood me with desirous words,
keep your distance, Nurse!
Fibs will only blacken your face,
old woman.
For one, your ugly face gives me the creeps
old hag, don’t stare at me wide-eyed like that!
Nurse, at your hands I’ve been cut to the quick:
I’d feed you to the vultures if I could.
From your spreading and squelching of rumors, old nurse,
may God make your mouth ulcerate!
What are you muttering about?
just wait till tomorrow morning—
old woman, I shall beat you to a pulp!
Well, you’ve gone and made enemies of all my friends:
what else do you have in store for me, old nurse?
When you don’t so much as say a word to him,
why do you keep mentioning Rangin’s name, old nurse?
Rangin is credited with inventing rekhti as a poetic voice. That is arguable,32 but is
certainly consistent with both his nom de plume (takhallus), which was “Colorful,” and the
“anything goes” milieu of Lucknow at the turn of the nineteenth century. Its distinctive
idiom is often called begamati zaban (the language of respectable ladies) because most of
the events it depicts are narrated by women of the zenana (women’s quarters of elite
houses). Rekhti is probably as much a parodic approximation as it is the actual language
women really spoke. Rangin said that he had picked up the idiomatic expressions of
courtesans (tawaifs) during the course of a misspent youth; and that he invented rekhti as
a form of tribute born of admiration for their pithy wit.33 Rekhti was male-authored poetry
110
narrated in a grammatically feminine voice; had this ventriloquism really been the diction
of tawaifs, then perhaps the idiom of rekhti should have been called “tawaifi zaban” 34
rather than “begamati zaban.” As it happens, extant Urdu poetry of eighteenth- and
nineteenth-century courtesans was narrated in the normative, masculine voice of rekhta
(the contemporaneous term for Urdu ghazal). Even tawaifs did not compose in tawaifi
zaban; apparently only their patrons did! And was there no difference between the idiom
of courtesans and that of their social rivals, respectably married women?
Rekhti self-consciously presents itself as a parody, the anti-ghazal. Its tone is largely
playful, mocking a literary tradition that takes itself very seriously.35 Its geographic
world sets its themes: the travails of burdensome husbands; the annoyances and quotidian
spats between housewives and their domestic servants; the rivalries among co-wives; and
the lascivious shenanigans of illicit liaisons—including within the zenana itself—form
its core.36 The normative ghazal features an always-grammatically-male narrator and
revolves around his emotional universe: the largely internalized and metaphysical strug-
gles of human longing for the divine; or at least the ennobling sacrifice of impossible
human love.37 The contrast between the two ghazal styles is striking.
Insha Allah Khan “Insha” (1756 –1818) was another extremely versatile poet in
Lucknow.38 A close friend and rival of Rangin, Insha could also be playful and irreverent
and his wicked wit often got him into trouble.39 He, too, completed a diwan-i rekhti
(collection of rekhti poems) in answer to Rangin’s. They are the only two full diwans of
rekhti that date from the first third of the nineteenth century. The following ghazal
displays Insha’s versatility and treats a range of themes, not least the homoerotic, whose
undisguised presence in rekhti was probably the reason the whole corpus of poetry was
suppressed in the twentieth century: 40
Since I’ve been facing the lane of desire
I’m obliged to chant the name of Ali,
remover of obstacles.
When my heart faded
I couldn’t help but recall
the withering of a bud not yet in bloom.
Don’t ask me about her fingers’ tenderness:
They’ve a smoothness like the tips of mung bean shoots.41
Don’t try to put one over on me.
you spent the night out, dear—
You’re skulking about all wrinkled and disheveled!
I can’t bear what I’ve had to suffer at your hands:
whatever you do is done haphazardly!
Girlfriend, the way I ran around yesterday,
I can’t tell you the state of my shins!
Why not go make offerings at the Prophet’s feet?
Don’t you, too, depend on the help of Lord Shiv?
111 Petievich : Expressive Culture in Nawabi Lucknow
 Who but you on God’s earth, Insha, Please God, let me see her don the bridal veil!
can still this restless, troubled heart? what matters it to me to see her settled
after I’m gone?
By far the most prolific of rekhti poets was Mir Yar Ali Khan “Jan Sahib” (1818?–1897?),
I tell you, Nabi Bakhsh is a bad son-in-law:
who is known exclusively as a composer of rekhti. He published three diwans perhaps half Please God, guard my daughter’s honor
a century later than Rangin and Insha. He seems to have started out in Lucknow and, when I’m gone.
after 1856, found patronage from the nawab of Rampur.42 In the opening sher below he
Sir, my very soul
invokes the special term, dogana, which is only employed by one woman when addressing
will be wounded in the grave
another, her sweetheart: should my co-wife show ire to the children
when I’m gone.48
My dear one, I swear I’ll give my life for you,
my sweet, simple, artless dogana!
In another ingenious utterance in the pioneering and authoritative Ab-i Hayat,
Play me with open jawari, my sweetheart: Azad draws a line connecting music, courtesans, rekhti, and the (so-called) characteristic
why not give full throat to this sitar! 43
effeminacy of Lakhnawiyat:
My Khizru’s well is neither sweet nor saline:
It’s clear that luxury and enjoyment and the company of musicians and dancing girls produce the same
its water is neither heavy nor light.44
emotional effect in such unclean matters as manure does in the growth of plants. Accordingly, rekhti
Can I express to you how much you bore me? made less progress among the cheerful starvelings of Delhi, and substantially more among those settled in
Go, get lost, leave my house, my dear! Lucknow—except with regard to style and dress. The volume of Jan Sahib is present as an example of it.

Shall I set fire to your tricks, you wretch? In this connection, the invention of rekhti should be understood as one cause of the effeminacy and lack of

OK, you win, I give up! ambition and cowardice that grew up among the common people. The riddles and magic spells that
Sayyid Insha composed in rekhti are not devoid of amusement.49
May your eyes and knees never give out on you: 45

don’t swear false oaths, my dear! One might note that neither are Azad’s audacious pronouncements devoid of amusement,
She drank and got fractious, the wretch. either!
My rival swallowed a dagger and died, my sweet! The Delhi-Lucknow rivalry raged on, but not all Dihlavis were so dismissive of
That miserable Jan Sahib, too, writes poetry;
Lucknow’s poets as Mir was of Jurat, or as Azad of Insha and Rangin. Even the great
why not compose a verse yourself, Mirza Asadullah Khan “Ghalib” (1797–1869), the Delhi ustad par excellence, acknowledged
my artful dogana? the importance of Nasikh in Urdu poetic tradition (admittedly while paying ultimate
tribute to Mir, who was both a Dihlavi and a Lucknowi, if we go by where he lived):
Rekhti has pretty much been savaged in Urdu literary criticism beginning with
Urdu’s earliest literary history, the Ab-i Hayat (1880).46 Though a Dihlavi, its author Ghalib, I keep faith with the words of Nasikh:
He who does not follow Mir is not one of us.
Muhammad Husain Azad’s manner of expression is no less flowery than that associated
with the quality of Lakhnawiyat when he offers the following assessment: Ghalib apna yeh aqidah hai baqaul-e Nasikh,
ap be bahra hai jo muteqad-e Mir nahin
Miyan Rangin prepared the newest bouquets and displayed them before the people of the mushaira—that
is, from out of Rekhtah he produced rekhti. We would certainly have said that the romantic poetry of Nasikh, keen to locate himself within this tradition, had said:
India had returned to its roots. But since previous poetry was founded on truth, and rekhti is meant only
for laughter and joking among friends, we cannot call it anything but buffoonery. . . . Although the Nasikh, there can be no doubt about Mir’s mastery:
original invention was that of Miyan Rangin, even greater feminine skills were shown by Sayyid Insha.47 He who is not his follower is cut off,
Lost even to himself.
It is possible that Azad had not read enough rekhti to appreciate its array of tone; and
Shubha Nasikh nahin kuch Mir ki ustadi men,
that he had only a slight acquaintance with the work of Jan Sahib, who seems often to
ap be bahra hai jo muteqad-e Mir nahin 50
communicate a genuine sympathy for women’s experience through his representations:

112 113 Petievich : Expressive Culture in Nawabi Lucknow

The foregoing examples remind us that the Delhi-Lucknow divide was not entirely
straightforward. It happened that the particular conditions and resources necessary to
cultivate this style coalesced in Lucknow between about 1775 and 1856.51 But there was
an active contemporaneous literary scene going on in Delhi: it just happened to be within
the walls of the Red Fort where the British had essentially imprisoned the Mughal
emperor; and where resources, rather than aesthetic orientation, were less extravagant.
Wajid Ali Shah and Drama
We may know more about Wajid Ali Shah than any other nawabi patron. The last (and
ultimately deposed) king of Awadh, he was an accomplished Urdu poet who wrote under
the nom de plume of “Akhtar” (Star). Wajid Ali was also a lavish patron of the arts.
Treated in very similar fashion to Asaf al-Daula by British historiographers and their
Indian pupils, his court is depicted as one of heedless decadence in both historiography
and tale.52 In Urdu, as I have argued above, the difference in treatment is noticeable.
Drama was not much patronized at earlier Muslim courts, but Lucknow is known for
its remarkable engagement with indigenous forms of expression, as many other scholars
have discussed. The texts of most thumris (see Peter Manuel’s essay in this volume) and
53
a great deal of kathak dance concerned stories about the Hindu god Krishna in his guise
as a romantic hero. Kathryn Hansen writes:
In the theatrical realm, the Nawab encouraged the Radha-Krishna themes found in other courts.
Attracted to song and dance from childhood, he established a rahaskhana (drama hall) where the amorous
exploits of Krishna and his female devotees were enacted, and he maintained a parikhana (harem) for the
ample provision of female artists. Hearsay has it that Wajid Ali himself participated in these private
sports in the role of Krishna. He also penned a skit, Radha kanhaiya ka qissa [The Tale of Radha and
Krishna], first played in Huzur Bagh in 1843. Upon ascending the throne he adapted several Persian-
style romances for the stage and sponsored performances of them in Qaisar Bagh.
Furthermore, the most famous early Urdu drama—claimed by some to be the first
ever—was also based on a Hindu theme. The Indar Sabha (1853) by Agha Hasan Amanat
was first staged in Lucknow. As Hansen has noted, Wajid Ali himself is said to have
appeared in it as the Hindu god-king Indra, with the women of his parikhana (literally
“fairy house”) playing the roles of Indra’s women. Hansen tells of a controversy concern-
ing whether or not the Indar Sabha was a European-influenced work:
Given the absence of antecedents for theatre in the Indo-Islamic tradition, several Urdu literary historians
have opined that the Indarsabha was based on Western opera, introduced into Lucknow’s court by
visiting European musicians. John Pemble notes that European music was in general not popular at
court, and he concludes that operatic influence “does seem far-fetched.” From another perspective, Hindi
literary historians have linked the Indarsabha to the Indian folk traditions, claiming Amanat’s play as
a vital bridge between ancient Sanskrit drama and a more recent regional theatre.
This debate is of interest to contemporary scholars who argue for a long history of
composite “Hindu-Muslim” expressive culture in North India, and the Indar Sabha offers
them fertile ground. To quote Hansen again:
114
The Indarsabha set a new standard for popular drama in North India. The work fuses Hindu and Muslim
elements of plot, meter, and language in a form more indicative of its Indian and Awadhi origins than
anything European. . . . Replete with pageantry, fantasy and romance, [it] was a multimedia piece
incorporating narrative, poetry, dance and music within the visually opulent setting of Indra’s heaven.
[Indra], this Hindu icon, with [his] popular symbolic relevance to India’s Muslim kings, is wedded [here]
to a story of Islamic origin. The paris and devs belong to the dastan story-telling tradition imported from
Persia. Specific motifs seem to be imitated from several Urdu romances [masnawis], including Mir
Hasan’s Sihr-al Bayan and Gulzar-i Nasim.54
As in the case of kathak dance and thumri, drama became an extraordinarily popular
expressive form in Indo-Muslim culture during the later nineteenth and the twentieth
centuries.55 And as in the case of those other two art forms, there was a strong connection
with tawaifs, some of whom populated Wajid Ali Shah’s parikhana.
Tawaifs
Courtesans—those remarkable people (mostly women), who are often far more learned
than women of good repute, and on whom the passage of traditional arts has historically
depended—existed wherever there was patronage.56 As long as a secondary literature
has existed, writers and filmmakers have been particularly fond of emphasizing the
connection between Lucknow and courtesans (tawaifs).57 Recall that in 1880 Azad drew a
causal relation between courtesans and rekhti; and rekhti and “one cause of the effemi-
nacy and lack of ambition and cowardice that grew up among the common people.” This is
repeated almost verbatim in a 2002 article 58 and in essence as recently as 2009,59 where
Lucknowi culture is characterized not by the term Lakhnawiyat but by “tawaif bazi”
(frequenting courtesans).
Memoirs and Novels
Most of what we “know” about this connection comes in the form of fiction, which is not to
say that the connection did not exist. British public health records attest to the presence
of commercialized trade in female company from at least the third quarter of the nine-
teenth century, though they do not distinguish between those who might have shaped the
distinctive culture of Lucknow and those who merely traded sex for money.60 Land
revenue records attest to the prosperity of at least the most successful courtesans, who
invested heavily in real estate.61
The perceived connections between courtesans, Lakhnawiyat, and Shia identity
remain strong. Scholars have suggested that most of Lucknow’s tawaifs were Shia.62
Certainly legend tells of women of the kotha (courtesan’s quarters) standing in the street
to offer water to Muharram mourners as they processed by; or feeding poor Shias on the
tenth day, Ashura; or holding majalis, the gatherings in which marsiyas or soz were
recited.63 (There were doubtless good incentives to convert to Shiism when one was
seeking support from a patron class that emulated a Shia royal family.)
While British revenue records have proved the most reliable to historians for recon-
structing nineteenth-century Lucknow’s social history, by far the most oft-quoted source
on its cultural history is that of Abdul Halim Sharar (1860 –1926). The author of Guzishta
115 Petievich : Expressive Culture in Nawabi Lucknow
Lakhnau (lit. “Bygone Lucknow”),64 Sharar was born in 1856, the year Awadh was
annexed by the British. Guzishta Lakhnau was written as a series of journalistic essays
ultimately compiled into book form around 1920.65 A rich and evocative source, it is still
not quite contemporaneous with the period it describes. Yet what it describes is the
Lucknow of Urdu, the Lucknow Sharar wanted—and wanted us—to remember.66
The second quintessential source on Lucknow and its courtesan culture (tawaif bazi,
as Adrian McNeil calls it) is an early-twentieth-century Urdu novel by the writer and
polymath Mirza Hadi “Ruswa.” The Urdu novel’s title is merely the heroine’s name,
Umrao Jan “Ada” (1905); in its first and best-known English translation it became The
Courtesan of Lucknow, as if to underline the connection of the city with the profession.67
The story is framed by a character impersonating the author, who purports to be an old
“friend” of a retired courtesan named Umrao Jan. Both of them are poets (his takhallus
is Ruswa, “the disgraced”; hers is Ada, “grace”),68 which is how their friendship is acci-
dentally renewed. Ruswa induces Ada to tell her life story, which also serves to evoke
bygone Lucknow.69 A tremendously popular work, Umrao Jan has shaped the image
of Lucknow and tawaifs for all of South Asia (201, p. 48). The tropes it introduces are
taken up repeatedly in a whole subgenre of “tawaif films.” 70 Saleem Kidwai has pointed
out how close the relationship continues to be between poets and the tawaifs who render
their work musically.71 Thus it is entirely appropriate to doff our hats to the role played by
Lucknowi tawaifs in developing and sustaining extant classical music and dance forms.
Conclusion
In summary, royal and noble patronage of many arts in Lucknow proved to have a long-
lasting impact on the expressive culture of North India, even into present times. Extant
evidence indicates that literary activity during the period of Lucknow’s heyday expanded
largely in the direction of established indigenous and existing Islamicate cultures.72 From
the very serious marsiya to the more playful rekhti; from the very self-serious linguistic
developments in islah-i zaban and Urdu ghazal to the spectacle of the Indar Sabha and its
parody in the Bandar Sabha (Monkey Court),73 Lakhnawi expressive culture did as much
to contribute to the legend of nawabi Awadh as did its architectural achievements.
116
1. K. S. Santha, Begums of Awadh, cited by many, including Michael H. Fisher,
“Women and the Feminine in the Court and High Culture of Awadh,
1722 –1856,” in Women in the Medieval Islamic World, ed. Gavin R. Hambly
(New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1998), 489 – 513.
2. See Rosie Llewellyn-Jones’s essay in this volume.
3. See William Knighton, The Private Life of an Eastern King. Compiled for a
Member of the Household of His Late Majesty King Nuseer-u-Deen, King of
Oude, 2nd ed. (London: Hope and Co., 1855).
4. Ibid.
5. See Fisher, “Women and the Feminine in the Court and High Culture of
Awadh.”
6. Knighton, The Private Life of an Eastern King, preface, iv.
7. See Richard B. Barnett, North India Between Empires: Awadh, the Mughals
and the British, 1720–1801 (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of
California Press, 1981).
8. Fisher, “Women and the Feminine in the Court and High Culture of
Awadh.”
9. See the essay by Muzaffar Alam and Sanjay Subrahmanyam in this volume.
10. See especially Muzaffar Alam, “The Pursuit of Persian: Language in
Mughal Politics,” Modern Asian Studies 32:2 (May 1998): 317– 49, for the
importance of Persian; Allison Busch, “Hidden in Plain View: Brajbhasha
Poets at the Mughal Court,” Modern Asian Studies 44:2 (2010): 267– 309, for
Brajbhasha; Carla Petievich, When Men Speak as Women: Vocal Masquerade
in Indo-Muslim Poetry (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2007), for Dakani;
and Sumit Guha, “Transitions and Translations: Regional Power and
Vernacular Identity in the Dakhan, 1500 –1800,” Comparative Studies of
South Asia, Africa, and the Middle East, 24:2 (2004): 23 – 31, for Marathi and
Persian.
11 . This is a common discursive ploy of Azad in Ab-i Hayat (see note 46 below)
and one of the ways in which he plays favorites among the writers he
discusses.
12 . Arabic nouns bore gender; but Persian did not, and this was the language
plumbed most deeply to enrich Urdu poetry’s lexical expanse.
13. Cf. Kumkum Chatterjee, “Cultural Flows and Cosmopolitanism in Mughal
India: The Bishnupur Kingdom,” Indian Economic and Social History
Review 46:2 (2009): 147– 82, who speaks of a regional cosmopolitanism on the
part of Bengali rulers; Guha, “Transitions and Translations,” in connection
with the Peshwas of Maharashtra; and Busch, “Hidden in Plain View.” Ruth
Vanita, “Married among Their Companions: Female Homoerotic Relations in
Nineteenth-Century Urdu Rekhti Poetry in India,” Journal of Women’s
History 16:1 (2004): 12 – 53, draws particular attention to the free borrowing
of non-elite modes of expression in discussing rekhti poetry; and Syed Akbar
Hyder, Reliving Karbala: Martyrdom in South Asian Memory (New York:
Oxford University Press, 2006), writes about the softness of communal
boundaries in his work on marsiya.
14. See Hyder, Reliving Karbala; Fisher, “Women and the Feminine in the Court
and High Culture of Awadh”; and Knighton, The Private Life of an Eastern
King.
15. The argument would involve the importance of Muhammad’s revelations and
the formation of Islam itself. It cannot be superseded in importance for
Muslims, but it is Karbala that truly cemented Shiism.
16. C. M. Naim, “The Art of the Urdu Marsiya,” in Urdu Texts and Contexts: The
Selected Essays of C. M. Naim (New Delhi: Permanent Black, 2004), 1–18.
17. For an eloquent, learned, and full treatment of the Urdu marsiya, see Hyder,
Reliving Karbala, from which much of this discussion is drawn.
18. Ibid., 30.
19. Ibid.
20. Anis was the grandson of Mir Hasan Dihlawi, a great masnawi poet who had
migrated to Lucknow from the former Awadhi capital of Faizabad and who is
sometimes included as one of the “Four Pillars of Urdu.” Cf. Annemarie
Schimmel, Classical Urdu Literature from the Beginning to Iqbal (Wiesbaden:
Otto Harrassowitz, 1975); Ahmed Ali, The Golden Tradition (New York:
Columbia University Press, 1973); and Ralph Russell and Khurshidul Islam,
Three Mughal Poets: Mir, Sauda, Mir Hasan (Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University Press, 1969). Dabir was born in Delhi and moved to Lucknow
early on, where he became the pupil of a great marsiya-go (marsiya
composer), Mir Muzaffar Husain Zamir. See Frances Pritchett with
117
Shamsar Rahman Faruqi, Ab-i Hayat: Shaping the Canon of Urdu Poetry
(Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2001), 420.
21 . See Hyder, Reliving Karbala: “Readers of elegiac poetry helped create a
Shi’i-tinged traditional culture in a society where, among the popular
classes, religious communal identity was still weak or at least not exclusivist
in tone.” Naim, too, has made this point in discussing one of Anis’s most
famous marsiyas [Naim, “The Art of the Urdu Marsiya”].
22 . Generally considered to be the lyric ghazal and rubai (quatrain), and the
narrative forms masnawi, marsiya (elegy), and qasida. This was called
Persian tartib, and was easily recognized by stringing together a series of
nouns using the Persian grammatical form of izafat. See the ghazal verse by
Nasikh below (mira sina hai...) for an example. Such izafat constructions
replaced the use of postpositions in standard Urdu grammar.
23. See Carla Petievich, Assembly of Rivals: Delhi, Lucknow, and the Urdu
Ghazal (New Delhi: Manohar, 1992), and Abul Lais Siddiqi, Lakhna’u ka
Dabistan-i sha’iri, 3rd ed. (Lahore: Urdu Markaz, 1967). Sayyid Abdullah
also discusses Lakhnawiyat in his essay, “Nasikh ki mansukh sha’iri,” in Wali
se Iqbal tak, 3rd ed. (Lahore: Maktaba Khayaban-i Adab, 1966), 224.
24. Petievich, When Men Speak as Women.
25. Khwaja Haidar Ali Atish, Kulliyat-i Atish, ed. Z. A. Siddiqi (Allahabad:
Ram Narayan Lal Beni Madhav, 1972), vol. 1, ghazal 58, v. 7.
26. Kulliyat-i Shaikh Imam Bakhsh Nasikh (Lucknow: Nawal Kishore, n.d.), 1st
diwan, ghazal 11, v. 1. Here the sense is “my heart is so scarred by this
separation that it is like a burning sun trapped within my bosom.” When
dawn finally arrives, the beloved has not come as promised, and the lover can
bear the pain no more. It is as though his wounded heart explodes, bursting
from his body and emerging like the sun over the eastern horizon. The other
major image in this verse is that of the chak-i gariban, the tear in his collar
that the afflicted lover makes as he is driven to distraction. Nasikh draws
together the bursting heart and the rend in the lover’s collar, equating that
moment of afflicted ecstasy with the sun emerging over the morning horizon
in a catharsis. The night is over, the suffering has reached its peak until the
next night, and the lover achieves temporary relief, knowing that the process
will be repeated again the next night.
27. Cf. Veena Talwar Oldenburg, ed., Shaam-e Awadh: Writings on Lucknow
(Delhi: Penguin India, 2007), 273, who speaks of “growing up in a Lucknow
so sweetly corrupt.”
28. Nur Naqvi, ed., Kulliyat-i Mushafi (Delhi: Majlis-i Isha’at-i Adab, 1967),
vol. 1, 346, rubai no. 28.
29. Mir Taqi Mir, Kulliyat-i Mir (Allahabad: Ram Narayan Lal Beni Madho,
1972), 4th diwan, vol. 1, 597, ghazal no. 1357, v. 2.
30. Jurat’s poetic output was by no means confined to this style, however.
31 . In the past decade several scholars have written about rekhti. See Carla
Petievich, When Men Speak as Women; Petievich, “Gender Politics and the
Urdu Ghazal: Exploratory Observations on Rekhta vs. Rekhti,” Indian
Economic and Social History Review 38:3 (July–September): 223 – 48;
Petievich, “Doganas and Zanakhis: The Invention and Subsequent Erasure
of Urdu Poetry’s ‘Lesbian’ Voice,” in Queering India: Same-Sex Love and
Eroticism in Indian Culture and Society, ed. Ruth Vanita (New York:
Routledge, 2002), 47– 60; Naim, “Transvestic Words: The Rekhti in Urdu,”
in In Urdu Texts and Contexts, 42 – 66, Vanita, “Married among Their
Companions”; and Ruth Vanita and Saleem Kidwai, Same-Sex Love in India:
Readings from Literature and History (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2000).
32 . It may be, rather, that Rangin coined the term rekhti. His work in this style
is strikingly reminiscent of that of the Dakani court poet Hashmi Bijapuri
(d. 1697), whose diwan predates Rangin’s Diwan-i Angekhta by more than a
century. A less credible theory enjoyed some currency in Urdu literary
criticism several decades ago that Insha Allah Khan Insha had in fact been
the inventor of rekhti. This seems to have originated from the prejudice that
since Insha was ultimately a better poet than Rangin, he must have been the
genius behind this poetic innovation. The literature on this debate does not
address the more serious “problem” of Hashmi Bijapuri. Cf. Andalib
Shadani, “Rekhta ka mujid” [The Inventor of Rekhti], in Tahqiq ki raushni
men (Lahore: Shaikh Ghulam Ali and Sons, 1963), 91–104.
33. See Sabir Ali Khan, Sa’adat Yar Khan Rangin (Karachi: Anjuman Taraqqi-i
Urdu, Pakistan, 1952). Margrit Pernau has aptly suggested that the diction
of rekhti would be better called tawaifi zuban than begumati zuban [personal
communication, May 2006]. Courtesans could never be begams, nor vice
versa, as they represented competing social spheres. Furthermore, tawaifs
Petievich : Expressive Culture in Nawabi Lucknow
 are valued for the refinement of manners and expression that clearly
distinguish them from more commonplace prostitutes, and they do so for
their elite male clients. Begams were also expected to display refinement if
they ever met outsiders, which was rare. It is possible that Rangin was
welcomed into the kotha (courtesan’s quarters) as a friend and not a client,
but many women have gone on record to explain that nonpaying male
company was discouraged. Cf. Veena Talwar Oldenburg, “Lifestyle as
Resistance: The Case of the Courtesans of Lucknow,” Feminist Studies 16:2
(1990): 259 – 87.
34. Cf. Mah-Laqa Bai “Chanda” et al. in Carla Petievich, “Baharistan-i naz vs.
Tazkirah-i rekhti,” in A Wilderness of Possibilities: Urdu Studies in
Transnational Perspective, ed. Kathryn Hansen and David Lelyveld (Delhi:
Oxford University Press, 2005), 223 – 50.
35. Though misogynistic to a great degree, it is not entirely so.
36. It is this last theme that inspired the title of Vanita’s essay on rekhti,
“Married among Their Companions.”
37. There are tropes about the garden, the lane outside the beloved’s house, the
gatherings inside her home, etc., but when rekhta speaks of the inhabitants of
such conventional loci it is only to underline the narrator’s condition as a
forlorn lover. Rekhta does not speak of household affairs or the mundane
concerns of life.
38. Insha’s oeuvre contains mostly normative rekhta ghazals and it is for this
work that he is held in high esteem within the Urdu literary tradition.
39. He was obliged to flee Lucknow at one point, after having taking a bit too
much liberty with Nawab Saadat Ali Khan.
40. The range here includes the first verse’s piety, a wistfulness in the second
that is reminiscent of a normative rekhta ghazal, followed by a salacious and
raciness of tone in the following three shers. The seventh verse speaks of
propitiating both the Prophet and Lord Shiva, and the poem concludes with a
more normative, self-aggrandizing signature verse to close the ghazal.
41 . According to Webster’s New International Dictionary of the English Language
(2nd ed., 1942), the mung bean—rather than the commonly encountered
mung lentil—is a bushy annual that bears the pods near the tips of slender
branches. Thus, the beloved’s figures are long and slender like the bean, and
the whiteness of her nails are like, perhaps, the pods at the end. I am
indebted to C. M. Naim for discussion of this verse.
42 . The nawab of Rampur was able to purchase a huge chunk of the legendary
nawabi library following Awadh’s annexation in 1856 by the British. His
descendants and the Government of India share custody of that remarkable
collection to this day, housed in the Raza Library at Rampur. See, for
example, Barbara Schmitz and Ziyaud-Din A. Desai, Mughal and Persian
Paintings and Illustrated Manuscripts in the Raza Library, Rampur (New
Delhi: Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts; Rampur: Rampur Raza
Library; and New Delhi: Aryan Books International, 2006).
43. Jawari is the bridge on a sitar. The editor of Jan Sahib’s diwan writes (not
quite technically accurately) that jawari is the name of a run[ner] (dauRa)
which is bound to the top of a sitar or tamboura by which its voice opens and
closes. Clearly the image here is of the dogana playing the narrator “like a
sitar.” There are two general kinds of jawari settings, known as band jawari
(closed), which is thought to elicit softer, rounder notes with fewer piercing
vibrations; and khuli jawari, which is thought to give rise to more open,
raucous, piercing, or shrill sounds. I am indebted to Kathryn Hansen, sitar
adept, for technical help in elucidating this verse.
44. Khwaja Khizr is the name of a prophet skilled in divination who is said to
have discovered and drunk of the fountain of life; hence he is considered as
the saint of waters [John T. Platts, A Dictionary of Urdu, Classical Hindi,
and English (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 494]. Thus, the narrator
remarks on the delightful “waters” as she dips into her Khizru’s “well.”
45. Literally “may your eyes never extend beyond your knees.”
46. Azad, a Delhi writer, published Ab-i Hayat in 1880. It remains a work of
extraordinary authority in Urdu letters. See Pritchett, Ab-i Hayat (note 20
above).
47. Ibid., 209.
48. Petievich, When Men Speak as Women, 326 –27. The concerns expressed above
are for others rather than oneself (which would be standard in rekhta,
wherein the narrator is obsessed with his own condition). They are also of a
temporal nature, rather than treating of the soul’s longing for the divine as is
the ideal in rekhta. In voicing a mother’s preoccupation for her children’s
118
welfare, these verses show how rekhti’s content can be quite different from 64. Oldenburg, in Shaam-e Awadh, has translated it “The Lucknow that Was.”
normative lyric poetry. But it is rather strong to call them “buffoonery.” 65. The title of the translation by E. S. Harcourt and Fakhr Husain of Sharar’s
49. Pritchett, Ab-i Hayat, 223. Guzishta Lakhnau, first published in 1975, Lucknow, the Last Phase of an
Oriental Culture, gives a much more faithful rendering of the original Urdu
50. As I have argued before (Assembly of Rivals, 183) the distinctive style
(Mashriqi tamaddun ka akhiri namuna). There is every reason to credit the
called Lakhnawiyat might just as accurately describe most of northern
sincerity of Sharar’s reportage; and customs and cultural practices do not
Indo-Muslim culture in the nineteenth century, including Delhi. Thanks
die out the instant political change occurs, so it is entirely likely that Sharar
to Frances Pritchett and Syed Akbar Hyder for reminding me of this
witnessed in childhood some of what he reported on. But one does notice that
“exchange.”
Guzishta Lakhnau, by 1920, has already taken on the characteristic tone of
51 . This is why an English translation of Abdul Halim Sharar’s famous work,
nostalgia that dominates talk of Lucknow.
Guzishta Lakhnau (lit. “Bygone Lucknow”) is titled “Lucknow: The Last
66. For other fond treatments of the Lucknow we love to evoke, see Oldenburg,
Phase of an Oriental Culture” (see note 65 below).
Shaam-e Awadh; and Amaresh Mishra, Lucknow: Fire of Grace: The Story of
52 . I refer here to the 1977 film Shatranj ke khilari by Satyajit Ray, which was
Its Revolution, Renaissance, and Its Aftermath (New Delhi: HarperCollins
based on the famous Urdu and Hindi short story of the same title by Munshi
India, 1998).
Premchand.
67. Khushwant Singh and M. A. Husaini, trans., The Courtesan of Lucknow
53. Cf. Petievich, When Men Speak as Women; and Vanita, “Married among
(Delhi: Hind Pocket Books, 1961). It is interesting to consider how closely,
Their Companions,” for two recent discussions.
and ambivalently, courtesan culture is associated with economies of surplus
54. Kathryn Hansen, Grounds for Play: The Nautanki Theatre of North India and conspicuous consumption. McNeil recently argued (not counterintui-
(Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1992), all quotes tively) that an increase in tawaif bazi should be read as the by-product of
from 75 –77. Hansen summarizes Indar Sabha’s plot as follows: “The events economic need on the part of disenfranchised women. Whether or not he is
take place in the court of the mythic Indra, king of the gods, who sits in state right, his theory will do little to detract from the soft, lustrous focus of
encircled by fairies. Sabz Pari (emerald fairy) has been smitten by love for Lucknowi culture that is held so dear, and will likely make little impact on
Gulfam (rose-hued), an earthly prince. Through the intervention of Kala the legend of the city.
Devi (black genie), she smuggles Gulfam into Indra’s heaven. Displeased at
68. Ada means “Grace, beauty; elegance; graceful manner on carriage; charm,
this infraction, Indra casts Gulfam into a well and clips the wings of Sabz
fascination; blandishment; amorous signs and gestures, coquetry...” (Platts,
Pari. The pari, however, is undaunted, and, singing irresistible songs in the
A Dictionary, 31), all of which are entirely appropriate for a courtesan-poet.
disguise of a jogin (female mendicant), eventually earns her lover’s release.
Indra grants his blessings to the couple, and the lovers are reunited.” The 69. Much has been written on this novel and there is no need to add to that
reference to Gulzar-i Nasim could be to either of two famous Lucknowi literature here.
masnawis of the nineteenth century, that of Nawab Mirza “Shauq” or that of 70. One notable attempt to deal historiographically with tawaifs and Lucknowi
Daya Shankar “Nasim.” culture from the perspective of women’s participation and the impact of the
55. Again, see Kathryn Hansen’s numerous publications on the subject. feminine is Fisher, “Women and the Feminine in the Court and High
Culture of Awadh.” Other attempts at historiographical analysis of the
56. As my own research has concerned mostly the work of published poet-
Lucknow legend in the realm of literature have similarly failed to halt the
courtesans, I rely for much of the following discussion on the ethnographic
juggernaut of cherished conventional wisdom. Cf. Ali Jawad Zaidi, Do adabi
and ethnomusicological work of others, especially of Saleem Kidwai, “The
iskul (Lucknow: Uttar Pradesh Urdu Akademi, 1974); and Petievich,
Singing Ladies Find a Voice,” Seminar no. 540 (2004): unpaginated; Amelia
Assembly of Rivals.
Maciszewski, “Tawa’if, Tourism, and Tales: The Problematics of Twenty-
First-Century Musical Patronage of North India’s Courtesans,” in The Cour- 71 . Kidwai, “The Singing Ladies Find a Voice.” See also Mallika Pukhraj,
tesan’s Arts, ed. Martha Feldman and Bonnie Gordon (New York: Oxford Bezubani zuban na ho jaye (unpublished), edited and translated into English
University Press, 2006), 332 – 52; Peter Manuel, Thumri in Historical and by Saleem Kidwai as Song Sung True: A Memoir (New Delhi: Kali for
Stylistic Perspectives (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidas, 1990); Adrian McNeil, Women, 2003). Kidwai foregrounds the importance of professional singers’
“Tawa’if, Military Musicians, and Shi’a Ideology in Pre-Rebellion Lucknow,” studied distance from the term tawaif since the late nineteenth century, by
South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies 32:1 (2009): 46 – 62; Daniel M. which time it had come to carry more social opprobrium than cultural cachet.
Neuman, The Life of Music in North India: The Organization of an Artistic Even in contemporary India many a middle-class family arranges for its
Tradition (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1980); and Regula daughters to be instructed in these arts, though there are those who dismiss
Burckhardt Qureshi, “Female Agency and Patrilineal Constraints: Situating kathak especially as degraded because of its development at a “decadent”
court by women of ill repute. Conversely, it has enjoyed a renaissance outside
Courtesans in Twentieth-Century India,” in Feldman and Gordon, eds.,
of India in the past half century because of its usefulness in reconstructing a
The Courtesan’s Arts, 312 – 331.
glorious Muslim cultural history.
57. The term derives from tauf, which means “circle/ing.” In addition to two film
versions of Umrao Jan (1982, 2006) there is the perennial favorite, Pakeezah 72 . There is a great deal more extant evidence of interaction with Europeans in
(1972), among numerous others. the form of visual culture, of course.
58. See Simonetta Casci, “Lucknow Nawabs: Architecture and Identity,” 73. This play by Bharatendu Harishchandra is referred to in Hansen, Grounds
Economic and Political Weekly, Sept. 7, 2002: “the observance of purdah for Play, 77.
remained strict, yet wives, concubines and courtesans had an effeminate
influence on the male identity, now a far cry from the ideal of the male
warrior of the Mughal period.” Casci does not offer documentation in support
of this described process.
59. McNeil, “Tawaif, Military Musicians, and Shi’a Ideology.”
60. But see Kokila Dang, “Prostitutes, Patrons, and the State: Nineteenth-
Century Awadh,” Social Scientist 21:9 –11 (September–November 1993):
173 – 96.
61 . See Oldenburg, The Making of Colonial Lucknow; and Oldenburg, “Lifestyle
as Resistance: The Case of the Courtesans of Lucknow,” 140. See also
Projesh Banerji, Dance in Thumri (New Delhi: Abhinav Publications, 1986).
62 . One did not need to be Shia in order to participate or support the Muharram
processors in this way—it was something Lucknowis of all stripes were wont
to do. Lucknow’s courtesans probably came from an extensive range of
ethnicities and caste backgrounds.
63. See Mirza Hadi Ruswa, Umrao Jan Ada, trans. David Matthews (New Delhi:
Rupa & Co., 1996), 69.
119 Petievich : Expressive Culture in Nawabi Lucknow
 Cat h e ri n e As h er

Lucknow’s Architectural Heritage

The city of Lucknow and its surrounding territory of Awadh is extraordinarily rich in its built environment,
reflecting a wealthy court and its elite. The nawabs of Awadh perceived themselves as the cultural successors of
the Mughal dynasty in India (r. 1526 –1858), and this is partly reflected in their architecture. But over time, a
reliance on Mughal prototypes diminished as the nawabs sought their own innovative forms, which in some mea-
sure were shaped by European models. Europeans likened the architecture of Awadh to fantasies based on the
enchanting Arabian Nights; they also considered it the epitome of decadence and bad taste. These reactions reflect
the time at which they were expressed. For example, visitors to the royal court of Awadh early in the regime’s life
(c. 1722 –c. 1797) tended to be more impressed than later visitors who came once notions of European authority,
and in particular that of the British, had become firmly embedded. This sense of British entitlement led to the
annexation of Awadh by the English East India Company in 1856. Our concern here is the appearance of the built
landscape of Awadh, especially Lucknow, before this critical date.

Establishing Nawabi Authority in Awadh

The nawabs of Awadh were initially appointed in the eighteenth century as governors of this agriculturally rich
and economically vibrant province of the Mughal Empire. However, as Mughal power waned, the nawabs were able
to assert an increasing level of independence until Awadh became a kingdom in its own right. It is perhaps not
surprising that the first significant monument built by the nawabs of Awadh was not in Awadh itself but in the
Mughal capital of Delhi. It is the tomb of Safdar Jang, who was essentially a semi-independent ruler of Awadh
but continued to see himself as a vassal of the Delhi-based Mughals, and he paid tribute to them on an annual
basis. His ties to the Mughals were expressed by his final resting place. Safdar Jang’s domed tomb is set in a

120 121 Asher : Lucknow’s ARchitectuRal HeRitage

 could not be manipulated. Although European renderings
of these buildings usually indicate that the stucco was left
plain, there is some evidence that polychrome was applied,
which would have given the architecture of Awadh an
extraordinarily exuberant air.
In 1775, when Shuja al-Daula was succeeded by his
son and heir apparent, Asaf al-Daula, the court was
shifted from Faizabad to Lucknow. It was located more
centrally within the province of Awadh, and the city,
situated on the Gomti River, was already a market center
of considerable importance. The most notable monument
of pre-nawabi Lucknow was a Sunni mosque (masjid)
built by the Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb (r. 1658 –1707),
which stands on a high hill dominating the landscape
overlooking the river. It may have played a role in inspir-
ing the many buildings intended for worship by Luck-
now’s Shia nawabs. However, Asaf al-Daula’s concern was
not so much with providing religious institutions as with
building within a large fortified palace complex, known as
the Macchi Bhawan, on the riverbank. Little remains of
the palace, but a pencil-and-watercolor illustration by the
uncle and nephew team of Thomas and William Daniell
(49, pp. 124–25) indicates that it was probably similar to
the palace complex at Faizabad. The rendition shows
massive exterior walls, which would have enclosed mul-
tiple buildings and gardens. Since at least the twelfth
century, manuals intended for Muslim rulers had stated
that kings must build grand walled palaces to indicate
their strength and to impress their supporters as well as
their enemies. This was important, as the Mughals had
taken some of the nawab’s territory, as had the British,
who would in the long run pose the greater threat.

6. Mausoleum of Safdar Jang, Delhi, c. 1820 –22

Page 120: 59. Samuel Bourne, View of the BaRa

ImambaRa Complex, 1864 – 65

Mughal-style garden and is the last large-scale tomb built in Delhi; the tradition of
structural tombs does continue in Awadh. Safdar Jang’s tomb is modeled on the late-
sixteenth-century mausoleum of the Mughal Emperor Humayun (r. 1530 – 40; 1555 – 56),
also in Delhi, especially in its use of red sandstone and white marble trim, and it antici-
pates much of what we will observe in the architecture of Lucknow with its exuberant
cusped arches and dominant floral design (6).
Faizabad, located about ninety miles east of Lucknow, was the capital of Awadh from
1765 to 1775, during the rule of Nawab Shuja al-Daula, under whose patronage numerous
grand edifices were erected. Few buildings, however, remain from this time, although
William Hodges, an English artist, and others left us impressions of the palace and the
entrance to a walled royal garden, the Lal Bagh (45, 48, p. 82). Palaces in early modern
South Asia were not a single large building but a series of pavilions with gardens, often
enclosed with high walls to protect the inhabitants from prying eyes. Walled gardens,
used for royal outings, also could be some distance from the palace, as was the Lal Bagh.
The gate leading to it, with elaborate ornament rendered in stucco, is likely an indication
of the once-lush garden that lay inside. Awadh was far from the quarries that provided
red sandstone and marble for Mughal monuments, as well as Safdar Jang’s tomb. Thus
buildings with a brick core were covered with stucco, which could be sculpted with numer-
52. William Carpenter, StReet Scene with Gateway and
ous designs, including floral forms, cuspings, and even royal emblems, in ways that stone Mosque (GANJ AND TRIPOLIA GATEWAY), 1856

122 123 Asher : Lucknow’s ARchitectuRal HeRitage

49. Thomas Daniell and William Daniell, The Palace of Nawab Shuja
al-Daula fRom the River Gomti (THE MACcHI BHAwAN), 1789

124 125 Asher : Lucknow’s ARchitectuRal HeRitage

 Asaf al-Daula and the City of Imambaras

Under Asaf al-Daula’s leadership, the uniqueness of Awadhi culture was further refined
and became increasingly distinct from that of Mughal Delhi. Awadhi poetry was now
more often written in Urdu than Persian. The Persian poetry of eighteenth-century
Mughal Delhi had lamented the stagnation and demise of that capital, while the Urdu
verse of the Lucknow court was light-hearted and celebrated love and the female form.
Awadhi cuisine became renowned for its richness, which was imagined to surpass that of
the Mughal table. So, too, architecture under Asaf al-Daula surpassed earlier structures
in terms of scale, ornament, and even building type.
The nawabs of Awadh were originally from Iran, whose population was predominately
Shia. While there are various sects within Shia Islam, all Shia believe that the wrongful
death of the Prophet Muhammad’s grandson Husain at the Battle of Karbala in 680 was
a travesty on the part of the Sunni Umayyads, then holders of political authority.1 For the
Shia, Husain is seen as the ultimate martyr and a significant spiritual force. All Shia
believers annually commemorate Husain’s murder, which falls on the tenth day of the
month of Muharram, although exactly how this is done varies within the Islamic world.
In Lucknow, Husain’s martyrdom is commemorated over a multiple-day period that
includes the recitation of poetry focusing on themes of mourning, the procession of
models of Husain’s tomb called taziya, and men in ritual procession who engage in self-
flagellation in remembrance of the martyr. Women gather in a separate venue and focus
on the recitation of poetry, often weeping profusely over the tragedy of Husain’s death.
Much of Asaf al-Daula’s patronage was directed at the ritual of mourning Husain by
constructing imambaras. These are buildings intended for the storage of taziya and other
paraphernalia associated with commemorative events during Muharram, but especially
for the recitation of poetry mourning Husain. Imambaras (also known as Husainiya)
were relatively new to the South Asian landscape and are a South Asian innovation, not a
57. Charles Shepherd and Arthur Robertson, Distant View
form taken from Iran. They probably first were built in the late sixteenth century in of the Bara ImamBara Complex, 1862

Hyderabad, in the Deccan, by a Shia ruler there, also of Iranian descent, although it is
not clear if there is a direct link between these structures in the Deccan and those in
Lucknow. In any event, Asaf al-Daula’s Bara Imambara (also known as the Asafi Imam-
bara) is by far the largest ever built anywhere (57; 58, 61, p. 129; 59, p. 120; 62, p. 128).
The Bara Imambara, possibly constructed as a famine relief project, appears to date
between 1784 and 1791. Originally this colossal complex, consisting of three courtyards
and buildings that enclose them, was attached to the no-longer-extant Macchi Bhawan
palace complex. The imambara was entered by gateways on the east and west; only the
west one, known as the Rumi Darwaza, survives. The elaborate gate is among the most
exuberant of all the buildings in Lucknow. Its triple arched entrance is surmounted by
large finials that give the gateway a distinctive air. Typical of the Awadh nawabs’ archi-
tecture, the gate was highly creative, characterized by a sense of dynamic articulation
never expressed in the more orderly structures of the Mughals. This entrance, once
paired with the nearly identical one on the east side, surely was intended as a triumphal
arch not dissimilar to the one at the Mughal emperor’s palace at Fatehpur Sikri. Also
part of the complex was the imambara itself, a huge free-standing mosque and a deep
step-well whose cool chambers could be used for residential purposes during the hot

126 127 Asher : Lucknow’s ARchitectuRal HeRitage

 Top: 58. Samuel Bourne, THE Rumi DaRwaza AND THE FIRST
COURTYARD OF the BaRa ImambaRa COMPLEX , 1864 – 65

Bottom: 61. Felice Beato, The Southwest VIEW of the

BaRa ImambaRa, 1858

Left: FIG. 13. Charles Shepherd and Arthur Robertson (England,

active 1862 – 63); Asafi Masjid in the BaRa ImambaRa
COMPLEX ; India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1862; albumen print,
25.2 x 37.5 cm; The Alkazi Collection of Photography

128 129 Asher : Lucknow’s ARchitectuRal HeRitage

Left: 65. Samuel Bourne, The Husainabad ImambaRa,
1865 – 66
Right: 66. Samuel Bourne, TOMB OF ZINAT ALGIYA IN
the Husainabad ImambaRa COMPLEX , 1865 – 66
67. Charles Shepherd and Arthur Robertson, THE JAWAB
OPPOSITE THE TOMB OF ZINAT ALGIYA IN the Husain-
abad ImambaRa COMPLEX , 1862
130
68. Shah Najaf ImambaRa, 1880
weather. At the time of the imambara’s construction, it
had the largest vaulted hall that ever spanned an uninter-
rupted space. The Bara Imambara is decorated with fully
three-dimensional floral motifs rendered in stucco and
pairs of curved fish, the house of Awadh’s royal emblem.
The complex and its decor were clearly intended to flaunt
the Shia nawabs’ increasing wealth and to indicate a
shifting power balance vis-à-vis the Mughal court. It also
was aimed at Europeans, who were both an increasing
presence in Lucknow and a growing potential threat to
Awadhi sovereignty.
In Awadh there were twenty-one recorded imambaras,
ten of which were built by ruling monarchs and the rest
by the elite. These imambaras are much smaller versions
2
of the Bara Imambara, for example the Husainabad
Imambara, built about 1837, not far from the larger one
(63, p. 88; 65; 66; 67). 3
The garden and pool in which the
131
Husainabad Imambara is situated is unusual for
a Muslim religious setting. There European-inspired
statues of tunic-clad females and animals are found, not
uncommon in secular architecture, but unique in this
religious context. The building itself is an elegant struc-
ture with cusped entrance arches and a lacelike domed
parapet. Inside the compound is a tomb modeled on the
Taj Mahal (1632 – 43), although its spatial tensions and
emphasis on height recall the aesthetics of eighteenth-
and nineteenth-century Mughal architecture (66).
Another imambara, called the Shah Najaf, built by King
Ghazi al-Din Haidar, was intended as a replica of the
burial site of the Prophet Muhammad’s son-in-law, Ali,
and was used as the ruler’s own tomb (68). The Shah
Najaf appears austere from the exterior, although its
interior is ornately embellished with European glass
chandeliers and a profusion of stucco adornment.
Asher : Lucknow’s ARchitectuRal HeRitage
 European-Style Architecture in Lucknow

Europeans had ventured to South Asia in considerable numbers since the late sixteenth
century. Some came in official capacities, but many came either as traders promoting
their own interests and/or as mercenary soldiers, the most ambitious of whom were able
to make significant fortunes. A case in point is the Frenchman Claude Martin, who
arrived in mid-eighteenth-century India as a common solider; he settled in nawabi
Lucknow and eventually, owing to his remarkable abilities as well as good luck, became
extraordinarily wealthy.4 He was rich enough to lend sizable sums of money to Nawab
Asaf al-Daula. Martin’s most notable architectural contribution is his own sumptuous
dwelling, which he called Constantia (107, p. 30; 108; 109, p. 58). He and his Indian
consorts lived in this immense mansion on the bank of the Gomti. Martin’s will provided
for his own tomb within the dwelling and for the founding of boys’ schools not only in
Lucknow but also in Calcutta and in Lyon, France. The Lucknow school still operates in
the very mansion he bequeathed, Constantia, which came to be known as La Martinière.
He also provided for his Indian consorts’ welfare.
In eighteenth-century India, European men felt it was perfectly acceptable to have
long-term relationships with Indian women. Many of these arrangements ended abruptly,
even though children were involved, when the men departed permanently for Europe, but

above: 108. Charles Shepherd and Arthur Robertson,

La MaRtinièRe and the Lath, c. 1862

Right: Fig. 14. Francis Frith, La MaRtinièRe and the Lath

(detail); India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1870s; albumen print,
6 1⁄4 x 8 1⁄4 in. (16 x 21 cm); The Alkazi Collection of Photography

132 133 Asher : Lucknow’s ARchitectuRal HeRitage

Martin insured the financial stability of his favorites, in particular Boulone. Her square-
plan, domed tomb still stands on the Constantia estate, although in a ruined condition.
Martin’s mansion proved a significant influence on many of the royal buildings of
Lucknow. While Constantia had ancillary service structures, it was built in the European
manner as an enormous single structure with multiple rooms and stories. At the apex are
arches that from a distance appear as the outline of a dome in silhouette. This particular
form was later emulated in some of the pavilions of the Qaisar Bagh Palace built in the
mid-nineteenth century by the nawabs. Constantia’s roof’s parapet is embellished with
stucco sculptures of classical gods, goddesses, and lions, a reference to Martin’s birth-
place of Lyon. Today many are damaged.
Awadh’s nawabs were perhaps not as smitten by European architecture for their own
uses as they were by European objects of art and furnishings. Their palaces were replete
with European goods that ranged from chairs to mechanical “toys,” 5 which for a Muslim
monarch would fall into the category of luxury objects. They would not be seen as indica-
tions of avarice and decadence, as EuroAmerican observers tend to critique the desire
for such objects. All the same, the Awadhi nawabs did build a number of western-style
pavilions, most of which are in a ruined condition today, largely for the use of their Euro-
pean residents and guests. A structure known as the Dilkusha (Heart Pleasing), greatly
damaged in the Uprising of 1857– 58, is one such building (82, p. 64). Early photographs
indicate its appearance. Designed in about 1805 by Sir Gore Ouseley, a self-made archi-
6

tect from England’s elite, this Lucknowi country house was modeled on an eighteenth-
century English one. The exterior porch featured classical Corinthian columns; the highly
symmetrical arrangement of the entire complex conformed to an Islamic desire for
balance in architectural layout. Dilkusha, built at some distance from the main palace
yet still on the riverbank, had multiple functions: it was a starting point for ceremonial
processions, a hunting lodge, and a guesthouse for Europeans.
In addition to pavilions built in the European style, often a distance from the
nawab’s administrative headquarters, were palace complexes that combined European-
style porticoes, windows, and other features with Indian-style domes and typical nawabi
stucco ornament. Notable was the Chattar Manzil, once part of a large multipavilion com-
plex, which was built not far from the British Residency. Its construction began about
1803. Its only surviving structure has been greatly altered over the years and today is the
Central Drug Research Institute. A photograph by Shepherd and Robertson dating to
1862, among others, indicates the combination of European and Indian styles on the
exterior of this complex that captured the imagination of European visitors (73). A
watercolor by a Lucknowi artist, today in the Khalili collection, London, of the palace’s
throne room indicates that the interior with its cusped arches and painted ceiling con-
formed closely to the idiom established under the Mughals and then adapted to Lucknowi
taste under the rulers of Awadh (37, pp. 136–37). The last ruler of Awadh, Wajid Ali Shah,
built his own palace estate known as the Qaisar Bagh, not far from the Chattar Manzil. Top: 73. Charles Shepherd and Arthur
Robertson, BARa Chattar Manzil
Once a vast complex, very little remains of this palace, which was largely destroyed in the AND FARHAT BAKHSH, VIEW fRom
the South, 1862
Uprising. European photographers documented its ruin in detail, possibly a statement of
European superiority over what was seen as a symbol of nawabi decadence (74, 77, p. 138; Bottom: 72. Samuel Bourne,
DARSHAN BILAS AND CHOTA
75, p. 139; 162, pp. 154–55). Chattar Manzil, 1864 – 65

134 135 Asher : Lucknow’s ARchitectuRal HeRitage

37. The Audience Chamber of the Kings of Awadh,
1850 –99

136 137 Asher : Lucknow’s ARchitectuRal HeRitage

Top: 74. Samuel Bourne, West
Gateway of the Qaisar Bagh
Palace, 1864 – 65
Bottom: 77. Samuel Bourne, Qaisar
Bagh, VineRy and Buildings,
1864 – 65
138
Top: 75. Samuel Bourne, View
in the Qaisar Bagh PALACE ,
1864 – 65
Bottom: 79. Samuel Bourne, Qaisar
Pasand, 1864 – 65
139 Asher : Lucknow’s ARchitectuRal HeRitage
 Among Lucknow’s most famous—or perhaps infa-
mous—European-style complexes is the British Residency,
where during the six-month siege in 1857– 58 British men,
women, and children were trapped, and most of them died
before the Residency’s liberation. Photographed fre-
quently by professional and amateur photographers after
it was largely destroyed in the Uprising (169), buildings on
the thirty-three-acre complex had been rarely recorded
before this time. A watercolor by the Indian artist Sita
7
Ram, who worked specially for British patrons, indicates
sober buildings constructed in a Georgian style, a far
cry from the exuberance of much contemporary nawabi
architecture. The complex was commenced in 1773, when
8
169. Samuel Bourne, Ruins of the Residency, 1864 – 65
Nawab Shuja al-Daula agreed to have a British agent at
court, although it would be interesting to know the extent
of the nawab’s enthusiasm, especially had he been able to
foresee the disastrous events of the 1856 British annexa-
tion, ending nawabi rule in Awadh.
Diversity in Awadh
Literature pertaining to the nawabi period in Awadh
tends to focus on the nawabs themselves, the colorful
Europeans residing in the city, and to a lesser extent the
nawabi elite; it mostly ignores the role of the large popula-
tion in Awadhi society who were not Muslims. The most
visible architecture in the city of Lucknow belonged to the
royal family and the elite, also Shia, and obviously
attracts the most attention, but Awadh’s population of
other faiths also built in the city and in the surrounding
countryside. The Hindu and Jain temples of Awadh tend
to be relatively small especially, when compared with Asaf
al-Daula’s huge imambara. This should not be seen as an
indication of these communities’ relationship to the
nawabi elite; rather, their small sizes reflect the norm for
eighteenth- and nineteenth-century temples found
throughout North India, including Benares (Varanasi),
one of the holiest cities for Hindus. A typical temple is
included in Robert Smith’s photographic panorama of
Lucknow (53, pp. 142–43), and similar temples, dating to
the nineteenth century, with their tall spirelike super-
structures are still seen today on the banks of the Gomti.
In a neighborhood of Lucknow known as Aliganj, the
Muslim Queen Begam Rabia, wife of King Muhammad
140
Ali Shah, built a temple dedicated to the monkey god
Hanuman. She built it after a dream revealing a buried
image of the god and her subsequent delivery of a long-
awaited child thanks to the deity’s blessing.9
During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries the
economy of Awadh prospered largely due to the richness
of the soil, which allowed for the bountiful production of
crops, especially grain. Tikait Rai, a Hindu minister to
Nawab Asaf al-Daula, founded towns in the hinterlands
of Awadh and provided them with temples.10 The decor on
Taikat Rai’s temple in the market town of Taikatnagar,
as well as others of the nawabi period, bears stucco floral
motifs and cusped arches similar to that on Lucknow’s
Islamic architecture, such as palaces and imambaras.
They also bear images of Hindu deities that would not, of
course, be found on Muslim religious architecture. This
Hindu minister also built a tank for the storage of water
in Lucknow, a service to the general population.11 Maha-
raja Balkishen, a Hindu minister to King Wajid Ali
Shah, Lucknow’s last ruler, provided a substantial market
town, which he named Maharajaganj after himself. It
included a fine temple, an impressive bridge, and ornate
gateways leading to the market, of which one still survives.
Less is known about the Jains of Lucknow, but local
tradition claims that in the early twentieth century there
were about four hundred Jain families living in Luck-
now’s Chowk area. Few remain today. This same tradition
indicates that Nawab Asaf al-Daula invited Jains from
other parts of North India to settle in the city, following
much earlier traditions in which Jains were invited to
Muslim courts to serve as bankers, moneylenders, jewel-
ers, and merchants. By the end of nawabi rule at least
fourteen Jain temples graced the streets of Lucknow,12
although only nine survive and most have been rebuilt.
One of the finest of these Jain temples is in a neighbor-
hood known as Sahedetganj, not far from Chowk, and is
richly embellished with floral stucco patterns, which have
been particularly well maintained.
A survey of the architecture of the various faith com-
munities shows that decor on all building types is similar.
Thus the architecture of Awadh must not be thought of as
being unique to Muslim patrons; rather, it reflects a style
that bespeaks the sophisticated exuberance of the period
which was embraced universally by the elite.
141 Asher : Lucknow’s ARchitectuRal HeRitage
53. Captain Robert Smith, PanoRama of Lucknow, 1832

1. See Peter Chelkowski, “Monumental Grief: The Bara Imambara,” in 6. Neeta Das, “The ‘Country Houses’ of Lucknow,” in Jones, Lucknow: City of
Lucknow: City of Illusion, ed. Rosie Llewellyn-Jones (Delhi: Alkazi Illusion, 180 – 91.
Collection of Photography; New York: Prestel, 2006), 101– 33; and Hussein 7. Rosie Llewellyn-Jones, “The Residency and the River,” in Llewellyn-Jones,
Keshani, “Architecture and the Twelver Shi’i Tradition: The Great Lucknow: City of Illusion, 192 – 99.
Imambara Complex of Lucknow,” Muqarnas 23 (2006), 219 – 50, for historical
8. For Sita Ram’s illustration, see Llewellyn-Jones, “The Residency and the
information about the Shia tradition and the Bara Imambara.
River,” 195.
2. Banmali Tandan, The Architecture of Lucknow and Its Dependencies,
9. Philip Lutgendorf, Hanuman’s Tale: Messages of a Divine Monkey (New York:
1722 –1856 (New Delhi: Vikas, 2001), 30.
Oxford University Press, 2007), 244 – 45.
3. See Tandan, The Architecture of Lucknow, 30 – 43.
10. Tandan, The Architecture of Lucknow, 69, ill. 11.
4. For a detailed account, see Rosie Llewellyn-Jones, A Very Ingenious Man:
11 . Tandan, The Architecture of Lucknow, 70, ill. 12.
Claude Martin in Early Colonial India (Delhi: Oxford University Press,
1992). 12 . Puran Chand Nahar, Jaina Inscriptions (Containing Index of Places,
Glossary of Names of Acharyas, etc.), Part II (Calcutta: Viswavinode Press,
5. Rosie Llewellyn-Jones, Engaging Scoundrels: True Tales of Old Lucknow
1927), 114 – 45.
(New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2000), 30 – 40.

142 143 Asher : Lucknow’s ARchitectuRal HeRitage

 So p h i e G o r d o n

“A Sacred Interest”: The Role of

Photography in the “City of Mourning”

Photography arrived in India only a few months after the daguerreotype and the calotype processes had been
revealed to the public in France and Britain for the first time in 1839. Initially, at least, the daguerreotype was
the more successful medium in India. The unique, positive image that was created on a sheet of highly polished
silver-plated copper was sharp, clear, and apparently permanent. The prints created from paper negatives (called
calotypes) were, in contrast, rough, grainy, and likely to fade. With chemical and technological advances, however,
the calotype process had by 1850 superseded the daguerreotype almost everywhere. The greatest single advantage
of the process was the ability to print multiple positive prints from a single negative. This allowed photographic
images to be sold, published, and distributed widely across India and the rest of the world, disseminating not only
aesthetically pleasing pictures but also information and knowledge in an easily accessible format.
Photography in Lucknow follows a distinct trajectory, unlike any other location in South Asia. The events
of 1857– 58 ensured that Lucknow became one of the most photographed cities in the country, possibly surpassed
in the nineteenth century only by Calcutta, the imperial capital. Before 1857, however, there had been little
demand for photographs, principally because Lucknow offered little of archaeological interest that would attract
the attention of European antiquarians, the primary market. What interest there was came from the British and
Indian elites living within the city. The architect and a functionary of the Husainabad Imambara, Ahmad Ali
Khan, who took up photography in the 1850s, produced many portraits to satisfy this demand, as well as photo-
graphing some of the royal palaces and religious buildings.

144 145 GoRdon : The Role of Photography

Page 144: 71. G. W. Lawrie and Company, BaRa Chattar
Manzil FRom the Gomti River , 1895

Fig. 15. Alexis de la Grange, Two-PaRt PanoRama Showing

the Stone BRidge, AuRangzeb Mosque, Rumi DaRwaza,
and BaRa ImambaRa Complex; India, Uttar Pradesh,
Lucknow, 1850 – 51; albumen print, 12 3⁄4 x 14 1⁄ 8 in. (32.3 x 35.9 x
2.8 cm); Canadian Centre for Architecture

146 147 Gordon

GoRdon : The Role
Role of
of Photography
Photography
 Occasionally a traveler reaching the city would produce a view as part of a series
of pictures depicting various locations across India, in the tradition of earlier artist-
explorers such as Thomas and William Daniell or William Hodges. In 1850 – 51, the
French aristocrat Baron Alexis de la Grange journeyed across India, photographing
a number of important architectural and cultural sites. He made what are probably the
earliest surviving photographs of Lucknow: a view of the Asafi Masjid, and a two-part
panoramic view encompassing the river Gomti on the left and the processional route
that emerges from the Rumi Darwaza on the right (fig. 15, pp. 146–47).
Following the Uprising, however, there was an unprecedented demand for images of
Lucknow showing the sites where the fighting had occurred. Initially the photographs
depicted the scarred city and the extent of the destruction; later, the views showed how
Lucknow was transformed into a colonial city following the widespread demolition and
rebuilding programs. The majority of the images concentrated on those spots where
particular scenes of British heroism or conflict had taken place in 1857, although occa-
sionally an alternative view of the city and its culture emerges.

Early Photography in Lucknow: Ahmad Ali Khan Left: 41. Ahmad Ali Khan, Wajid Ali Shah, King of Oudh,
c. 1855

While most early photographic activity in India occurred in the great imperial metropo-
lises of Calcutta, Bombay, and Madras, there is evidence that photography reached
Lucknow surprisingly early. The art historian P. C. Mookherjee, writing in 1883, stated
that photography was already flourishing in the city in 1850 after a British member of
the army taught the necessary skills to Ahmad Ali Khan, the darogah of the Husainabad
Imambara.1 Using Khan’s nickname “Chotay Miya,” Mookherjee also describes Khan as
the architect of both the Husainabad and the Qaisar Bagh complexes, two of the most
theatrical constructions in the city. Mookherjee then continued: “his portrait taking was
very creditable and his architectural views were in high demand.” 2
Khan was known to take photographs of sitters upon request, and various British
individuals took advantage of this in order to send portraits back to their families. The
Reverend Henry Polehampton wrote to his mother in England about his experiences
attempting to obtain a portrait from Khan: “He is the only man in the station who does
daguerreotypes and everybody wants them, so he is becoming an important person. . . .
He is a gentleman, and does not take pay; so one has no hold on him.” 3
Two albums in the British Library, formerly in the possession of The Times war
correspondent William Russell, display the range of work that Khan produced before May
1857. The albums function as a poignant record of the city prior to the changes that were
about to take place. They also provide an opportunity to examine how the city was
perceived by one high-status individual. The albums include over one hundred portraits of
prominent members of both the European and Indian communities, as well as a series of
architectural studies, concentrating particularly on the Chattar Manzil complex and the
Husainabad Imambara. Among the portraits of the Europeans is one of the photographer
John Dannenberg, who worked in the city before 1857.4
Khan’s portraits include both formal and informal portraits of King Wajid Ali Shah
Right: 42. Ahmad Ali Khan, Mumtaz Alam Nawab
Qaisar Mahal Sahiba of Awadh, c. 1855
surprising access to the women of this Muslim court,
suggest that Khan must have been of a relatively high
social status. An account written much later states that
he was appointed as an official court photographer:
“Through Ali Naki Khan, the corrupt Prime Minister,
he was appointed Court Photographer, and the King,
Wajid Ali Shah, permitted him to take, under the strict-
est injunctions of secrecy, the likenesses of his Queen
and the ladies of the Royal Harem.” 5
A set of formal photographs of the king and his
begam exist in the British Library; elaborately painted
borders incorporating symbols of the Awadhi court have
been added to each. In the king’s portrait, a delicate
gold-leaf nimbus has been applied to the photograph,
surrounding the royal head in an attempt to evoke the
tradition of Mughal painting (41).6 In contrast, a photo- Fig. 16. Ahmad Ali Khan, Wajid Ali Shah with His Queen
graph showing Wajid Ali Shah with Begam Akhtar Mahal Begum Akhtar Mahal Sahiba and Their Daughter
(copy of lost photograph), c. 1885; India, Uttar Pradesh,
Sahiba and one of his daughters presents us with an Lucknow. For source, see note 5, p. 163.

and the royal family (41, 42, fig. 16). These remarkable studies, which demonstrate a informal, domestic picture of the ruler, without any of the

148 149 GoRdon : The Role of Photography


Top: Fig. 17. Ahmad Ali Khan (fl. c.
1850s– 60s), View fRom the
Chattar Manzil; India, c. 1856;
albumen print; The Alkazi Collection
of Photography
Bottom: 70. Samuel Bourne, View
of the Chattar Manzil Palace
Complex, 1864 – 65
150
symbols of royalty, seated on a European-style sofa
(fig. 16, p. 149). Although known today through an early
publication, this photograph would not have been taken
for public consumption. The majority of Ahmad Ali
Khan’s photographs would never have been seen outside
the circle of those who commissioned them had it not been
for the 1857 Uprising and the resulting looting of prop-
erty. A number of Khan’s negatives and albums passed
into the hands of British army officers and consequently
made their way back to Britain, where some of the images
were subsequently published. 7
Khan’s architectural views present a valuable record
of Lucknow as it was prior to the Uprising. It is difficult
to read these images without imposing upon them the
knowledge of what is to come, yet although they do serve
as important historical documents of buildings that were
subsequently destroyed, the photographs also function as
an impression of the pre-Uprising city in the mind of one
of its more prominent citizens. Khan’s views concentrate
on the seat of royal power—the Chattar Manzil—and the
most important religious structure in the city—the
Husainabad Imambara. By concentrating on these two
structures, Khan highlights two different, but overlap-
ping, possible conceptual maps for the original, nawabi
city (fig. 17, 70).
Most of Khan’s photographs of the Chattar Manzil,
the home of the nawabs for almost fifty years, depict the
complex viewed from the riverside. Earlier artists had
documented the city from the river, and this continued to
be a familiar viewpoint into the 1850s. Navigating the city
via the river was the easiest and quickest way to move
long distances, and it would have been a viewpoint
familiar to the royal family and members of court.
When the palace does not appear in the frame, it is
usually because the photographer was standing on the
rooftop of the Chattar Manzil, amidst its chattris. In
doing so, Khan placed himself and the palace at the
source of the outward gaze, looking over the city from the
heart of the royal seat of power. He placed the nawab at
the center of the vision, thus emphasizing the nawab’s role
as the center of power.
Khan also photographed the Husainabad Imambara
from many different viewpoints. Lucknow was, and still
is, an important Shia center, and the mourning rituals
151
associated with the Prophet’s grandson Husain are
commemorated annually in the month of Muharram in
imambaras around the city. In Lucknow, processions
move through the city from one religious site to another,
partially following the path taken by the royal proces-
sional route that passes through the Rumi Darwaza and
the Husainabad gateway. These public spaces were
frequently described in religious terms, emphasizing the
associations with the Muharram performances.8 The
Husainabad Imambara, as an important Shia complex,
thus occupies a central position in the religious life of the
city, which is reflected through Khan’s photography. It
also serves as the burial site for its royal patron, King
Muhammad Ali Shah. Although the majority of Muslims
in the city were Sunnis, the nawabs were Shias of Persian
origin, and the public processions and commemorations
served to define the Shia community, binding it closely to
the identity of the city.
These two identities, royal and Shia, were to be
comprehensively overwritten after 1857. Even Ahmad Ali
Khan, who continued to photograph at least until about
1862, shifted his gaze to acknowledge the new power in
the city: the British and their memories of “the Mutiny.”
Photography during the UprisinG, 1857–58
Following the outbreak of the conflict in Lucknow in May
1857, Ahmad Ali Khan joined his fellow countrymen and
fought against the British. P. C. Mookherjee wrote that
Khan subsequently “lost his fortune and name, and died a
miserable man.” 9 It is not known exactly what Khan’s fate
was, but he did in fact manage to rehabilitate himself
after the Uprising to the extent of joining the Bengal
Photographic Society in 1862. “Mahamedoodolah Ahmud
Ali Khan, alias Chota Meah” was proposed at a meeting
in Calcutta on 29 July 1862.10 The members of the society
were most probably unaware that in February 1858 they
had viewed at a society meeting some photographs that
“were taken by the Darogah who has since gone over to
the rebels.” 11
No photographs taken during the conflict can be
attributed to Khan. Some members of the British mili-
tary, however, took photographs in late 1857 and early
1858; officers often had the means and the time to learn
GoRdon : The Role of Photography
the new technology for their own amusement, while for others, such as the Royal Engi-
neers, photography was part of their training in Britain.12 Dr. Patrick Fitzgerald of the
Indian Medical Service was probably the first photographer to work during the conflict.
He arrived in the outskirts of Lucknow in December 1857 and photographed at La
Martinière (Constantia) and at the Alam Bagh, where he was stationed with the Madras
Fusiliers.13 In early 1858, Captain John Milliken and Lance Corporal Jones, both of the
Royal Engineers, arrived in Lucknow and each produced a handful of views showing
various buildings while they were occupied by the British troops, including the Sikander
Bagh (Secundra Bagh), Musa Bagh, and Dilkusha Kothi.14 The work of both men was
purely documentary, capturing the chaos of the city as events were still unfolding,
although the technical limitations of photography at the time made it impossible to
photograph any scenes of the fighting; this was in fact usually left to the imagination of
graphic artists. The work by these military photographers makes an interesting compari-
son with the highly polished and often staged work of the commercial photographer
Felice Beato, who arrived in India in early 1858.
Beato (1832 –1909), described as “a native of Corfu,” 15 was a commercial photographer
who began his career working in Greece, Turkey, and the Middle East. His first experi-
ence of war photography was covering the Crimean conflict in Russia in 1855 – 56. Beato
arrived in Calcutta on February 13, 1858, and only a few days later attended a meeting of
the Bengal Photographic Society, where he exhibited his work from the Crimea and
Istanbul.16 He was followed to Calcutta by his brother Antonio in July.17 The expedition
167. Felice Beato, Baillie GuaRd Gate, 1858
had evidently been carefully planned in advance; Felice had traveled from Greece with
hundreds of glass-plate negatives pre-prepared so he was able to leave for the trouble
spots to begin work almost immediately.18 Felice traveled on to Kanpur first, then
Lucknow, Delhi, and other North Indian cities, while Antonio later established a studio and in the annual exhibition of the Bengal Photographic one that was entirely focused on Lucknow as the location
where the negatives would be printed up and sold. Society, the photographs were also shown in London at of the Uprising (164, p. 85; 165, p. 156; 167). It moved from
The first of Beato’s several visits to Lucknow took place at the beginning of April the end of 1858 at the exhibition of the London Photo- east to west along the route taken by the relieving British
1858, just a few weeks after the British had finally regained control of the city. Beato graphic Society. A contemporaneous reviewer noted that troops, stopping at various sites on the way to highlight
followed in the wake of the troops as they proceeded through the city, mapping out a “these admirable views give us, in fact, the pictorial the places where events that had significance for the
route with his camera that began on the eastern edge of Lucknow at Dilkusha and romance of this terrible war. They are necessary, as our British had taken place, such as the storming of the
La Martinière, and ended in the west at Musa Bagh. This took the photographer along contemporaries say, to an understanding of war now, and Sikander Bagh and the subsequent hand-to-hand fighting.
the grand processional route that passed through the Rumi Darwaza, and toward the will be indispensable to future historians.” 20
One particular image of the interior of the Sikander Bagh
British Residency. By August, a few months later, the newspaper The Englishman was The photographs were popular, and were purchased has become Beato’s most notoriously staged scene, as it
carrying advertisements for the photographs: by soldiers and British people living in India, many of has been proven beyond doubt that he arranged the
whom would have been directly affected by the Uprising. 21
skeletons in the courtyard in order to obtain the most
We have the pleasure to inform our readers that M. Beato’s views of Lucknow of the principal sites Beato also licensed his photographs for sale in 1861– 62 affecting image (166, p. 157).22 When for sale with Hering,
there, taken since the siege, have just been brought to Calcutta. Mr Beato intends publishing them at through the British photographer and print-seller Henry each photograph was given a title that placed it within
once, and copies may be seen at No. 37 Cossitollah [Beato’s studio]. 19 Hering, so the photographs were widely seen over a num- the larger narrative of the Uprising. Thus a view of La
ber of years. The photographs were used by artists such Martinière became “The Martiniere School. First Attack
Beato produced over sixty images of the city, as well as two remarkable panoramas as Egron Lundgren in the preparation of their own work of Sir Colin Campbell in November 1857; Second Attack,
that amply demonstrate his technical skills: a sequence of eight views taken from one of and even as the basis for stained-glass memorial windows 2nd March, Lucknow.”23 The building becomes the
the minarets of the mosque in the Bara Imambara (163, pp. 154–55), and a six-part in the parish church of Stratfield Mortimer in England. backdrop to aid the act of remembering the conflict. The
panoramic sequence taken from the roof of the Roshan al-Daula Kothi in the Qaisar The narrative that Beato created through his royal city through which religious mourners had pro-
Bagh complex (162, pp. 154–55). In addition to being displayed at the gallery in Calcutta photographs presented a new conceptual map of the city: cessed now became a site of a different kind of mourning

152 153 GoRdon : The Role of Photography

162. Felice Beato, PanoRama of Lucknow, Taken fRom
the Qaisar Bagh Palace, 1858

163. Felice Beato, PanoRama of Lucknow, Taken fRom

the BARa ImambaRa, 1858

154 155 GoRdon : The Role of Photography

 and pilgrimage—that of the British tourist recalling the fate of his compatriots and the
sacrifices that they made for imperial ambition.
The route outlined by Beato’s photographs was to be repeated by subsequent photog-
raphers as well as in countless guidebooks to Lucknow over subsequent decades. Beato’s
photographs were also the first steps in the collective myth-making process in which
stories of British heroism during the Uprising were recalled and held up as examples to
inspire others, while tales of Indian duplicity would serve as warnings to future gen-
erations. This persistent remembrance of the Uprising altered completely the British
perception of Lucknow and indeed of India.

Above: 165. Felice Beato, Ruins of the BatteRy in

the Residency Compound, 1858

Right: 166. Felice Beato, InteRior of the Sikander

Bagh, after the SLAUGHTER OF 2,000 REBELS BY THE
93RD HIGHLANDERS, AND THE 4TH PUNJAB REGT., 1858

156 157 GoRdon : The Role of Photography

 Photography after the Uprising

In 1858 – 59, immediately after the end of the conflict, a handful of other photographers
came to Lucknow, although none produced work that had the same impact as Beato’s.
The photographers captured many of the same locations that Beato had photographed,
but gradually the buildings were being either pulled down or repaired. Photography shows
the extent of the demolitions: large areas around the Qaisar Bagh and Chattar Manzil
were cleared completely (70, p. 150). The images also show how Lucknow was tidied up,
“improved” and re-created as a picturesque and peaceful colonial town. Only the Resi-
dency remained as a shell, an untouchable relic preserved forever in the British mind.24
The husband and wife partnership of Major Robert and Harriet Tytler made a small
number of views of the city (78, 81). The Tytlers had taken up photography in February
1858 in Delhi, where over the course of several months, Robert Tytler had received advice
from the commercial photographers Charles Shepherd and Felice Beato as well as the
amateur Dr. John Murray. By March 1859, the Tytlers had produced about 500 negatives
of views in North India, including Lucknow, many of which closely followed Beato’s
compositions. First the negatives, and then the positive prints were shown at meetings of
the Bengal Photographic Society. A reviewer noted: “The collection is unquestionably the
finest ever exhibited in Calcutta; it embraces every scene of the mutiny of 1857, from the
cavalry lines at Meerut to the Residency at Lucknow.” 25
Also in Lucknow in 1859 was John Dannenberg, whose appearance in the city before
1857 has already been noted. Dannenberg was absent during the conflict, but returned to
the city in mid-1859 and prepared a series of views which were displayed in Calcutta in
February 1860. The Bengal Hurkaru noted they were “a very superior collection of views
taken by the collodion albumen process at Lucknow.”26 Years later, in 1892, Dannenberg
reprinted a handful of his Lucknow photographs and published them in an album titled
Mutiny Memorials alongside doctored copies of Beato’s work. He presented the album as
Top: 78. Possibly by Robert Christopher Tytler and
his own work, and it was accompanied by a printed leaflet quoting rich, fulsome reviews Harriet Christina Tytler, Qaisar Pasand,
from the newspapers: c. 1858 – 59

Left: 81. Robert Christopher Tytler and Harriet

If . . . places have the adumbrations of human souls still inhabiting their precincts as a sort of delicious Christina Tytler, VIEW of the UPPER PORTION of
the Qaisar Pasand, 1858
spiritual aroma of self-sacrifice pervading the localities where noble life and beautiful human love were
shed in profusion for a nation’s cause, then this album of Mutiny memorials will remain a sort of incence
to the heroic dead in pictorial form.27

The album, despite containing poor-quality copies of Beato’s photographs, sold well
and demonstrates the continued appetite of images of the sites associated with the
Uprising. This appetite had been fed by a succession of commercial photographers who
worked in Lucknow from the 1860s onward. The short-lived partnership of Shepherd and
Robertson (Charles Shepherd had worked with Robert Tytler in Delhi) produced in about
1862 a number of important architectural views (57, p. 127; 73, p. 135; 108, p. 132; Fig. 13,
p. 128) that were subsequently incorporated into the Bourne and Shepherd stock. Samuel
Bourne arrived in Lucknow in December 1864 and remained for a few weeks, photograph-
ing all aspects of the city. His views of Hazratganj depict yet another image of Lucknow:
the peaceful commercial center, with wide, empty streets and picturesque trees, carefully

158 159 GoRdon : The Role of Photography


Fig. 18. Samuel Bourne, HazRatganj; India, Uttar Pradesh,
Lucknow, 1864 – 65; albumen print, 7 1⁄2 x 12 5⁄ 8 in. (19 x 32 cm);
The British Library, Photo 577/(49)
avoiding any reference to the Uprising (fig. 18). Similar views were taken by John
Edward Saché, who had established a photographic studio in nearby Nainital in 1867.
Saché took his first views of Lucknow in about 1867, but it was not until 1871 that he set
up a permanent studio on Hazratganj. The photographer G. W. Lawrie began his career
in Saché’s studio before setting up his own establishment, first in Nainital and in 1882 in
Lucknow. Lawrie and Company eventually became the most important studio in the city
at the end of the nineteenth century (71, p. 144).
All of these photographers concentrated on one site above all others: the British
Residency, which was the one view of Lucknow that every British visitor had to acquire
for his photograph album. The image, often with the Union Jack flying on the tower,
became an iconic representation of the British perception of Lucknow.
Darogah Abbas Ali
Although British photographers were largely responsible for the dominant vision of the
post-1857 city, one photographer—Abbas Ali—produced a range of work in the 1860s–70s
that acknowledges both the British and the Indian cities.
160
His book The Lucknow Album was published in 1874
in Calcutta, and contains fifty albumen prints accompa-
nied by descriptive text. The book is concerned almost
entirely with the events of 1857, and uses highly emotional
language with strong religious overtones, emphasizing
the role of Lucknow as a pilgrimage site for the British:
[T]his album will bear a sacred interest, and many a tear will fall
at the contemplation of some well-remembered spot, over which
a sort of holy radiance will appear to linger as the book is sorrow-
fully closed.28
The order of the photographs follows that established by
Beato, beginning in the east of the city with the Alam
Bagh, and moving in a westerly direction. The text
encourages the visitor to pause for reflection at various
locations, employing biblical metaphors, as well as some-
times Classical associations, to heighten emotions.
Into this landscape of Christian mourning, three
photographs have been included that recall Lucknow’s
Islamic associations. The shrine known as Dargah
Hazrat Abbas, the Kasmain Karbala, and the Talkatora
Karbala are the last three images in the book (69, also
p. 93). This breaks the east-west progression, and their
sudden appearance hints that Abbas Ali may possess a 69. Darogah Abbas Ali, TalkatoRa Karbala (top) and
Dargah HazRat Abbas (bottom), from The Lucknow
different conceptual map of the city that looks back to the Album: Containing a SeRies of Fifty PhotogRaphic
Views of Lucknow, 1874
period when Lucknow was described in religious terms
and linked to the Muharram processions. Simply by incor-
porating the images, Abbas Ali was moving outside the
boundaries of the dominant European understanding
of the city.
Abbas Ali’s conception of the city is extended further
with the book The Beauties of Lucknow, also published
in 1874 (200, p. 162). It contains twenty-four portraits of
women with descriptive text, and was aimed at an Indian
clientele. The book, which exists in two editions, one in
English and one in Urdu, states in the preface that its
patrons are “the nobility and gentry of Oudh.”29 The
photographs show a few of the women in theatrical
costumes for a version of the Indar Sabha, a dramatic
production popularly attributed to the Lucknow-based
poet Amanat Ali, written in 1853. The play incorporated
many of the different musical, literary, and dramatic
styles that were popular at the court of Wajid Ali Shah
161 GoRdon : The Role of Photography

200. Darogah Abbas Ali, Gummoon Jan, Dancing GiRl
(left) and Lall-PuRRee, of the Indar Sabha (right), from
The Beauties of Lucknow, 1874
and, while the origins of the Indar Sabha are still debated, what was important in the
1870s was that the audience “believed they were beholding a direct link to the Awadh
court and its sumptuous ambience.” 30 The photographs function as glimpses of this
now-extinct court, particularly given the traditional reading of the Indar Sabha as a
metaphor for the court of Wajid Ali Shah.
As an Indian publication for an Indian (male) audience, the book evokes a melancholy
longing for the past glories of Lucknow, a “Lucknow immemorable for the Oriental
magnificence of the entertainments” at the pre-1857 court.31 It also suggests how an
Indian audience may have read the architectural photographs of the city: not as sites
linked to the Uprising, but as representations of the city’s rich cultural past. While the
Uprising undoubtedly remains a watershed in the photographic depiction of the city,
Lucknow has always been a city of mourning, whether through Shia religious associa-
tions, the sites of 1857 conflict, or a longing for a lost cultural heritage. The British vision
of the city was predominant in photographic images from the nineteenth century, but the
work of Abbas Ali reminds us of the multivariant ways that the city was conceptualized
by its inhabitants and its visitors.
162
1. Khan is listed in the Bengal Directory for 1856 under the heading, 26. The Bengal Hurkaru, March 2, 1860.
“Respectable Native Inhabitants” as “Ahmud Ally Khan, Darogah of 27. Rare Photographic Memorials of the Mutiny, printed leaflet with the album
Hoosunabad.” Darogah can imply various positions of authority, depending Mutiny Memorials, 1892, 4; the British Library, Photo 254 /1.
on the context. Here it probably means a superintendent—someone with
28. Abbas Ali, The Lucknow Album (Calcutta: G. H. Rouse, Baptist Mission
responsibility for the structure and running of the building, but not the
Press, 1874), 2.
religious ceremonies.
29. The Beauties of Lucknow, Consisting of ... the most Celebrated and Popular
2. P. C. Mookherjee, Pictorial Lucknow (Lucknow 1883; reprint New Delhi and
Living Histrionic Singers, Dancing Girls, and Actresses of the Oudh Court
Chennai: Asian Educational Services, 2003), 183.
and of Lucknow (Calcutta: Calcutta Central Press, 1874), preface. No
3. Edward and Thomas Polehampton, eds., A Memoir, Letters and Diary of the author’s name is provided on the title page, but the work is attributed to
Rev. Henry S. Polehampton (London: Richard Bentley, 1858), 141– 42. Abbas Ali by P. C. Mookherjee in Pictorial Lucknow, 183.
Although Polehampton mentions daguerreotypes, all the work by Khan to
30. Kathryn Hansen, “The Indar Sabha Phenomenon: Public Theatre and
have survived employs either the calotype or wet collodion process.
Consumption in Greater India (1853 –1956),” in Pleasure and the Nation: The
4. A “Mutiny” album in the National Media Museum, Bradford, contains about History, Politics and Consumption of Public Culture in India, ed. Rachel
five pre-1857 views of Lucknow which may be attributable to Dannenberg. Dwyer and Christopher Pinney (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2000),
Views include the Lal Barahdari, the Roshan al-Daula Kothi, the Chini 76 –114, quote on 82.
bazaar, and a view of the Jilau Khana in the Qaisar Bagh which also appears
31 . The Beauties of Lucknow, preface.
in Dannenberg’s 1892 album, Mutiny Memorials.
5. W. L. Low, Lieutenant-Colonel Gould Hunter-Weston of Hunterston ... one of
the defenders of Lucknow during the Indian Mutiny 1857–8, a Biographical
Sketch (Selkirk: Scottish Chronicle Offices, 1914), xi.
6. Further portraits of the royal women can be found in the “Warner Album” in
The Alkazi Collection of Photography (ACP 2001.18.0001).
7. Low, Lieutenant-Colonel Gould Hunter-Weston.
8. Rebecca M. Brown, “Abject to Object: Colonialism Presented through the
Imagery of Muharram,” RES 43 (Spring 2003), 203 –17.
9. Mookherjee, Pictorial Lucknow, 183.
10. Journal of the Bengal Photographic Society 1:2 (September 1862), 39 – 40.
11 . The Bengal Hurkaru and India Gazette, February 23, 1858.
12 . The Royal Engineers introduced photography to the curriculum in 1856; the
Addiscombe Military Academy, where the officers for the English East India
Company were trained, began teaching photography in the mid-1850s.
13. Examples survive in the British Library (Photo 591) and in the Alkazi
Collection of Photography. Fitzgerald displayed some of his Lucknow views
at the Madras Photographic Society in December 1860.
14. Examples of Milliken’s work survive in the Canadian Centre for Architec-
ture, Montreal. Jones’s photographs can be found in the National Army
Museum, London.
15. Rosie Llewellyn-Jones, ed., Lucknow: City of Illusion (London: Alkazi
Collection of Photography; Munich: Prestel, 2006), 249.
16. The Bengal Hurkaru, February 23, 1858.
17. Antonio Beato remained in Calcutta until December 1859, when he left for
Malta.
18. Beato was using glass-plate negatives, about 10 x 12 inches, prepared in
advance; his contemporaries in India, such as Dr. John Murray and Robert
and Harriet Tytler, were using calotypes. Years later, Beato gave a talk in
London about his work. The British Journal of Photography reported the
lecture, stated “his Indian views ... had all been taken upon plates previously
prepared at Athens.” British Journal of Photography, February 26, 1886, 136.
19. The Englishman, August 27, 1858.
20. Journal of the London Photographic Society, February 22, 1859, 185.
21 . Beato’s photographs of sites affected by the Uprising are relatively easy to
locate in institutions. His work of other sites, including Amritsar, Agra, and
Sarnath and his ethnographic portraits of “Indian types,” is much rarer.
22 . John Fraser, “Beato’s Photograph of the Interior of the Sikandarbagh at
Lucknow,” Journal of the Society of Army Historical Research, 59:237 (1981),
51– 55.
23. Hering published a list of Beato’s photographs for sale, A Magnificent
Collection of Photographic Views and Panoramas Taken by Signor F. Beato
During the Indian Mutiny in 1857–58, and the Late War in China, London,
1862. The titles link the majority of the views directly to the Uprising.
24. The chronology of the photographers’ visits to Lucknow can be ascertained
by examining the architectural evidence in the images. The changes were
rapid, with drastic alterations happening within weeks. Others who
photographed in Lucknow in the late 1850s–early 1860s, but not discussed
here, include the professional photographers Oscar Mallitte and Edmund
David Lyon, and the amateur Donald Horne Macfarlane.
25. The Englishman, May 28, 1859.
163 GoRdon : The Role of Photography
 M ali n i roy

Origins of the Late Mughal Painting

Tradition in Awadh

While the affiliation between the Mughals and the province of Awadh began as early as the late sixteenth century
when Akbar incorporated the province as part of the Mughal Empire, it is curious that a painting tradition in
either a local vernacular or in a substyle of the Mughal tradition did not appear till the mid-eighteenth century
during the rule of the provincial ruler Nawab Shuja al-Daula. With Delhi in turmoil, some artists belonging to the
imperial atelier, which had burgeoned under the supervision of Muhammad Shah (r. 1719 – 48) in the earlier part of
the century, redirected their attention toward soliciting patronage from provincial rulers, courtiers, and European
officers in the cities of Faizabad and Lucknow. Subsequently the Awadhi substyle, a derivative of the later Mughal
painting tradition, emerged.
Several key artists including Mir Kalan Khan (fl. c. 1734 –70) and Nidha Mal (fl. c. 1735 –75) are known to
have relocated to the provincial Mughal court from Delhi. As these artists disseminated their knowledge of the
later Mughal style to the rising generation of artists, the emerging Awadhi style was strongly locked into the
Mughal idiom. By the mid-1760s, the painterly style would gradually shift into a distinctive substyle; by reflecting
on European models, artists became increasingly conscious of “imparting volume to their figures and spatial depth
to their compositions.” 1 In point of fact, artists were keen to break away from the Mughal mind-set and improve
preexisting compositional formats in order to include realistic landscape settings. Specifically, the widespread use
of aerial perspective to create distant landscape vistas in the backgrounds, complete with mountain ranges and
small rounded bushes, would become a trademark of Awadhi painting. From the outset, artists painted a few

164 165 Roy : Late Mughal Painting Tradition in Awadh


12. Style of Mir Kalan Khan, EuRopean Woman Seated on
a TeRRace Smoking a Venetian-Style Water Pipe, c.
1760 –75
Page 164: 15. Attributed to Mir Kalan Khan, A PRincess
Visiting a FoRest ShRine at Night, c. 1760
Top: Fig. 19. Sital Singh, An Indian pRince smoking a
hookah; India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1754; opaque
watercolor and gold on paper, page 15 7⁄ 8 x 10 3⁄4 in. (40.3 x 27.3
cm), image 11 x 8 3⁄ 8 in. (27.9 x 21.1 cm); Bibliothèque Nationale
de France, Paris, Estampes, Rés. Od. 43, pet. fol. 18 (Collection
Gentil)
Bottom: FIG. 20. Wazir al-Mamalik Nawab Shuja
al-Daula Bahadur ; India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow,
c. 1759; watercolor on paper, 9 7⁄ 8 x 7 1⁄ 8 in. (25.4 x 18.2 cm);
Museum für Islamische Kunst I.4598 folio 19
166
portraits of Shuja al-Daula as well as of unidentified
courtiers, ragamala paintings (visualizations of the
2
musical modes), and terrace scenes of princes and prin-
cesses enjoying entertainments. Of course, for the art
historian it is a challenge to differentiate between
paintings produced at Awadh and Delhi during this
intermediate phase.
By the 1770s, the Awadhi substyle entered into a new
phase. The arrival of British and French officers to the
region brought forth momentous change; the diffusion of
European culture culminated in a dynamic milieu that
would affect all aspects of nawabi culture and the fine
arts. As European officers lavished their attention on
local artists, the Awadhi painting tradition effloresced
into its most productive phase. Artists such as Mihr
Chand (fl. 1759 – 86), Nevasi Lal (fl. c. 1760 –75), Mohan
Singh (fl. c. 1763 – 82), and Gobind Singh (fl. 1775 – 82)
were commissioned to produce portraits of Shuja al-Daula
and Mughal emperors, ragamala paintings, and illustra-
tions to literary texts. With European officers acquiring a
multitude of loose paintings, illustrated manuscripts as
well as albums containing Awadhi examples, which have
since found their way into private and public collections, a
considerable amount of information on the Awadhi
tradition is revealed.
Although it would be conventional to propose Shuja
al-Daula as the leading patron of the later Mughal
painting tradition in Awadh, in fact, there is substantial
evidence that points to European patronage as the
principal force that encouraged local artists to flourish
particularly in the second half of the eighteenth century.
Scarcely any paintings can be directly linked to nawabi
patronage; very few paintings are marked with seals or
inscriptions that would suggest that they once belonged to
the collection of the nawab of Awadh. One known example
is found on the reverse of a mid-eighteenth-century
portrait, European Woman Seated on a Terrace Smoking a
Venetian-Style Water Pipe (12). It is inscribed “sarkar
navvab Shuja al-Dawla . . . Bahadur Sahib” (His Excel-
lency the Regent, Shuja al-Daula the hero). Although this
3
inscription does not offer a precise date, nor indicate
patronage, it clearly implies that it had passed through
Shuja al-Daula’s hands. As there are countless unpub-
lished Awadhi paintings in both private and public
167
collections, further clues on nawabi patronage may yet
come to light.
A small number of portraits of Shuja al-Daula, which
can be assigned to the first half of his rule (1754 – 64), are
suggestive of sporadic patronage. In general, the lack of
inscriptions, dates, and artists’ attributions make it
difficult to determine the precise chronology of produc-
tion. Additionally, although most portraits are not
inscribed with the sitter’s identity, through the common
physiognomy and costume drawn by artists one can
differentiate between portraits of Shuja al-Daula, Asaf
al-Daula, and unidentified Awadhi noblemen. In the first
years of his rule, Shuja al-Daula is pictured as a relatively
slender man with a distinctive mustache. An early por-
trait picturing Shuja al-Daula standing on a terrace
accompanied by two attendants followed the classic
Mughal model of a terrace portrait (Fig. 19). Presented in
strict profile, he holds a pink flower in his left hand and a
hookah mouthpiece in the other. His attendant holds the
base of the hookah. Even though the sitter’s identity is not
provided, through the distinctive attire of the green khilat
(ceremonial robe) trimmed with fur and the turban with a
decorative crescent-shaped band, commonly worn by
Awadhi nobles, the sitter’s identity is disclosed. Only the
nawab of Awadh would be pictured in this particular
garment. A second portrait of Shuja al-Daula (fig. 20),
which can be dated no earlier than 1759, is inscribed
“Wazir al-Mamalik navvab Shuja al-Dawla Bahadur.”4
Again, following Mughal convention, the nawab is pic-
tured standing outdoors and elegantly dressed in a
floor-length white jama, accentuated by select pieces of
jewelry including a feathered aigrette on his turban. In
this study, the nawab has put on weight; rather than a
neat mustache, Shuja al-Daula’s facial hair has developed.
The portly figure, drooping mustache, and slight growth
on his cheeks would appear in other studies of the nawab.
In addition to portraits of Shuja al-Daula, the Awadhi
repertoire included illustrations of specific episodes from
literature and poetry (11, p. 168; 24, p. 173), ragamala
paintings (140, 141, p. 183), as well as a high number of
terrace scenes picturing individuals observing musical
performances (Fig. 21, p. 172) or celebrating religious
festivities. Much of this early phase of painting is
undoubtedly indebted to the arrival of leading artists
Roy : Late Mughal Painting Tradition in Awadh
 from Delhi. Of the Mughal artists to settle in the region, Mir Kalan Khan and Nidha
Mal were the most prolific. Despite the lack of biographical information on these artists,
the number of surviving works provides an insight into the continuation of their careers.
As a leading artist of Muhammad Shah’s atelier in Delhi, Mir Kalan Khan is often
associated with the Awadhi painting tradition.5 Trained at the imperial atelier in the
Mughal tradition, in his painterly style in Awadh Khan demonstrated a preference for
eclectic compositions and experimenting with non-Mughal idioms (16, 17). A key painting,
which documents Khan’s encounter with the nawab of Awadh, is a portrait of Shuja
al-Daula inset within a hunting scene (157, pp. 4–5). Using a panoramic view of the
Allahabad fort as the backdrop, Khan portrayed Shuja al-Daula dynamically slaying a
lion. The nawab’s identity is readily discernible; Khan opted to render the nawab’s
physiognomy complete with drooping moustache and beard that was similar in style to

Left: 17. Mir Kalan Khan, ChRist (Jesus) as a Child in the Temple, c. 1760

Right: 11. Mir Kalan Khan, A DRowning Man Saved fRom MaRine MonsteRs
by a PRincely Boat, c. 1750 – 60

Opposite: 16. Mir Kalan Khan, LoveRs in a Landscape, c. 1760 –70

168 169 Roy : Late Mughal Painting Tradition in Awadh


18. Mir Kalan Khan, Village Life in Kashmir , c. 1760
the work of his contemporaries. Mir Kalan Khan’s genre scenes are also particularly
interesting, though the subject matter is not always immediately comprehensible. Khan
had a tendency to paint within a single composition specific vignettes or episodes from a
variety of literary texts. It is often unclear whether the artist intended to embellish a
story or simply used characters from various literary texts to create whimsical theatrical
scenes. This experimental phase embraced a variety of painterly modes, including Ital-
ianate and Flemish styles of landscapes (18), figural depictions from Rajput or Safavid
paintings (16, p. 169), or even Bijapuri models.6 In some instances, Mir Kalan Khan would
mix these various ideas within a single composition. One might expect that his paintings
have a pastiche appearance, but Mir Kalan Khan’s approach would more often result in
an unexpected aesthetic harmony.
A second major Mughal artist to have an impact on the rising generation of Awadhi
artists is the painter Nidha Mal. During the height of his career in Delhi, Nidha Mal
painted several noteworthy portraits of Muhammad Shah accompanied by his courtiers.
170
Along with his forte in portraiture, Nidha Mal brought to
Awadh his shrewd awareness of spatial conventions, his
pictorial style of terrace scenes, and a “partiality to the
color white (20).” One of his paintings, of an unidentified
7
Awadhi nobleman accompanied by ladies of the harem
watching entertainments, is representative of his later
style (fig. 21, p. 172). For this composition, Nidha Mal
notably adopted a striking color palette consisting of
shades of bright orange and yellow-greens, juxtaposed
with brilliant white. Both the concept of lavish terrace
scenes and this combined color palette would appear in
works by Nidha Mal’s contemporaries (3, p. 172).
The rising generation was directly influenced by the
models introduced by artists such as Mir Kalan Khan
and Nidha Mal. In particular, Awadhi artists developed a
partiality toward painting nighttime terrace scenes that
pictured women celebrating festivals or playing games.
Drawing on existing Delhi paintings, they incorporated
fireworks, lanterns, and candelabra to illuminate night
scenes. These grandiose illustrations were painted with
20. Nidha Mal, An Awadh Nobleman Reclining on a
Couch by Moonlight, c. 1755 – 65
171
precision; pavilions are strategically placed on the terrace
and adorned with colorful textiles and women are dressed
in flowing garments (fig. 21, p. 172). Faizullah, one of
the rising stars in the Awadhi art scene during the 1760s
and 1770s, would radically transform terrace scenes into
confections of multilayered “idealized palaces surrounded
by formal gardens” that would recede to the horizon (21,
p. 76; 24, p. 173).8 These highly stylized paintings were
filled to the brim with multiple vignettes of harem enter-
tainments, lush gardens with birds, and armies fighting
battles in the far distance. Not only would these paintings
become paradigms within the Awadhi tradition, they were
symbolic of the flourishing courtly life in the cities of
Lucknow and Faizabad.
In spite of the lack of information substantiating
nawabi patronage, the collections amassed by European
officers testify that additional sources of patronage were
available to Awadhi artists. From the mid-1760s, officers
affiliated to the French Compagnie des Indes Orientales
and the English East India Company were stationed in
Roy : Late Mughal Painting Tradition in Awadh
 FIG. 21. Nidha Mal, An Awadhi Nobleman, PRobably
Shuja Al-Daula, with Five Ladies of the HaRem
Watching EnteRtaineRs in a Water GaRden; India,
Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1755 – 65; opaque watercolor on
paper, 10 3⁄ 8 x 14 3⁄4 in. (26.5 x 37.5 cm); Virginia Museum of Fine
Arts, promised gift of Mr. and Mrs. Bensky H. Field, L.10.2004

Above: FIG. 22. PRincess Zib an-Nisa Watching

FiRewoRks, CelebRating Shab-i BaRat; India, Uttar
Pradesh, Lucknow or Faizabad, c. 1754 –75; opaque watercolor
and gold on paper; Museum für Islamische Kunst, I.4596
folio 23

Right: 3. An Al FResco EnteRtainment for

PRinces, c. 1768

Opposite: 24. Faizullah, The Women of Egypt Cut

Their FingeRs Peeling ORanges when FiRst Seeing
YUSUF’s Beauty, c. 1770

172 173 Roy : Late Mughal Painting Tradition in Awadh


Top: 29. Nevasi Lal, Nawab Shuja al-Daula with His
Ten Sons, AFter a Painting by Tilly Kettle, 1774
the region; these men would solicit examples of Indian
Bottom: 27. Various Indian artists including Nevasi Lal and
Mohan Singh, TReaty of the Nawab with the BRitish at
paintings from local artists. In particular, the collections
BenaRes in 1765, from A “Gentil Album” Depicting
amassed by Jean-Baptiste Gentil, Antoine-Louis Polier,
ManneRs and Customs of People of India, 1774
and Richard Johnson are central to understanding the
Awadhi tradition; these collections reveal particular
details surrounding the establishment of minor studios
by European residents as well as the names and some
biographical information on a number of artists who
flourished in both Faizabad and Lucknow. As a direct
consequence of their collective patronage, enormous
numbers of paintings were produced in the second half
of the eighteenth century.
Of the major connoisseurs in the region, Jean-
Baptiste Gentil (1726 –1799) was the earliest to establish
a small studio in the city of Faizabad. Gentil’s career in
India commenced with the Compagnie des Indes Orien-
tales from 1752 through the early 1760s. Leaving the
French company, Gentil opted to take up a private post as
the aide-de-camp for Shuja al-Daula by the mid-1760s. In
the period leading up to Shuja al-Daula’s death in 1775,
Gentil enlisted several artists to produce a wide range of
illustrations that would be incorporated into several
volumes. Of the artists affiliated to Gentil’s studio, only
Mohan Singh and Nevasi Lal have been identified. At the
9
focal point of Gentil’s collection was a series of illustrated
albums, including a volume containing individual maps
174
FIG. 23. The PRovince of Awadh, from
Jean-Baptiste Gentil’s Atlas of the Mughal
EmpiRe; Faizabad, 1770; watercolor and ink on
paper, 15 1⁄ 8 x 21 1⁄2 in. (38.4 x 54.5 cm); The British
Library, APAC, Add. Or. 4039 folio 19r
of the Mughal provinces (fig. 23),10 a history of the
Mughal Empire, a volume on Indian coins,12 as well as a
11
manuscript depicting native people (27).13 Although artists
trained in the Mughal style drew the illustrations, these
works are more often described as products of the so-
called Company school. This term is used to categorize
“a special type of Indian painting which was produced for
Europeans and was heavily influenced by European
taste.” 14 Gentil’s manuscripts were filled with informal
vignettes that were either imbedded within the text or
painted on the periphery of maps. While the delineation of
figures and objects remained in the traditional Indian
style, owing to the time constraint imposed by Gentil the
artists were only able to produce hastily drawn illustra-
tions that were accentuated with watercolors.
In addition to the illustrated volumes, Gentil commis-
sioned a series of large-format architectural drawings of
buildings in Faizabad and Delhi.15 To paint this series of
illustrations, artists pasted multiple sheets of paper in a
horizontal format in order to picture an entire façade of a
building. These decorative illustrations were painted in a
water-based medium and did not include the surrounding
landscape. Within this series we find an illustration of
Shuja al-Daula’s palace in Faizabad (Fig. 7, p. 81).
Gentil’s memoirs also account for another major
project: during the winter of 1774 –75, he entrusted his
175 Roy : Late Mughal Painting Tradition in Awadh
studio to produce copies of Tilly Kettle’s portraits of Shuja al-Daula. Tilly Kettle
(1735 –1786), the British portrait painter, was invited to Faizabad, where he received
commissions from both Shuja al-Daula and British officers, including Sir Robert Barker,
circa 1772. Kettle’s portraits had a pronounced impact on Awadhi artists; only a few
portraits of Shuja al-Daula following the common physiognomy as pictured in figure 20
are dated to the early years of his rule. As Kettle painted several full-length oil paintings
of Shuja al-Daula, including group portraits of the nawab accompanied by his progeny or
British officers, Awadhi artists would become aware of new portraiture conventions as
well as an updated physiognomy of the nawab, from which they could produce their own
versions. Even though Gentil’s memoirs state that he commissioned his studio to produce
copies of four portraits by Kettle, as of this date only one copy by a member of Gentil’s
studio has been located. Nevasi Lal, one of Gentil’s leading artists, painted a portrait of
Shuja al-Daula with His Ten Sons that was based on an original by Kettle (29, p. 174). As
Nevasi Lal’s works are generally unsigned, without Gentil’s note on the reverse of this
work, “painted at Faizabad by Nevasilal, Indian artist, 1774,” it would not have been
possible to identify Nevasi Lal’s hand. Although additional versions of Kettle’s portraits
produced by Gentil’s studio cannot be accounted for, both Nevasi Lal’s contemporaries
and later generations of Awadhi artists would often compose portraits of Shuja al-Daula
in the style of Tilly Kettle; several of these appear in the collection of Antoine Polier (31,
p. 239; 154, p. 180).
Antoine-Louis Polier (1741–1795), another major connoisseur in the region and
contemporary to Gentil, was a native of Lausanne, Switzerland. On arriving in Madras
in 1758, Polier started his career by enlisting as a cadet with the English East India
Company. Polier was actively engaged in campaigns, worked in the capacity of surveyor,
and was promoted to chief engineer in charge of reconstructing Fort William in Calcutta
(Kolkata). In 1772, Polier was assigned to the court of Shuja al-Daula in Faizabad, to
serve in the capacity of chief engineer and architect. Within months of his arrival, Polier
established a small studio that was headed by the preeminent artist Mihr Chand.16 Over
the course of the next thirteen years, in both the cities of Faizabad and Delhi, Mihr
Chand and the members of the studio were responsible for producing at least twelve FIG. 24. Shamsa page; India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1776;
opaque watercolor and gold on paper; inner field 7 1⁄2 x 7 1⁄2 in.
exquisitely bound albums containing examples of Awadhi paintings as well as examples of (19 x 19 cm); Museum für Islamische Kunst, I.4594, folio 40
seventeenth-century Mughal and Deccani works, together with specimens of calligraphy
(117, 124).17 Particularly noteworthy, Polier’s studio ensured symmetry throughout the
collection by including similarly designed frontispieces in each of the albums with either a
sunburst-shaped medallion or rectangular cartouche that would be inscribed with details
of ownership and the contents of the particular album (Fig. 24, p. 177). In addition, the
majority of album leaves were decorated with double, dark blue borders and distinctive
multicolored floral marginal designs. While Polier endeavored to build up his collection in
India, it is curious that he sold off the majority of albums either during his final months
in India or after his return to London in 1788.18
Polier’s collection was extraordinary, as it featured the majority of the known paint-
ings ascribed to the artist Mihr Chand, who was one of the preeminent artists to flourish Top: 124. Deva GandhaRa Ragini, c. 1780

in the region. Within these albums, the artist’s repertoire included portraits of Mughal
Bottom: 117. Mihr Chand, A DeRvish Receiving a
emperors (115, p. 178), Shuja al-Daula (31, p. 239), and courtesans as well as drawings of Visitor , c. 1765 –76

176 177 Roy : Late Mughal Painting Tradition in Awadh

Left: 122. Style Of Mihr Chand, The Mughal PRince
Top Left: Fig. 25. Visit of the
MiRza Jawan Bakht, c. 1786
Qawwal Shir Muhammad with
Abul Hasan Qutb Shah; India,
Right: 115. Mihr Chand, The Mughal EmpeRor Shah
Mughal, c. 1720; opaque watercolor and
Alam II on a Palace TeRRace in Allahabad, c. 1759
gold on paper, image 9 7⁄ 8 x 8 1⁄ 8 in. (25 x
20.7 cm), page 15 7⁄ 8 x 10 3⁄4 in. (40.3 x
27.3 cm); Bibliothèque Nationale de
France, Paris, Est., Rés. Od. 43, pet.
Fol. 24 (Collection Gentil)

Mughal landmarks and subjects of Hindu mythology. As the finest examples of Mihr Top Right: 123. Mihr Chand, The
Qawwal Sheikh Shir Muhammad
Chand’s oeuvre were integrated into Polier’s collection, this resource assists in under- Debates with His FolloweRs,

standing the impact of European patronage on local artists, the stylistic nuances of a c. 1765 –73

single artist, as well as providing an idea of the resources, such as European engravings Bottom Left: 149. Female
Musician, c. 1760
and earlier Mughal, Persian, and Rajput paintings, that were readily available to artists
in Awadh. Although scholars have known that Mihr Chand appropriated heavily from Bottom Right: 148. Mihr Chand,
Female Musician, c. 1765 –73
Tilly Kettle’s works to produce his own portraits of Shuja al-Daula, it has recently been
discovered that Mihr Chand also directly copied existing paintings that he found in
Gentil’s collection (Fig. 25, 123; 148, 149).19 In addition to the visual evidence, Polier’s
connection to Mihr Chand is substantiated through a series of personal correspondence
sent to the artist in this period.20 As Polier’s letters have been recently translated from
Persian to English and published, it has become possible to determine the extent of the
working relationship that was formed between the artist and patron. Of immense signifi-
cance, for the first time in the history of later Mughal painting, we have first-hand
documentation on the patronage of artists.

178 179 Roy : Late Mughal Painting Tradition in Awadh


FIG. 26. Mihr Chand, Colonel Polier Watching a
Nautch; India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, 1773 –74; opaque
watercolor and gold on paper, 11 5⁄16 x 15 7⁄16 in. (19 x 28 cm);
Collection of Princess Sadruddin Aga Khan
Left: 154. Attributed to Mihr Chand, Nawab Shuja
al-Daula, after a PoRtRait by Tilly Kettle,
and Two PictuRes of Beauties, c. 1780
Right: 155. Asad Khan anD Alamgir , c. 1780
180
Within Polier’s collection, Mihr Chand’s finest
painting is that of Colonel Polier Watching a Nautch
(fig. 26). Although scholars debate the sitter’s identity,
Mihr Chand’s portrayal of the European wearing tradi-
tional Awadhi garments and enjoying a dance perfor-
mance is without doubt Mihr Chand’s notable patron
Antoine Polier.21 This social commentary authenticates
Polier’s patronage of the artist as well as indicating the
style of paintings that appealed to European clientele;
portraits of prominent European residents including John
Wombwell, Warren Hastings, and Richard Johnson were
also painted by Mihr Chand’s contemporaries.
At Polier’s behest, Mihr Chand was also asked to
produce a series of portraits of Shuja al-Daula that would
be assimilated into new albums bound for Polier and that
could be presented by Polier to his acquaintances (31,
p. 239; 154).22 As Mihr Chand’s multiple portraits are
dispersed through Polier’s collection and also found
elsewhere, it suggests that the artist had cornered the
market during the final years of the nawab’s rule; only
a few portraits by other artists, including Nevasi Lal’s
Shuja al-Daula with His Ten Sons, also date to this
period. As Mihr Chand may not have been afforded the
opportunity to compose portraits of the nawab in situ, he
turned to Tilly Kettle’s oil paintings for inspiration.23
Appropriating heavily from Kettle’s work, Mihr Chand
created full-length portraits of Shuja al-Daula standing
outdoors, bust-length portraits, as well as a version of
Shuja al-Daula with his ten sons (fig. 27).
Shuja al-Daula’s untimely death in 1775 had no direct FIG. 27. Mihr Chand, Nawab Shuja Al-Daula and His Ten
repercussions on the Awadhi painting tradition. Although Sons; India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1774; opaque
watercolor and gold on paper, 13 1⁄ 8 x 9 1⁄ 8 in. (33.3 x 23.2 cm);
his eldest son and successor, Asaf al-Daula, transferred Museum für Islamische Kunst, I.4596 folio 18
the nawabi court from Faizabad to Lucknow, artists had
no option but to follow in his lead. Aside from a few
portraits of the rotund Asaf al-Daula receiving courtiers
(figs. 28, 29, p. 183), there is limited information on this
nawab’s patronage of Indian artists. For an overview of
the continuation of the Awadhi painting tradition through
the end of the eighteenth century, it is only possible to
rely on the evidence of European patronage.
Through the end of the eighteenth century, the
Awadhi tradition persevered through the continued
patronage of European residents and officers in the
region. Particularly the efforts of Richard Johnson
181 Roy : Late Mughal Painting Tradition in Awadh
(1753 –1807), a British civil servant, deserve recognition. Compared with the collections
assembled by Gentil and Polier, which predominantly feature works of one or two named
Awadhi artists, Johnson’s collection holds paintings ascribed to multiple artists who
flourished in Awadh from 1780 to 1782. This vast resource constitutes the majority of
known Awadhi paintings that are held within a single collection.
Richard Johnson arrived in Calcutta in 1770 and took up the post of a writer in the
Bengal Civil Service. Within a short time, his achievements were recognized and he was
promoted to the post of assistant to Governor-General Warren Hastings. In Calcutta,
Johnson collected Mughal and Deccani paintings, later Mughal paintings from Mur-
shidabad, as well as Sanskrit and Persian manuscripts. During the period 1780 – 82,
Johnson was assigned to Lucknow, where he served in the capacity as the assistant to
the British Resident Nathaniel Middleton. In Lucknow, he would continue to expand his
collection and, more importantly, commission Awadhi paintings from local artists.
Although Johnson primarily commissioned new ragamala paintings and illustrations to
literary texts, his collection included topographical views and portraits that he had
purchased from artists in Lucknow. By the time of Johnson’s departure back to England,
he had sixty-seven albums; these were sold to the East India House Library in 1807 and
currently are held by the British Library in London.
Artists affiliated with Johnson’s studio include Mohan Singh, Ghulam Reza, Gobind
Singh, Muhammad Ashiq, Udwat Singh, Sital Das, and Ram Sahai.24 From this list it
is evident that Mohan Singh, who worked for Jean-Baptiste Gentil during the 1770s in
Faizabad, had transferred to Lucknow by 1780. Although Johnson was in Lucknow only
briefly, his artists were challenged to produce multiple sets of ragamala paintings,
depictions of Hindu deities, and manuscript illustrations. Ragamala paintings, the per-
sonification of the various Indian classical modes, feature prominently within Johnson’s Top Left: FIG 28. Hasan Reza Khan

collection. Typical sets of ragamala painting include thirty-six ragas and raginis. Rather PResents a Request to Asaf
al-Daula; India, Uttar Pradesh, Awadh,
than producing fully executed paintings, Johnson’s atelier produced either nim-qalam c. 1775; opaque watercolor on paper, page
18.5 x 12.8 in. (47 x 32.5 cm), image 13.7 x
(grisaille) illustrations or colored drawings of the various modes. Illustrations by artists 11.2 in. (34.7 x 28.5 cm); Bibliothèque
Nationale de France, Paris, Mss. Or.,
including Ghulam Reza’s, as seen in his delineation of Bhairava Raga and Bhairavi Smith-Lesouef 249, No. 6523
Ragini, which picture the Hindu deity Shiva, are a testament to the artistic accomplish-
Top Right: FIG. 29. Asaf Al-Daula
ments of Awadhi artists (139, 140). Receiving Hasan Reza Khan, Haidar
Beg Khan, and Other CouRtieRs;
The Awadhi tradition of painting did not cease at the end of the eighteenth century, India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, late 18th
century; opaque watercolor and gold on
however artists faced hardships in obtaining patronage from Shuja al-Daula’s descen- paper, 10 1⁄4 x 14 1⁄4 in. (26 x 36.2 cm);
dants as well as from the European residents. Further causing complications for the local Collection of Shawn Ghassemi

community was that they faced competition from European artists, including Johann Bottom Left: 139. Ghulam Reza,
BhaiRava Raga, c. 1780 – 82
Zoffany (1733 –1810) and Ozias Humphry (1742 –1810), for Asaf al-Daula’s fleeting atten-
Bottom Right: 140. Ghulam Reza,
tion. As a result, they consciously adjusted their style for the preferred “Company” idiom
BhaiRavi Ragini, c. 1780 – 82
in order to attract a wider audience; we find many Lucknow versions of the portraits of
Asaf al-Daula and the Mughal Prince Jawan Bakht that were originally painted by
Zoffany and other European artists at Lucknow (122, p. 178). In addition, by modifying
their choice of medium from a heavy gouache to watercolor, artists were able to rapidly
execute sets of illustrations on topics such as portraits of Mughal emperors or on the
occupations of the native people for European consumers to take home as souvenirs. Of
course, there are isolated paintings that suggest the patronage of the rulers of Awadh,

182 183 Roy : Late Mughal Painting Tradition in Awadh

 including a commemorative scene of Ghazi al-Din Haidar
entertaining Lord and Lady Moira at a banquet (fig.
and Wajid Ali Shah in darbar with Lord Hardinge. Of
16. Antoine Polier, A European Experience of the Mughal Orient: The Ijaz-i
Arsalani (Persian letters 1772–1779) of Antoine-Louis Henri Polier, trans.
R9) M. Alam and S. Alavi (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2001), fol. 37a.
17. The majority of albums commissioned by Antoine Polier are found in the
25

all the later Awadhi rulers, Wajid Ali Shah held the most
promise as patron of art. As an accomplished poet and
aficionado of the Awadhi painting tradition, he commis-
sioned 103 illustrations to accompany a volume of his
poetry entitled the Ishqnamah, which chronicled the
author’s life in Lucknow and his passion for women.
This beautifully executed compilation would have been the
final opportunity for Awadhi artists to revive the later
Mughal painting style that had flourished during the
second half of the eighteenth century and to be offered
such a major commission from a member of the Awadhi
ruling family.27
Museum for Islamic Art in Berlin (MIK I 4593- 4599) and at the Museum for
Asiatic Art in Berlin (MIK I 4063 and 5005). Other albums are held at the
British Library, the British Museum, and the Achenbach Collection for
Graphic Arts in San Francisco.
18. Lucian Guthrie Harris, “Archibald Swinton: A New Source for Albums of
Indian Miniatures in William Beckford’s Collection,” Burlington Magazine
143 (2001), 360.
19. M. Roy, “Some Unexpected Sources for Paintings by the Artist Mihr Chand,
Son of Ganga Ram (fl. c. 1759 – 86),” South Asian Studies 26:1 (2010), 21–29.
26
20. Polier, A European Experience of the Mughal Orient.
21 . Losty, “Towards a New Naturalism,” 51– 52.
22 . Polier, A European Experience of the Mughal Orient.
23. Mildred Archer, “Tilly Kettle and the Court of Oudh,” Apollo (1972): 96 –106.
24. Aside from Mohan Singh, these artists flourished during the period 1780 – 82.
25. BL, APAC, Add.Or.742
26. Royal Collection, Windsor Castle, RCIN 1005035.
27. J. P. Losty, “Painting at Lucknow,” in Lucknow: Then and Now, ed. R.
Llewellyn-Jones (Mumbai: Marg, 2003), 132 – 33.

1. J. P. Losty, “Towards a New Naturalism, Portraiture in Murshidabad and

Awadh, 1750 – 80,” in After the Great Mughals, Painting in Delhi and the
Regional Courts in the 18th and 19th Centuries, ed. B. Schmitz (Delhi: Marg,
2002), 35.
2. J. P. Losty and L. Leach, Mughal Paintings for the British Library (London:
Indar Pasricha Fine Arts, 1998), no. 26.
3. European Woman Seated on a Terrace Smoking a Venetian-Style Water Pipe.
Lucknow or Faizabad, c. 1760 –75. Los Angeles County Museum of Art,
M.72.88.5. The inscription on the verso was transcribed (sarkar navvab
Shuja’ al-Dawla...Bahâdur Sâhib) and translated by Prof. Wheeler M.
Thackston.
4. Shuja al-Daula was appointed as wazir of the Mughal Empire by Shah Alam
II in 1759 – 60.
5. For details regarding Mir Kalan Khan’s early career in Delhi, see Terrance
McInerney, “Mughal Painting during the Reign of Muhammad Shah,” in
After the Great Mughals, Painting in Delhi and the Regional Courts in the
Fig. 30. Ghazi Al-Din Haidar EnteRtains LoRd and 18th and 19th Centuries, ed B. Schmitz (Delhi: Marg, 2002), 20. For further
Lady MoiRa; India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1820 –22; information on Khan’s style in Awadh, see Losty, “Towards a New
gouache on paper, 13 1⁄2 x 18 3⁄4 in. (34.5 x 47.5 cm); The British Naturalism,” 49 – 51.
Library, Add. Or. 1815
6. Losty, “Towards a New Naturalism,” 49 – 51.
7. McInerney, “Mughal Painting during the Reign of Muhammad Shah,” 25.
8. Stuart Cary Welch, India: Art and Culture 1300–1900 (1985; reprint New
York: Prestel, 1997), 281.
9. Inside an album held by Victoria & Albert Museum (hereinafter V&A)
(IS 25 -180), the frontispiece is inscribed with the names of Nevasi Lal and
Mohan Singh. Although only these two artists have been named, with the
high number of illustrations produced for Gentil’s various projects, it is very
likely that other artists were part of Gentil’s studio.
10. Empire Mogol divisé en 21 soubahs ou gouvernements tiré de differens
écrivains du pais en Faisabad en MDCCLXX. British Library (hereinafter
BL), APAC, Add.Or.4039.
11 . Abrégé historique des souverains de l’Indoustan. Bibliothèque nationale de
France (hereinafter BnF), Ms.fr. 24219.
12 . Histoire des Pieces de Monnayes qui ont été frappé dans l’Indoustan. BnF,
Ms.fr.25287.
13. Receuil de toutes sortes des Dessins sur les usages et coutumes des peuples de
l’Indoustan ou empire Mogol. V&A, IS 25 -180.
14. Mildred Archer and Graham Parlett, Company Paintings: Indian Paintings
of the British Period (London: Victoria and Albert Museum, 1992), 11.
15. BnF, Od- 63.

184 185 Roy : Late Mughal Painting Tradition in Awadh

 M u z a f far Alam
An d San jay Su b rah m an yam

Of Princes and Poets in Eighteenth-

Century Lucknow

Though it had been a garrison and administrative center of some importance through much of the Mughal
period in northern India, Lucknow truly emerged into prominence in the latter half of the eighteenth cen-
tury—when the Mughal Empire as a political structure was entering into a phase of decline and decentraliza-
tion under the long rule of Shah Alam II (r. 1761–1806).1 In this respect it was like a number of regional courts
and urban centers (Murshidabad, Bhopal, Arcot, and Hyderabad also come to mind) which profited from the
considerable reorientations of the eighteenth century in order to construct or consolidate their own profiles.
The fact that they did so at the expense of the declining imperial center at Shahjahanabad-Delhi lent this
process a bittersweet taste to a number of contemporary observers, many of whom were obliged for economic
and more general material reasons to migrate from Delhi to these newly prosperous centers of power. This
brief essay is largely concerned with the nature of the tensions that were inherent in this process, as seen
through the eyes of some princes and poets who flocked from Delhi to Lucknow in the latter half of the eigh-
teenth century.
The memoirist Abdul Halim “Sharar” (1860 –1926) famously described Lucknow as the “last exemplar
of eastern culture in Hindustan” (Hindustan mem mashriqi tamaddun ka akhiri namuna) in the nostalgic
essays that he published in the journal Dil Gudaz between 1913 and the early 1920s.2 A patriotic denizen of the
town, he traced its past back to distant antiquity, as far as the Ramayana and the Mahabharata, using the
folk etymology that linked Lucknow (Lakhnau) to Lakhan (or Lakshmana), the brother of the hero and god

186 187 Alam and SubRahmanyam : Of PRinces and Poets

 Rama. His rather imaginative early history of the town also tied it to the activities of the
legendary warrior-saint Salar Masud in the eleventh century, and he claimed that “a large
population of Hindus and Muslims were settled there before Akbar’s reign.” A crucial
figure in his account is that of a certain Shaikh Abdur Rahim Bijnauri, who he stated
made his residence there and was granted lands and revenues by the Mughals at the very
end of the sixteenth century. His descendants and other shaikhzadas, some of Afghan
origin, are depicted by Sharar as the great local power-holders in the area for much of the
high Mughal period until the early eighteenth century, when the major Iranian noble
Saadat Khan Burhan al-Mulk decided for his part to make his power base in the area.
The central task of Burhan al-Mulk was thus to rein in the pretensions of the shaikhza-
das, and create a new dispensation based on a deeper fiscal penetration into the country-
side and its resources.3 Despite the prestige of Lucknow, which had by now also acquired
a significant presence of learned ulama in centers such as the celebrated Farangi Mahal
(itself consolidated in Aurangzeb’s reign), Burhan al-Mulk chose to center his activities
further to the east, in a town that came for a time to overshadow Lucknow in the
region—namely Faizabad. In turn, Burhan al-Mulk was succeeded as the chief regional
4
powerbroker by his son-in-law Muhammad Muqim Nishapuri, titled Safdar Jang. His
presence in the area appears to have increased the Shia flavor to Muslim settlement there,
and this continued under the rule of his son Nawab Shuja al-Daula, who also built up the
site of Faizabad to a considerable degree after having initially preferred Lucknow.5 The
balance was definitively redressed away from Faizabad and in favor of Lucknow only
during the following reign, that of Nawab Asaf al-Daula and then eventually in that of
Nawab Saadat Ali Khan.6
Faizabad and Lucknow had certainly managed to attract a number of migrants from
Delhi by the middle decades of the eighteenth century. Sharar’s account is very evocative
of this change. He writes:
As soon as it was known that Shuja-ud-Daula had decided on Faizabad for his headquarters [in 1765],
crowds flocked in that direction, and thousands came and settled there. The entire population of Delhi
seemed to be making preparations to move there. Most of the eminent people of Delhi bade farewell to their
domiciles and turned towards the east. Night and day people kept coming and caravan after caravan
arrived to stay and become absorbed into the environs of Faizabad. In no time persons of every race and
creed, literary men, soldiers, merchants, craftsmen, individuals of every rank and class had gathered
there.7
al-bayan, that has been most frequently cited, and by the time of its writing, it is clear
that Mir Hasan had reconciled himself to Lucknow, the Shia culture of which would
eventually be fervently defended by his grandson Mir Anis. However, his earlier writings
such as the Masnawi gulzar-i eram completed in 1779 (AH 1192) give a rather different
impression.10 This long text concerns Mir Hasan’s departure from Delhi and arrival in
Lucknow via Makanpur; alongside a relatively brief description of Lucknow, there is a far
more extensive section on Faizabad, which he much prefers. Here is how the poem begins:
Since the time Hindustan was shattered,
my Destiny took me to the East
My heart was attached to an idol there [Delhi],
and it was difficult to be separated from it.
That image is still present in my eyes,
like a stone embedded in a goblet.
Even though I left the place,
still the fact of separation tortures me.
I have travelled in a carriage helplessly
trapped like a bird in a moving cage
Though I moved from one stage to another,
my heart was left behind at each station.11
It is thus clear that Mir Hasan saw his departure from Delhi as something to regret,
indeed a form of bitter exile, which he assimilated—whether literally or as a mere poetic
device—to separation from a beloved. He notes, for example, that “on the pretext of
having left my homeland behind / I turned the jungle into a river with my tears.” After
passing through the important Jat center of Dig, he eventually joined a procession to the
town of Makanpur in honor of the heterodox saint Shah Madar.12 Gradually, a combina-
tion of regular access to the good things of life such as snacks and sweetmeats, and some
amorous adventures seem to have assuaged his bitterness somewhat while on the road.
However, the tone of derision resumes as soon as he arrives in Lucknow, and indeed the
heading of that particular section is bluntly indicative of this: “Arrival in the prison-
house, and my understanding the verse: The world is a prison for believers, and a paradise
for infidels” (Rasidan be-sijn wa wazih shudan maani-yi: “Al-duniya sijnun-lil-muminin
wa jannatun-lil-kafirin”). Here he writes:

O cup-bearer! Bring a jade-colored goblet

Page 186: 128. AuRangzeb, c. 1780
Two of the great poets of Delhi, Mir Muhammad Taqi “Mir” and Mir Hasan, were Place more precious stones at its rim.
however not amongst the first wave of migrants but rather belonged to a second moment, When I arrived in the land of Lucknow
when Asaf al-Daula had moved the center of affairs to Lucknow a decade later, in the I saw no pleasure (bahar) in that town.
mid-1770s. Of the two, Mir (1723 –1810) is uncharacteristically tactful regarding Lucknow Grief had so besieged my soul,
in his usually quite acerbic memoir Zikr-i Mir, where he describes the splendid reception I felt I could never take to this place.
Even if there are many pious people here,
given to Warren Hastings by Nawab Asaf al-Daula in 1784 in the most fulsome terms
What shall we do if the place itself is bad? 13
(glossing over the fact that the same period was one of famine and misery in northern
India, a fact that did not escape an embarrassed Hastings).8 The account of the region by
Mir Hasan saw the problems of Lucknow as partly associated with the physical site of the
his younger contemporary Mir Hasan (1736 –1786), which has attracted less attention, is
town itself, as well as the fact that it seemed quite disorderly in its construction to him in
spread over several texts from his pen.9 It is one of his later writings, the Masnawi sihr
evident comparison to the greater orderliness of Delhi. His verse-account thus continues:

188 189 Alam and SubRahmanyam : Of PRinces and Poets

 This country is settled on bumpy ground, In a more politic vein, he also concedes that the Nawab-Wazir Asaf al-Daula has begun to
So that its paths wind all up and down. effect great improvements in the town, by way of constructing great public buildings and
Some houses are up near the sky imposing some order on what was otherwise a rather chaotic situation.
And the huts of some are almost underground.
When we say, “It’s not Lucknow, but because of this age,” May Asaf al-Daula be kept safe forever,
We blame this age for no fault of its own. For he made the plans for his stay in this place.
The paths and customs here are all dirty. He laid foundations for such buildings here,
At times it’s low, and sometimes it rises up. That their spectacle had the whole world in raptures.
This town is so crowded together, He put an end to all the dirtiness here,
That it’s scarcely possible to take a breath. And gave a real shape to Lucknow.
Each lane is so narrow here, O God! May this leader live forever,
That even the wind cannot pass through. who made the town of Lucknow into a garden.17
The sludge in the lanes is black with mud,
Like sweat from the body of an Ethiopian.14
At the same time, it is clear that Mir Hasan’s distaste for Lucknow does not stem
from the comparison with Delhi alone. Rather, he also has extended passages in the same
The denigration thus continues in verse after verse. He complains that the houses are far
masnawi where he makes evident his own strong preference for Faizabad, which he
too small, while their wells are like tiny specks with water oozing out like pus from a
portrays in the most glowing terms. If the poet sees Lucknow as a “cruel city” (shahr-i
wound in the chest. To be sure, the place had an ancient past going back practically to the
bedad), Faizabad for him is no less than a “flower-garden.”
time of the legendary Decius, but its lanes were labyrinthine, and even the crossroads
were so narrow that it was hard to take a horse through them. The Shia Mir Hasan even O cup-bearer! Fill my goblet rapidly.
compares Lucknow to Kufa near where Imam Husain was killed, complaining in turn of Take my boat across to the other side.
the miserliness of its people, its vulnerability to attacks by wild animals like wolves, and I am now fed up with the narrowness of this place [Lucknow],
the fact that its river—the Gomti—overflowed its banks practically every year. And each hill here is like a rock on my chest.
When I saw this condition of the place,
As for what transpires here during the rains, A wave came one day over my breast:
What can I say about its horrors? Why not make a trip to Faizabad?
When the Gomti rises all round, And so I raised up my heart and left.
Houses begin to drown like bubbles in a stream. As soon as I entered that town,
No wood can be found, nor logs for a fire, It felt as if heaven’s door had opened.18
There’s water all around, and grain is dear.
There’s so much water in the place, This town, the seat of power built up by Shuja al-Daula, was in the poet’s words full of
That it’s not a town but a water-pot instead. 15 “open bazaars and wide-open streets / like lines on a white piece of paper.” He rejoices in
the extended description of the Tripuliya quarter, as well as other bazaars, with jewels,
In later passages, however, Mir Hasan attempts for a time to soften the tone of his criti- cloth merchants, money changers (sarrafs), and metalworkers. Indeed, it is evident that
cism somewhat. He notes that at least a few generous patrons have settled in the town, the commercial prosperity of Faizabad impresses him no end, what with flowers, fruits,
even if most of them have their origins in Delhi. One of them was a certain Khwaja Basit. sugarcane, sweetmeats (phirni and faluda) as well as many other products including
kebabs of different varieties. There is also a vast number of occasions and locations for
But if there’s one place, it is Khwaja Basit’s,
sociability, whether in the coffee shops, or in establishments where female prostitutes
Quite in keeping with the Khwaja’s status.
(randiyan) as well as young boys (launde) from Kashmir and elsewhere preen themselves.
May God protect him and that abode,
For here it is the symbol of Delhi. Mir Hasan waxes eloquent in several passages regarding the dresses and ornaments worn
Bravo! See the tastes and desires of lovers, by the people, and especially the women, of Faizabad. These include flirtatious women
Songs in an assembly, and the recollections of friends. covered with perfume (itr) and sandal essence, whose dresses are often revealing of their
It is one of the exemplars of Hindustan, breasts. If Lucknow is chaos then, Faizabad for the poet is a commercial, culinary, and
It is a page from that wonderful album.16 erotic paradise.19

190 191 Alam and SubRahmanyam : Of PRinces and Poets

 Lucknow also comes in for some rather harsh criticism in another of Mir Hasan’s And when you need to relieve yourself,
texts, the “Poem Denigrating His Mansion” (Masnawi hajw-i haweli, from 1775/76 [AH Close the door to the house where you dwell.

1189/90]).20 This is written in a far more humorous tone than the poem we have cited So that a guest arriving there by chance,
From the closed door divines at a glance,
above, and we shall cite the opening passages to give the reader a flavor of its contents.
And thinks: well, if the door is shut
Someone must be sitting on the pot.21
Ever since I took on a house here,
For a rent of two rupees a year,
Has anyone, since the world was created, Humiliated and constantly assailed by heat, dust, and the scourge of thousands of ants
seen such a house, so I’ve debated? who seem to swarm all around Lucknow, the poet’s life in the town is described in this
poem as a veritable purgatory. With one’s nostrils full of mud, what poetry can one write,
The people in it are always annoyed,
asks Mir Hasan rhetorically. The fate of the poet and writer in Asaf al-Daula’s Lucknow
It’s not a house but a mortal killjoy.
The house, I found, has a strange quality,
is thus seen as anything but joyous.
I entered it and got a feverish malady.
Fortunate that man, who from disgust
My cheek threw up a dreadful swelling, at the troubles of the world, gave up the ghost.
As if I’d been butted by that dwelling. And like the ants, disappeared in the sod,
As if instead of a kiss of affection, And took the earth to be his abode.
My face had been bitten at first inspection. If you laugh at it all, it might seem not so sad,
But if not, perhaps, there’s a lesson to be had.22
What shall I say of its courtyard all bare,
Just four cots can be spread out there.
A thatched roof about five planks wide, But the reality seems to have been far more complex than the dark picture painted by Mir
So thin the sun burns through all day long inside. Hasan in these verses, some simply gloomy and some bitingly humorous. For many poets
in both Persian and Urdu can be listed in Lucknow in these times, some Muslims such as
A veranda made of nine or ten spare beams,
Mir or Mir Hasan, and others Persianized Kayasthas and Khatris.23
While a thatched roof over it leans.
An old ladder just to clamber up and down, A decade or so after Mir Hasan’s salvos, we get a somewhat different view of Luck-
of rough bamboo, just lies around. now under Asaf al-Daula from the pen of a princely Mughal writer who also resided there
for a time. This was Mirza Ali Bakht “Azfari,” a direct descendant of the Great Mughals
Everyone is in peril day and night,
who had grown up in Delhi and remained there until about the age of thirty, as a sort of
A slip, and it’s your death from a height.
And if your skirt gets caught up in that bamboo,
elite prisoner.24 Eventually, Azfari—like many of his cousins who were in a similar
Its notches tear your clothes quite in two. situation—managed to escape by profiting from a breach in the city walls, and made his
way to a variety of courts in Rajasthan where he pleaded with their rulers to support
Know the truth, it’s plain enough to state,
him in a bid for the throne. In this endeavor, he met with very limited success and was
It’s all crooked here, and nothing’s straight.
eventually tempted by the prospect of migrating to the Asaf Jahi court in the Deccan.
The chief quality of that yard can be found,
In the fact that it goes up and down. When this proved too difficult, Azfari decided to try his luck with Asaf al-Daula in
Lucknow.25 Making his way to the Rohila principality of Rampur, he wrote letters from
At every breath, your foot may be twisted,
there to the Nawab-Wazir (that is, Asaf al-Daula), his deputy, and a certain notable called
So you walk as if only tiptoes existed.
Maharaja Jhao Lal explaining his situation to them and received positive responses with
There’s no kitchen, or even a privy space,
As if there were no such habit in this place. promises of good treatment. The Mughal prince proceeded cautiously however and only
left Rampur after a few months. On his arrival in Lucknow in the early 1790s, Maharaja
In midcourtyard is a plain raised square,
Jhao Lal greeted him and had him stay at Gau Ghat. Like Mir Hasan, Azfari was
With the sludge from it spreading everywhere.
initially far from impressed; the lanes, bylanes, bazaars, land, and buildings of Lucknow
As a curtain, two dusty wooden shutters,
That will soil the hands of the man who enters.
were in his view all still in rather poor shape. The streets were narrow, he complained,
The courtyard’s slope is made so cunning and the ground was all up and down so that the town compared in his eyes unfavorably to
It’s into the house the water’s always running. Jaipur, which he had already visited. Conversely, Asaf al-Daula had built matchless
That helpless water: where can it go? buildings there, but it seemed that the town’s very foundations and temperament (uftad-i
It too must return to its own abode.

192 193 Alam and SubRahmanyam : Of PRinces and Poets

an balda) were somehow asymmetrical (na-mauzun). Still, he noted, it was now well
populated and many accomplished people from the different arts were living there. Azfari
then adds sarcastically that the people here were so perfect, that one needed God’s
protection from them. 26
Eventually, it appears that Azfari warmed somewhat to the place, its people, and
especially to the court of Asaf al-Daula. After a year in Lucknow, he thus seems to have
decided that he would settle there in a more permanent way, and hence sent for his own
family from Delhi. He writes in his memoir, the Waqiat-i Azfari, that Asaf al-Daula, his
deputy (naib) Sarfaraz al-Daula, and others were so diligent in their service to him that
he eventually remained in the town for all of seven years and two months. His social
interactions with these aristocrats are described as excellent. As an instance of the
culture and refinement of the court, Azfari notes that he used to engage in archery
(tir-andazi) but that Asaf al-Daula was such a great archer that Azfari and his cousin
Mirza Jalal al-Din became his disciples. We learn from the Waqiat that over the years a
number of other Mughal princes from Delhi had taken refuge in Lucknow. However, over
the years Asaf al-Daula had ceased to pay too much attention to some of them (especially
the minor princes), a fact that stuck somewhat in Azfari’s craw. It so happened that not
long after his arrival, in the season of the Holi festival, the nawab called him to witness
the music and dance (raqs-o surud) at the court. On this occasion, Azfari stated that it
did not behoove the nawab’s quality and justice to treat his cousins as he did, since they
were also after all of Timurid descent. To make his point, he then extemporized a verse.
When Timur’s family came to seek your shelter,
Your glory lay in making them rich and contented.
But what have their cousins done to deserve humiliation (zalil-o khwar)?
For it is far from justice that two breezes blow through the same roof. 27
He reports that on hearing this Asaf al-Daula smiled and said regretfully he had been too
busy with his own household and their sustenance (maash). However, from then on he
would pay greater attention to the Mughal princes, paying them a proper stipend each
month. Azfari counts his intervention in favor of his cousins something of a success, for
this assurance continued to be upheld for quite some time; it was only when Nawab Saadat
Ali Khan came to power that he had took back the grants (wazifa or maash) from them.
Azfari’s time in Lucknow also brought him into contact with other Mughal grandees
such as Nawab Madar al-Daula, who, though he was only loosely a member of the Timurid
clan, still commanded great respect. Indeed, he reports, Asaf al-Daula respected him so
much that—despite certain persisting tensions between the two—he would stand up from
his throne when he entered, and would seat him at his side. Madar al-Daula apparently
still was in possession of a great estate with horses, camels, and elephants and had a large
family with many wives. His dealings with Azfari were courteous, but he also insisted
that it was the latter who had a higher status since he was a direct descendant of the
emperor Jahandar Shah on his mother’s side while Madar al-Daula himself was not (man
az nasl-i Timuriyya nistam). It was through Madar al-Daula, it seems, that Azfari even-
tually came to understand that he would need to modify his somewhat abrupt manners if
194
he wished to do well in the all-too-polite high society of Asaf al-Daula’s court. Azfari thus
notes that he was initially not given to such courtly habits, but little by little picked up
these manners over the years in Lucknow. He was thus able to show off his extensive
erudition not merely in Persian, but in Arabic and Turkish, and grew so influential that
he arranged a number of important marriages amongst the Mughal elite in Lucknow.
It would appear however that the treatment received by Azfari in Lucknow was better
than that meted out to the run-of-the-mill Mughal prince, even if Asaf al-Daula generally
remained mindful of the proprieties and did not overly abuse etiquette. Other Timurid
princes who were present in Lucknow at the time included Mirza Sulaiman Shikoh, Mirza
Ilahi Bakhsh, and Mirza Husain Bakhsh. At the same time, the nawab was also himself
sensitive to slights, both real and perceived. Azfari reports for example that one of his
cousins, Mirza Jawan Bakht Jahandar Shah, had earlier fled Delhi for Lucknow and had
developed a close friendship for a time with Asaf al-Daula to the extent that the latter had
set aside 50,000 rupees for his household expenses. However, after a few years, the Mirza
left for Delhi without the consent of the nawab to bring his relatives from there, and this
offended Asaf al-Daula. Eventually, when the prince came back to Lucknow, the nawab
used an occasion for the exchange of witticisms to humiliate Jawan Bakht to the point
that the latter left for Benares (Varanasi), never to return. On the other hand, whenever
Asaf al-Daula was visited by Azfari he always made it a point to stand and to seat the
Mughal prince next to him, even on one occasion when the nawab was suffering as a
result of a fall from a horse. Asaf al-Daula’s cautiousness with regard to the use of the
symbols of royalty is emphasized by Azfari in the following anecdote.
I lived in Lucknow for seven years and saw the procession of the Nawab a thousand times. He never
allowed a fly-whisk (morchal) to be used above his head. I heard that one day that he said to the princes
who had come from Delhi, “I feel embarrassed that I used a fly-whisk in the presence of such high-statured
people such as yourself.” He therefore stopped using it. However, in the procession, over the amaris and
haudas [types of seats] of around twenty elephants, the morchals would also be in accompaniment, but the
elephant upon which he rode did not itself have a morchal. He commanded that an ordinary handkerchief
(rumal) be used to swat flies for him. Several times I have been to his palace and also visited the house of
Hasan Raza Khan with him, but he never sat on a throne (masnad) in front of me and he did not use a
morchal to whisk away the flies, although he did use a large fan (badkash).28
The degree of courtesy shown to Azfari by Asaf al-Daula was also not necessarily
reflected in the attitude of all those in his court. The Mughal prince reflects for example
on an episode that took place at the time of the Holi festival, when a certain Sharaf Ali
Khan, a courtier and cousin of Sarfaraz al-Daula, rather rudely threw a ball full of water
on his back. The faux pas offended the nawab considerably, and Azfari himself had to
intervene in order to defuse the situation, reminding the nawab that “etiquette and regard
and respect for elders are all set aside in playing Holi.” Over the years he spent in Luck-
now, Azfari thus seems to have experienced both unease and an occasion to develop his
own not inconsiderable self-esteem. He also grew to appreciate that court culture in
Lucknow had its own rhythms and values, and in some instances was less attuned to
West and Central Asia than that of Delhi. The following anecdote which he recounts is
illustrative of this.
195 Alam and SubRahmanyam : Of PRinces and Poets
In a private meeting, in my presence, one Shah Husain who was fresh from abroad (wilayat), was a good
reciter, and also sang several maqams well from the music of wilayat, came to the court. Shah Husain was
considered to be peerless as nobody like him had come to Lucknow before. He came to the court and started
reciting the book, Dih Majlis. One of the courtiers in a tone of appreciation addressed the Nawab: “Do
listen to the beautiful and attractive voice in which the Shah is reciting. He is an expert of the art. There
is no match for him perhaps even in wilayat. It is so good that such a distinguished person visited your
court in your period and because of you, even we can enjoy this beautiful voice.” The Nawab replied,
“Perhaps you say this on account of your knowledge. This banda (meaning, himself) is totally illiterate in
this art.” Evidently, the Nawab was weary of the recitation. The point of this response was that he did not
approve of the recommendation even if it had come from his own mother. When this harsh remark of the
Nawab reached Shah Husain, he became uncomfortable, and later he told me, “Now, even if I am chained,
I will not stay in Hindustan,” and he did precisely that. In actuality, in the practice of his own wilayat, he
was fully accomplished. When he arrived here, he did not listen carefully to the songs of Hindustan and
he gave preference to the songs of wilayat over those of Hindustan. When he heard Indian songs, however,
he liked them very much and accepted that the real music is what the people of India sing.29
All this however was not enough, in the final analysis, to keep Azfari in Lucknow. After
spending the greater part of the 1790s in Asaf al-Daula’s court, Azfari decided eventually
to seek his fortune elsewhere. He therefore departed for Benares and Calcutta (Kolkata),
and eventually made his way after considerable travails to Madras (Chennai) and Arcot,
where he settled under the Walajah nawabs. However, his family connections with Luck-
now remained intact even after his departure in 1796.
In the meanwhile all my brothers and cousins arrived in the Lucknow of Nawab Asaf al-Daula and are
safe there. The Nawab has treated them generously. They are all living in peace. My real brother is enjoy-
ing appropriate hospitality even from the deputy wazir and is honoured and safe there. He has two sons
and two daughters, the elder son being named Mirza Ilahi Bakhsh and the younger Mirza Izad Bakhsh,
may God bestow upon them knowledge, wisdom and honor and may they enjoy a long natural life. 31
The received wisdom on Lucknow tends to highlight two moments. One is the early
phase under Asaf al-Daula, usually associated with the activities of European savants
and collectors, men such as Claude Martin and Antoine-Louis Polier. This moment is
usually thought of as embodying a particular style of cosmopolitanism, when East and
West came together. A second moment is that of the end of the nawabi regime in the
1850s, captured in fiction by Munshi Premchand in a celebrated story and then commit-
ted to the screen by Satyajit Ray as The Chess Players (Shatranj ke khiladi). Here we see
a Lucknow that has become effete and depleted of creative energy, an overripe fruit
waiting to be plucked by the greedy hand of the colonial power. In this brief essay, we have
attempted to add some further voices and perceptions to those that are normally encoun-
tered in the historiography. In so doing, we hope to have contributed—in however modest
a way—to an understanding of the significance of the rise of Lucknow in a context that
included its two great rival cities: Delhi-Shahjahanabad and Faizabad.
We are grateful to C. M. Naim for his helpful suggestions and indications while
we were planning this essay. We hope elsewhere to extend the analysis of Mir Hasan and Azfari
presented here in a relatively brief form.
196
1. See Violette Graff, ed., Lucknow: Memories of a City (Delhi: Oxford
University Press, 1997), 16 – 48.
2. Abdul Halim Sharar, Hindustan mem mashriqi tamaddun ka akhiri namuna
ya‘ni Guzashta Lakhnau, ed. Rashid Hasan Khan (New Delhi: Maktaba
Jamia, 1971); the English translation is Abdul Halim Sharar, Lucknow: The
Last Phase of an Oriental Culture, trans. E. S. Harcourt and Fakhir Husain
(1977; Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1989).
3. Muzaffar Alam, “The Awadh Regime, the Mughals and the Countryside,” in
Graff, Lucknow: Memories of a City, 16 – 31.
4. Francis Robinson, The ‘Ulama of Farangi Mahall and Islamic Culture in
South Asia (London: C. Hurst, 2001).
5. On Shiism in the region, see the important analysis in J. R. I. Cole, Roots of
North Indian Shi‘ism in Iran and Iraq: Religion and State in Awadh,
1722–1859 (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1988).
6. For the standard account, see Richard B. Barnett, North India Between
Empires: Awadh, the Mughals, and the British, 1720–1801 (Berkeley and Los
Angeles: University of California Press, 1980).
7. Sharar, Hindustan mem mashriqi, 44 – 45; Sharar, Lucknow: The Last Phase
of an Oriental Culture, 31.
8. C. M. Naim, Zikr-i Mir: The Autobiography of the Eighteenth-Century Mughal
Poet: Mir Muhammad Taqi “Mir” (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1999),
121–24.
9. On Mir Hasan, see Ralph Russell and Khurshidul Islam, Three Mughal
Poets: Mir, Sauda, Mir Hasan (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1968).
10. For this text, see Mir Hasan, Masnawiyat-i Hasan, ed. Wahid Qureshi
(Lahore: Majlis-i Taraqqi-i Adab, 1966), 175 –212.
11. “Masnawi gulzar-i eram,” in Mir Hasan, Masnawiyat-i Hasan, 177.
12. On Shah Madar and Makanpur, see Anna Suvorova, Muslim Saints of South
Asia: The Eleventh to Fifteenth Centuries, trans. M. Osama Faruqi (London:
Routledge-Curzon, 2004), 171–77.
13. “Masnawi gulzar-i eram,” in Mir Hasan, Masnawiyat-i Hasan, 186.
14. Ibid., 186 – 87.
15. Ibid., 189.
16. Ibid., 190.
17. Ibid., 191.
18. Ibid.
19. Mir Hasan’s presentation of the “public sphere” is briefly discussed by
Farhat Hasan, “Forms of Civility and Publicness in Pre-British India,” in
Civil Society, Public Sphere and Citizenship: Dialogues and Perceptions, ed.
Rajeev Bhargava and Helmut Reifeld (New Delhi: Sage, 2005), 84 –105.
20. “Masnawi hajw-i haweli,” AH 1189/90, in Mir Hasan, Masnawiyat-i Hasan,
153 – 69.
21. “Masnawi hajw-i haweli,” in Mir Hasan, Masnawiyat-i Hasan, 153 – 55.
22. “Masnawi hajw-i haweli,” in Mir Hasan, Masnawiyat-i Hasan, 169.
23. Zohra Farooqui, Awadh ke farsi-guh shu‘ara (1134–1273 Hijri/1721–1856)
(Delhi: Maktaba Isha’at al-Qur’an, 2003); on Urdu poets, see for example
Abu’l-Lais Siddiqi, Lakhnau ka dabistan-i sha‘iri (Delhi: Maktaba-yi
‘ilm-o-fan, 1965).
24. On Azfari, see Muzaffar Alam and Sanjay Subrahmanyam, “Envisioning
Power: The Political Thought of a Late Eighteenth-Century Mughal Prince,”
Indian Economic and Social History Review, 43:2 (2006): 131– 61.
25. Mirza Ali Bakht Azfari, Waqi‘at-i Azfari, eds. T. Chandrasekharan and Syed
Hamza Hussain Omari (Madras: Government Oriental Manuscripts Library,
1957), 95 –119. For an Urdu translation, see Waqi‘at-i-Azfari, trans.
Muhammad Husain Mahvi Siddiqi (Madras: University of Madras, 1937).
26. Ibid. (Persian text), 96.
27. Ibid. (Persian text), 97.
28. Ibid. (Persian text), 107.
29. Ibid. (Persian text), 104 – 5.
30. S. Muhammad Husayn Nainar, trans., Sources of the History of the Nawwabs
of the Carnatic: Sawanihat-i-mumtaz by Muhammad Karim, 2 vols. (Madras:
University of Madras, 1940 – 44), 2:48 – 49.
31. Azfari, Waqi‘at-i Azfari (Persian text), 118.
197 Alam and SubRahmanyam : Of PRinces and Poets
 St e ph en M ar k e l

“This Blaze of Wealth and Magnificence”:

The Luxury Arts of Lucknow

“This blaze of wealth and magnificence . . .” 1 In expressing these words of awe in 1798, the Reverend William
Tennent aptly characterized the ostentatious grandeur of the Awadh court and Lucknow cityscape. By its zenith
in the mid-nineteenth century, Lucknow was not only the wealthiest and largest city in all of India, but it has been
estimated that two-thirds of its population were artisans.2 While much of Lucknow’s imposing palatial architec-
ture perished in the tragic destruction of 1858, significant numbers of its sumptuous decorative art objects survive
as immutable testaments to the masterful accomplishments of Lucknow’s generally anonymous artisans 3 and to
the life of luxury they enabled the city’s elite to enjoy. The best known of these artistic splendors is Lucknow’s
famed silver and gilt silver metalware embellished with brilliant blue and green champlevé and basse-taille enamel-
ing (91), but sophisticated metalware made in other techniques and media was also produced, as well as adorned
glassware, delicate jewelry, and ornate weaponry.4 This essay discusses the development of Lucknow’s decorative
arts to demonstrate how the choice of motif and medium was used to achieve a unified aesthetic vision heralding
the self-fashioned identity of Lucknow’s ruling nawabs, leading resident Europeans, and wealthy landowners
(taluqdars) in the post-nawabi era following the annexation of Lucknow by the English East India Company in
1856 and subsequent exile of King Wajid Ali Shah. Just as a codified floral imagery was developed to identify and
proclaim the dynastic origin of a wide range of artworks created for the celebrated Mughal emperors and members
of the nobility in the seventeenth century, a distinctive style of floral decoration that evolved in Lucknow was
extensively employed for similar conceptual purposes. Whereas the Mughals preferred a single flowering plant

198 199 MaRkel : The LuxuRy ARts of Lucknow

 (often the ubiquitous poppy, but several other genera as well as hybrid and fantastic
creations) or series of floral sprays formally arranged against a plain background, the
luxuriant floral motifs favored in Lucknow during the latter eighteenth and early nine-
teenth centuries are generally less staid and more exuberant. The vibrant, flowing floral
imagery of Lucknow transmuted the orchestrated severity of Mughal flowering plants
to produce a vitality of form and spirit far removed from the somber products of the
Mughal ateliers.
During the rule of the first two nawabs, Saadat Khan Burhan al-Mulk and Safdar
Jang in the second quarter of the eighteenth century, the early decorative arts of Luck-
now drew creative inspiration from the works of Delhi and other important centers of
artistic production. Two works in different media, but both attributed to the first half of
the eighteenth century, are rare examples from this formative period. An enameled silver
betel box (pandan) (87) and an enameled glass huqqa base (98) 5 are similarly emblazoned
with a riot of open blossoms (poppy and lotus, respectively) atop thin vertical stems
flanked by green leaves. Whereas the denseness of the Mughal-inspired flowering plants
bespeaks a post-seventeenth-century date, the verticality and repetition of the motifs
belie their placement within the distinctive corpus of Lucknow’s mature floral decoration
that bloomed in the late eighteenth century. The close stylistic relationship of Lucknow’s
early floral imagery to Mughal artistic traditions is to be expected given the many years
of high-level service at the Mughal court by the early nawabs of Lucknow and their
adoption of Mughal royal symbolism and patronage patterns. This is particularly true
during the rules of Safdar Jang and his son Shuja
al-Daula, both of whom rose in rank to the exalted post of
prime minister (wazir) of the Mughal Empire. Moreover,
in 1752 Safdar Jang assumed the authority to appoint the
supervisors of the imperial workshops,6 which may have
facilitated his contact with artists. In addition, the
aesthetic traditions of the Deccan were another fertile
source of artistic influence. Not only are certain Lucknow
paintings known to be based on Deccani antecedents,7 but
there is also a close stylistic and technical relationship
between the enameling of Hyderabad in the Deccan and
that of Lucknow.8
There is literary evidence for significant quantities of
ornate decorative art objects, and enameled metalware in
particular, in use early in the nawabi period. In late 1745,
for the extremely costly and elaborate wedding celebration
of his son Mirza Jalal al-Din Haidar, who would rule as
Shuja al-Daula, Safdar Jang provided lavish gifts to the
bride’s family that included “large numbers of vessels,
such as cups, dishes and crockery of various shapes and
workmanship. Conspicuous among these were more than a
thousand silver vessels enamelled with gold.” 9 90. Water Pipe Base, late 18th or early 19th century

Under Shuja al-Daula and his wife, the Bahu

Begam,10 and even more so under his son and successor
Asaf al-Daula, Faizabad and then Lucknow were con-
sciously and increasingly promoted as centers of artistic
patronage in order to lure the leading cultural luminaries
and intelligentsia of Delhi and beyond:
Various classes of people from different places, especially from
Delhi, began pouring into this area [Faizabad]. Architects, engi-
neers, physicians, artisans, artists and poets flocked to the city
to diminish the glories of Delhi and to enhance the richness of
Faizabad. The very seat of Muslim culture and civilization at Delhi
was thus eclipsed by the emergence and rise of a new centre of
culture at Faizabad. 11
Asaf al-Daula patronized a new generation of artistic performers
and courtiers who took established forms further and created a new
Lucknow school of cultured expression. Not content only to match
the faded glories of other capitals, Asaf al-Daula sought to surpass
them all. . . .12
Left: 87. Betel Box, early 18th century
Right: 98. Water Pipe Base, c. 1700 – 50
The newly envisioned culture of Lucknow was mani-
fested in the decorative arts primarily through the crea-
Page 198: 91. Water Pipe Base, late 18th–early
19th century tion and “branding” of myriad works with a distinctive
style of lush floral imagery and select motifs. Individual
flowering plants in the Mughal style occasionally still
appear, often demarcated by elegant cartouches, but their
botanical structures and the overall decorative programs
of Awadh objects are much busier in composition than on
Mughal precursors (90). In the mature Lucknow style
of decorative art that developed during the rule of Asaf
al-Daula, the predominant ornamentation consists of
stylized irises, lilies, poppies, roses, rosettes, and other
blossoms both real and imaginary, all bursting into bloom
on scrolling vines (95, pp. 202–3; 96, p. 202). Similar
foliated creepers are also found as border decoration of
contemporaneous Indian paintings commissioned by a
preeminent European patron of the arts residing in
Faizabad and Lucknow, Colonel Antoine-Louis Polier
(119, p. 203).13 Variants of the mature style feature flower-
ing branches with perching birds rising from meandering
ground lines (99, p. 203) or a rich organic pattern of
flora and fauna spreading over the surface of an object
(86, p. 204).

200 201 MaRkel : The LuxuRy ARts of Lucknow

Right: 96. Chape fRom a SwoRd
ScabbaRd, c. 1780; detail

bottom: 95. TUREEN with cover ,

c. 1775; two details

Top Left: 127. Detail of floral border

on Shah Jahan, c. 1780

Top Right: 99. Water Pipe Base,

c. 1780; detail to left

202 203 MaRkel : The LuxuRy ARts of Lucknow

 86. Betel Box in the FoRm of an Ogival Dome,
c. 1780; tray of betel box

The verdant vistas of vegetation are sometimes

interspersed with architectural vignettes (93), which
perhaps reflect related compositions found in chinoiserie
designs widely popular in Europe and England during the
eighteenth century.14 Given the cosmopolitan artistic
interests of Asaf al-Daula, an international cadre of
artists, and an abundance of imported works of art
present in Lucknow, it is likely that the distinctive styles
of decorative floral imagery that arose in Awadh during
this period drew from a variety of sources. This creative
process of hybridity and synthesis was paralleled through-
out the humanities in Lucknow. 93. SwoRd and ScabbaRd, 18th century; details of scabbard

204 205 MaRkel : The LuxuRy ARts of Lucknow

 An important submotif of Lucknow’s floral/vegetal imagery is the split acanthus leaf.
Acanthus leaves were used as decorative motifs in western art as early as the seventh
century BCE on Corinthian capitals. They have a long history of being assimilated into
South Asian artistic traditions, as they appear in the Buddhist art of ancient Gandhara
(present-day Pakistan and Afghanistan) in the first few centuries of the Common Era,
and then again during the Mughal period. The Mughals used both the full acanthus leaf
and the split (or half) acanthus leaf in their repertoire of design elements.15 In Mughal
decorative art a full acanthus leaf often appeared as either a flush or a bas-relief motif or
to provide a three-dimensional form for a projecting handle, whereas the split acanthus
leaf was typically used to form a curvilinear border or edge design. In contrast, in Luck-
now’s decorative arts the split acanthus leaf was frequently used in a distinctive manner
as an elegant framing device in which a series of split acanthus leaves linked end-to-end
to form an ornamental cartouche or as an undulating vine festooned with split acanthus
leaves, both designed to highlight a floral or, occasionally, an animal motif (89, 94; 93,
p. 205). In addition to the split acanthus leaf motif, the acanthus bract (a modified leaf
growing on a stalk) is also often found adorning Lucknow’s decorative arts (88, p. 212).16

Top Left: 94. KATAr SHEATH, late 18th century

Top Right: 97. SwoRd BELT FITTING, 1750–1800

Left: 89. Basin, late 18th or early 19th century;

detail opposite

206 207 MaRkel : The LuxuRy ARts of Lucknow

 Top: 92. Two Pieces fRom a Water Pipe,
late 18th or early 19th century

Bottom: 100. Water Pipe Base, c. 1725 –75

Opposite: 83. Water Pipe, late 18th or

early 19th century

208 209 MaRkel : The LuxuRy ARts of Lucknow

Top: 177. Rosewater Casket, late
18th century

bottom: 161. Betel Set belonging

to edward clive, late 18th or early
19th century

Top: 178. Shield pResented to EdwaRd VII when

PRince of Wales by the MahaRaja of Kashmir duRing
the winter of 1875–76, early 19th century

Bottom: 43. CeRemonial Mace of Wajid Ali Shah,

1848 – 56

210 211 MaRkel : The LuxuRy ARts of Lucknow


88. TRay and Matching Box with Four Scent Vials,
late 18th century; a single vial
Another important motif, or more properly, decorative pattern, appearing in the
luxury arts of Lucknow features enameled green lotus leaves, either fan-shaped or
pendant on a thin stalk, set dramatically against a gold background (88).17 The green
lotus leaves are sometimes graced with small adjacent blue-and-white blossoms (other
minor variations in detail exist), and the lotus leaves are at other times replaced by small
flowering plants with red petals and green leaves, but the motif is characteristically
represented in a regularly spaced diamond grid pattern on a gold ground. This distinc-
tive motif is found on both extant decorative objects and on their representations in
painting.18 Its importance in an art-historical context is that its presence corroborates a
Lucknow attribution to the decorative object or painting on which it appears.
The decorative motif par excellence used throughout all the arts of Lucknow is a pair
of fish, generally arranged head-to-head with their curved bodies forming a circle (192).
The prevailing assumption by scholars is that the fish emblem represents an idiosyncratic
Lucknow artistic rendition of the Mughal insignia of exalted rank known as the mahi-ye
maratib (Fish of Dignity).19 The fish insignia has a long heritage in pre-Islamic and
Islamic cultures of the Middle East and South Asia. Sir William Henry Sleeman, who
served in the British army in India and Nepal from 1809 to 1856 and as Resident in
Lucknow from 1849 to 1856, relates the belief apparently current during his time in India
that the mahi-ye maratib was thought to have been first instituted by Khusru Parviz
(now known as Khosrau II) at the time of his accession as king of Persia in 590. Subse-
20
quently, it was to be awarded in recognition of valorous service by Muslim rulers in South
212
192. Woman’s Head ORnament, c. 1800 – 50
Asia, including the Delhi sultans, the Islamic sovereigns
in the Deccan, and the Mughal emperors. During the
reign of the Mughal Emperor Akbar (r. 1556 –1607)
the mahi-ye maratib was judiciously granted, but from
Bahadur Shah (r. 1707–12) onward its bestowal was
reportedly less discriminating.21 Nonetheless, it remained
a prestigious distinction and was accorded only to the
Mughals’ highest-ranking military commanders.22 As was
the case with Mughal hereditary titles, the direct descen-
dants of the mahi-ye maratib awardees seem to have been
eligible to inherit its honorific status. 23
The mahi-ye maratib was represented in physical
form as a golden or gilt fish (or elongated fish head) and
two gilt or steel globes,24 all borne on individual standards
displayed at royal functions and carried in royal proces-
sions and in the retinue of nobles who had been awarded
213
it.25 According to Sleeman, the symbolism of the fish and
globes was originally ordained by Khosrau II:
When he ascended the throne the moon was in the constellation of
the Fish, and he gave orders to have two balls made of polished steel,
which were to be called Kaukabas (planets), and mounted on long
poles. These two planets, with large fish made of gold, upon a third
pole in the centre, were ordered to be carried in all regal processions
immediately after the king, and before the prime minister.26
The distinctive Lucknow emblem of paired fish was
used specifically to proclaim the Lucknow royal image
and serve as the leitmotif of the Lucknow nawabs. Given
the fish emblem’s ubiquity in the arts of Lucknow, one
might expect that its impetus and perhaps even a for-
mally decreed rationale leading to its inauguration would
have been recorded for posterity. Regrettably, the circum-
stances of its adoption are shrouded by the veils of
history. An examination is therefore warranted into
factors possibly contributing to the selection of this
important motif as the symbol of the Lucknow rulers. In
Abdul Halim Sharar’s classic homage, Lucknow: The Last
Phase of an Oriental Culture,27 the author postulates two
pre-nawabi era possibilities for the origin and promotion
of the fish emblem in Lucknow. Both concern Shaikh
Abdur Rahim, who was appointed governor (subedar) of
Awadh province by Akbar in 1580. Shaikh Abdur Rahim
was from the family of hereditary but impoverished rulers
of Awadh, the shaikhzadas. After his appointment, he is
commonly believed to have built a fort known as the
Macchi Bhawan (Palace of the Fishes) on a hill near the
bank of the Gomti River in Lucknow. Sharar thus specu-
lates that:
Either because Shaikh Abdur Rahim had been awarded the title of
Mahi Maratib at the Imperial Court or because on the twenty-six
arches on one portion of the fort the architect had engraved two
fishes on each arch [in the spandrels], making a total of fifty-two
fishes, this fort became known as Machi Bhavan. The word bhavan,
as well as meaning ‘fort’, could be a corruption of the word bavan,
meaning ‘fifty-two’.28
Whether there was confusion between the two similar
words cannot be resolved by historical inquiry. Conse-
quently, this supposition should best be relegated to the
MaRkel : The LuxuRy ARts of Lucknow
realm of popular lore. Regardless, literary evidence discounts the likelihood of Shaikh
Abdur Rahim being a recipient of the mahi-ye maratib. Akbar’s official court chronicler,
Abul Fazl, states that Shaikh Abdur Rahim’s rank was merely “commander of 700
[men],” which is far short of the required rank of 6,000 men. Moreover, besides his low
29
rank, Shaikh Abdur Rahim had been “rebuked and excluded from Court” by Akbar for
drinking alcohol, so it is unlikely that he was able to incur sufficient imperial favor to
receive the prestigious award. Finally, even Sharar’s account of Shaikh Abdur Rahim’s
30
biography and his reputed patronage of the Macchi Bhawan have been questioned by
recent scholars.31
The controversy over the identity of the Macchi Bhawan’s original patron notwith-
standing, a causal relationship between the fish appearing on the Machhi Bhawan and
the later adoption of the fish emblem by the nawabs of Lucknow must be regarded as
tentative at best. Of far more direct relevance (recognized for the first time herein) was
Muhammad Shah’s conferring of the mahi-ye maratib to Saadat Khan in 1720: “on the
20th November (20th Muharram, 1133-H.), Saadat Khan was honoured with the title of
Bahadur Jang (brave in battle) and was granted the Mahi and Maratib.” Saadat Khan
32
had risen rapidly in military service under Emperor Muhammad Shah (r. 1719 – 48). He
had received promotions in honor of his resounding success in several important battles,
and was elevated to the rank of commander of 6,000 men and appointed governor of
Akbarabad (Agra) province in October 1720.33 The following month he was awarded the
mahi-ye maratib for his role in suppressing a rebellious insurrection, and in September
1722 he was appointed governor of Awadh. 34
Another possible contributing factor in the adoption of the fish emblem by the Luck-
now nawabs is the tale of a fish omen that appeared to Saadat Khan. It is preserved in
popular lore, as is the idea already mentioned of suggestive wordplay inherent in the
Fig. 31. Robert Home, PRoposal for Coat of ARms; India,
Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1819; drawing on paper, 10 1⁄ 8 x 18 1⁄ 8 in.
(25.7 x 45.9 cm); Victoria and Albert Museum, E. 1524 –1943
214
Top: 38. Medal of Ghazi al-Din Haidar , 1819
Bottom: Fig. 32. ThRone Chair ; India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1820; wood,
gilt, with gilt brass and gilt gesso mounts; upholstered seat, back, and arms, 35 x 24 x
24 in. (89 x 61 x 61 cm); Victoria and Albert Museum, IS 6 -1991
215
name of the Macchi Bhawan. According to this legend,
after Saadat Khan had been appointed governor of
Awadh by Muhammad Shah but before he had conquered
the ruling shaikhzadas and assumed control of the
province, he left Farrukhabad with his troops bound
for Lucknow and crossed the Ganges River during the
rainy season:
It is said that when his boat reached the middle of the river, a
fish leaped into the Nawab’s lap. Considering it to be a good omen,
he treasured the fish carefully, its skeleton remaining with his
descendants till the fall of his dynasty.35
Although this may be a mere fish story, it does provide
anecdotal support for the strong symbolic linking of fish
to the early history of Lucknow and the creation of its
royal imagery. The honor of the mahi-ye maratib contin-
ued to be conferred in Lucknow following the rule of
Saadat Khan.36 But it was during the later reigns of the
kings of Lucknow, beginning with Ghazi al-Din Haidar in
the first quarter of the nineteenth century, that the fish
emblem achieved its most profound significance in the
city’s arts. When the Lucknow court artist Robert Home
(1752 –1834) designed the royal regalia for Ghazi al-Din
Haidar’s coronation in 1819, the fish emblem had become
so ingrained as a symbol of Lucknow’s nawabi dynasty
that Home chose it as the primary element for the new
king’s coat of arms, in which a pair of curved fish are
innovatively combined with another idiosyncratic Indian
visual form, a punch dagger (katar) (fig. 31). Ghazi al-Din
Haidar’s coat of arms was proudly displayed as
his royal emblem and incorporated as a decorative motif
in works of art made during his rule, such as an elegant
throne chair probably designed by Home and given by
Ghazi al-Din Haidar to Lord Amherst, India’s governor-
general (1823 –28), during his visit to Lucknow in 1827
(fig. 32).
While the presumed plethora of palatial objects
embellished with Ghazi al-Din Haidar’s coat of arms has
not survived, the primary extant sources of documenta-
tion for the use of the royal insignia are the coronation
medals and coinage issued by the new king (38).37 The
coat of arms on Ghazi al-Din Haidar’s coinage displays a
variation of Home’s original design. Instead of depicting
MaRkel : The LuxuRy ARts of Lucknow
 the pair of fish encircling the punch dagger, the dagger
surmounts the fish and is itself topped by Ghazi al-Din
Haidar’s pointed crown. The ensemble is flanked by a pair
of English-inspired heraldic lions. Coinage issued by
the subsequent kings of Lucknow all employed variant
heraldic forms of the fish emblem.38 In the mid-nine-
teenth-century coat of arms of Wajid Ali Shah, the fish
are transformed into honorific mermaids bearing flag
standards. The mermaids flank a pair of swords and a
shield or two shields in place of the earlier punch dagger.
The crowning elements of the coat of arms are a royal
parasol surmounting a crown of the lobed form in vogue
during Wajid Ali Shah’s rule. This distinctive coat of
arms was used extensively to decorate Wajid Ali Shah’s
palatial arts and architecture, such as a grand silver
presentation cup (44) and the gateways of the Qaisar
Bagh palace.39 Iconographic variations of Wajid Ali
Shah’s coat of arms, or perhaps decorative motifs inspired
by his coat of arms, sometimes also appear on what may
be nonofficial or later works, such as on a delicate chikan
textile (102).
Even after nawabi rule ended with the annexation
of Awadh in 1856, the fish emblem continued to enjoy
frequent expression in the arts of Lucknow patronized by
the wealthy landowners and made for western visitors.40
This is particularly true in the case of metalware. The
Above: 102. Shawl with Chikan WoRk (detail), early 19th
traditional fish emblem is often used as the primary century
design in a specifically Lucknow style of bidri-ware (made
Left: 44. PResentation Cup with Coat of ARms of
of a zinc, copper, and lead tin alloy) adorned with distinc- Wajid Ali Shah, 1848 – 56

tive raised (zarbuland) ornamentation (180, p. 219; 181,

p. 218). 41
In the plentiful “Anglo-Indian” style silver vessels
made in Lucknow during the later nineteenth century,
fish function in various compositions as a decorative motif
imbued with a generic symbolic association with Lucknow
rather than as a dynastic emblem (183, p. 219).42
A hitherto little-examined aspect of the decorative
arts of Awadh is its lapidary arts. In the sixteenth
through mid-nineteenth centuries, a sophisticated tradi-
tion of gemstone and hardstone carving (technically
“abrading”)43 and an extensive market network for raw
stones and the finished products flourished in South Asia,
particularly in the Mughal realm and the Deccan.44 The
nawabs, nobles, and elite foreign residents of Lucknow
and Faizabad were among the primary consumers of such

216 217 MaRkel : The LuxuRy ARts of Lucknow

 Top: 183. Bowl with Fish Designs,
c. 1880 –1900

Bottom: 180. Plate with

181. Wine Decanter , c. 1880 Emblematic PaiRs of Fish, c. 1880

218 219 MaRkel : The LuxuRy ARts of Lucknow

 luxury goods.45 An elegant emerald seal inscribed with the name and titles of Colonel
Antoine-Louis Polier and the date 1774 /75 (AH 1188) exemplifies the high quality of
Awadh’s lapidary arts (160).46 The emerald seal can be directly associated with Awadh not
only on the basis of its well-known patron, but Polier is additionally known to have
engaged a lapidarist renowned for engraving seals and inscriptions on rubies and other
gemstones; named Muhammad Salah Khan, he lived in Faizabad and also traveled with
Shuja al-Daula’s court entourage.47 The continuity of fine seal engraving being produced
for Lucknow patrons through at least the mid-nineteenth century is evidenced by an
exquisitely inscribed agate accession seal of Wajid Ali Shah dated 1846/47 (AH 1263) that
recently appeared on the London art market.48
Even though the presence in Lucknow of works of art made of nephrite jade and
other hardstones is attested by historical records,49 few documented examples survive.
The finest and most important such work is an exceptional sword hilt made of white jade
inlaid with rubies and emeralds in distinctive gold settings (112). The sword blade is
inscribed in gold as being presented to Claude Martin by Asaf al-Daula in 1786/87 (AH
1201).50 Despite the problematic potential for mixing and matching the hilts and blades of
South Asian swords and daggers, which begs the question of whether the Claude Martin–
inscribed sword blade and its current jade hilt should be assigned the same attribution,
their contemporaneity can be corroborated by stylistic analysis. On both the blade and
the hilt, the split acanthus leaf is used as a design element in the mode typical of Luck-
now decorative art as previously discussed, and the acanthus bract is also used on the hilt
in the Lucknow fashion. This renders any significant disparity in temporal or geographic
origin highly unlikely. A stylistically related but less finely executed jade dagger hilt also
survives (fig. 33). Identified here as a Lucknow work for the first time, it bears a similar
design composition of the inlay and also features the motifs of the split acanthus leaf
and acanthus bract.
Claude Martin’s ownership of numerous hardstone objects and works of art is
160. EmeRald Seal Belonging to Antoine-Louis
recorded in the inventory of his estate prepared by his executors, Hamilton and
Polier , gem 1774 /75 (AH 1188)
Aberdeen, in May 1800 prior to its sale at public auction in Calcutta in January 1801.51
The preparer of the inventory describes the vast majority of the hardstones as “agate,”52
but two factors make it extremely probable that these objects were actually made of jade.
First, there is an extremely wide range of object types, including a “Tulwar [talwar/
sword] Agate Handle given by Sujah Dowlah [Shuja al-Daula].”53 Based on the extant
corpus of South Asian hardstone objects, a typological spectrum of this extent and the
evident size of the largest objects would be much more likely to accord with works made
of jade than of agate. Second, at the time of the compiling of the Martin estate inventory,
“agate” was reportedly the standard English word used to translate the Persian term for
jade, yashm.54 Thus, Martin’s estate inventory provides evidence not only for the exis-
tence of numerous jade works of art among his own personal effects but also for their
presence in the nawab’s royal collection. The Lucknow origin of the jade hilt on Claude FIG. 33. Dagger (detail); India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow,
c. 1785; hilt: white nephrite jade inlaid with gold, rubies, and
Martin’s inscribed sword is therefore fortified. It can thus be regarded as a key bench- emeralds; blade: steel; length overall: 14 1⁄2 in. (36.8 cm); The
Metropolitan Museum of Art, Bequest of George C. Stone, 1936,
mark of later South Asian jades. 36.25.673a,b
A recent discovery adds significant new evidence confirming Claude Martin’s collect-
Left: 112. SwoRd PResented to Claude MaRtin (detail),
ing and perhaps even his patronage of jade objects. A green nephrite jade mirror back dated 1786/87

220 221 MaRkel : The LuxuRy ARts of Lucknow

with multicolored enamel-and-gold floral decoration, now in the Islamic Arts Museum
Malaysia (2008.1.14), bears a faintly engraved ownership inscription reading, “Colonel
Claud[e] Martin, Lucknow, 1782 (113).”55 A tantalizing reference in the Martin inventory
to a “Looking Glass [mirror] with a [sic] Agate Frame” might be linked to this inscribed
mirror, or at least one similar. Thus, Claude Martin’s inscribed mirror, and his previously
discussed sword and dagger hilts, provide tangible confirmation of sophisticated jade
working being both produced and collected in Lucknow.
The decorative arts of Lucknow and Faizabad, especially those made during the
reigns of Shuja al-Daula and Asaf al-Daula, exhibit an elegance of form and material
sumptuousness rivaling those produced during the heyday of the great Mughal emperors
in the seventeenth century. A wide variety of ornate metalwork was produced, including
arms and armor, palatial tableware, and elegant jewelry. The metal wares were techni-
cally sophisticated and varied. Finely worked silver and gilt silver objects were adorned
with brilliant enameling and inlaid with gemstones. Sundry glassware was fashioned,
much of which was embellished with painted and gilded decoration. European glassware
was also imported in significant numbers, especially chandeliers. Given the sophistication
of craft and medium, the luxurious arts of Lucknow may be regarded among the pinna-
cles of artistic expression in the long and rich history of South Asian art. The awestruck
description of a tapestry in the Claude Martin Estate Inventory is equally apropos for
the myriad other splendors of the age:

the Extreme Brilliancy of the Colours and the Richness of design have never been Equalled by any thing
Seen in this Country . . . it is impossible to describe their beauty.

113. MiRRor That Belonged to Claude MaRtin,

dated 1782; detail left

222 223 MaRkel : The LuxuRy ARts of Lucknow

1. The full quote is, “Amidst all this blaze of wealth and magnificence,
thousands of poor wretches are seen on the road to all appearance in real
want.” Rev. Tennent’s disparaging praise is in accordance with the frequent
reaction of Europeans to the ostentatiousness of Asaf al-Daula’s court
compared to the stark poverty of the general population. Quoted from Rev.
William Tennent, Indian Recreations (London, 1804), 2:409, by Rosie
Llewellyn-Jones, A Fatal Friendship: The Nawabs, the British, and the City of
Lucknow (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1985), 231.
2. Veena Talwar Oldenburg, The Making of Colonial Lucknow 1856–1877
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984), 3, 12.
3. The works of many Indian painters active in Lucknow have been identified,
but very few examples of Lucknow’s decorative arts can be directly
associated with an individual artist or craftsman.
4. For a survey of Lucknow’s decorative arts by media, see Stephen Markel,
“Luxury Arts of Lucknow,” Arts of Asia 23:2 (March–April 1993): 108 –20.
5. For a discussion of the LACMA huqqa base’s Lucknow origin, see Markel,
“Luxury Arts of Lucknow,” 119.
6. Ashirbadi Lal Srivastava, The First Two Nawabs of Awadh, 2nd ed. (Agra:
Shiva Lal Agarwala & Co., 1954), 202.
7. For example, see Linda York Leach, Mughal and Other Indian Paintings
from the Chester Beatty Library (London: Scorpion Cavendish, 1995), 2:700.
8. Manuel Keene, “The Enamel Road, from Siena, Paris, London and Lisbon,
leads to Lucknow,” Jewellery Studies 10 (2004): 99 –126.
9. Srivastava, The First Two Nawabs, 110. See also Ashirbadi Lal Srivastava,
Shuja-ud-Daulah, Vol. I, 1754–1765 (Calcutta: Midland Press, 1939), 6.
10. The Awadh begams were major patrons of the arts. See Memoirs of Faizabad
(1772–1781/82): Being a Translation of “Tarikh-i-Farahbakhsh” of Muham-
mad Faiz Bakhsh, Part – I, Part – II, trans. William Hoey, ed. Hamid Afaq
Qureshi (1889; reprint Lucknow: New Royal Book Co., 2004, 2005), 1:61– 62;
Carla Petievich, Assembly of Rivals: Delhi, Lucknow, and the Urdu Ghazal
(New Delhi: Manohar, 1992), 32 n 2; and Richard E. Barnett, North India
Between Empires: Awadh, the Mughals, and the British, 1720 –1801 (Berkeley
and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1980), 175.
11 . K. S. Santha, Begums of Awadh (Varanasi: Bharati Prakashan, 1980), 9.
12 . Michael Fisher, A Clash of Cultures: Awadh, the British, and the Mughals
(New Delhi: Manohar, 1987), 72.
13. I am indebted to Wynyard Wilkinson for his detailed stylistic analysis and
photographic details of the Lucknow tureen (95). Personal communication
via Indar Pasricha Fine Arts.
14. For example, see Dawn Jacobson, Chinoiserie (London: Phaidon, 1993); and
Oliver Impey, Chinoiserie: The Impact of Oriental Styles on Western Art and
Decoration (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1977). See also the
discussion of such “paysages” in Keene, “The Enamel Road,” 115.
15. For several examples of acanthus leaves found on Mughal jades, see Stephen
Markel, “Mughal Jades: A Technical and Sculptural Perspective,” Asianart.
com (July 2008), www.asianart.com/articles/markel 2 /index.html#2.
16. For a discussion of the related depiction of the acanthus bract in European,
Deccani, and Lucknow art, see Keene, “The Enamel Road,” 122 –23 n63.
17. For a discussion of this motif’s clear affiliation with the arts of Lucknow, see
Markel, “Luxury Arts of Lucknow,” 115 –16.
18. For enameled daggers with this motif, see Kjeld von Folsach, Art from the
World of Islam in The David Collection (Copenhagen: The David Collection,
2001), 343, no. 569 (32 /1980); and Howard Ricketts, Splendeur des armes
orientales, trans. Philippe Missillier (Paris: ACTE-EXPO, 1988), 97, no. 157
(now in the Khalili Collection, London). For paintings, see von Folsach, Art
from the World of Islam, 107, no. 82 (46/1980) www.davidmus.dk/
assets/345/20.3- 46 -1980 -Miniature-Paladshaver.jpg; and Francesca
Galloway and Michael Spink, Islamic Art from India, sale catalogue
(London: Spink & Son, 24 April–10 May 1980), 53, no. 77.
19. Variants of the term appear in modern literature as mahi-maratib and
mahi-o-maratib. It has also been translated loosely as “Fish and Dignities”
or “The Honor of the Fish.” I am indebted to Saqib Baburi for the correct
spelling of the term and for sharing several historical literary references, and
to Rosie Llewellyn-Jones for generously discussing the history and use of the
Lucknow fish emblem. Personal communications.
20. W. H. Sleeman, Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official, 2 vols., ed.
V. A. Smith (Westminster, 1893; reprint New Delhi: Asian Educational
Services, 1995), 1:165.
224
21 . Zahir Uddin Malik, The Reign of Muhammad Shah 1719–1748 (New York:
Asia Publishing House, 1977), 317.
22 . The mahi-ye maratib was not granted to nobles below the rank of commander
of 6,000 or 7,000 men. William Irvine, The Army of the Indian Moghals: Its
Organization and Administration (London, 1903; reprint Delhi: Low Price
Publications, 1994), 33; and M. Athar Ali, The Mughal Nobility under
Aurangzeb (Aligarh: Department of History, Aligarh Muslim University,
1966), 141. For an explanation of the Mughal military ranking system, see
Irvine, The Army of the Indian Moghals, 3 –11; and Ali, The Mughal Nobility,
38 – 43.
23. Ali, The Mughal Nobility, 140; and Sleeman, Rambles and Recollections,
1:165.
24. There is often an apparent lack of correlation between painted and extant
representations of the mahi-ye maratib (see examples identified in note 25
below). In painting, only the fish standard is generally shown without being
accompanied by the twin globes, but the extant representations of the
mahi-ye maratib do have the accompanying globes. Although this may be due
to artistic license or misunderstanding, an even more compelling reason may
be the common discrepancy between object and image in Mughal and later
South Asian art. Artists seemed to have painted types of objects rather than
actual specific objects. Moreover, a selective realism was employed that was
dependent upon the hierarchical importance of the subject being portrayed.
For a discussion of this issue, see Stephen Markel, “Correlating Paintings of
Indian Decorative Art Objects with Extant Examples: Correspondences and
Issues,” Asianart.com (February 2003), www.asianart.com/articles/markel/
index.html.
25. For a painted and extant examples of mahi-ye maratib, see a Kishangarh
painting from c. 1700 of The Emperor Aurangzeb at a Royal Hunt in the
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (2003.430), www.metmuseum.org/
toah/hd/mugh_2 /ho_2003.430/htm; Manuel Keene with Salam Kaouki,
Treasury of the World: Jewelled Arts of India in the Age of the Mughals
(London: Thames & Hudson in association with The al-Sabah Collection,
Dar al-Athar al-Islamiyyah, Kuwait National Museum, 2001), 106, no. 8.30;
and Gordon Sanderson, The Arts and Antiquities of India: An Illustrated
Selection (1910; reprint New Delhi: Cosmo Publications, 1983), 41, pl. XII.
For a late-eighteenth-century Delhi set of fish and other ensigns of royalty in
the former royal collection of Gwalior, see Anna Jackson and Amin Jaffer
with Deepika Ahlawat, eds., Maharaja: The Splendour of India’s Royal
Courts (London: V&A Publishing, 2009), 94, fig. 76.
26. Sleeman, Rambles and Recollections, 1:166.
27. Abdul Halim Sharar, Lucknow: The Last Phase of an Oriental Culture, trans.
and ed. E. S. Harcourt and Fakhir Hussain (London: Elek Books, 1975).
28. Sharar, Lucknow, 37.
29. Abu’l-Fazl, The A’in-i Akbari by Abu ‘l-Fazl Allami, Vol. 1, trans. H.
Blochmann, ed. D. C. Phillott (1871; 2nd revised ed., 1939; reprint, 2 vols.,
Delhi: Low Price Publications, 2001), 1:524 (Book 2, no. 197).
30. Abu’l-Fazl, The Akbarnama of Abu-l-Fazl, trans. Henry Beveridge, 3 vols.
(1902 – 39; reprint Delhi: Low Price Publications, 1989), 3:545 (Chapter 64,
no. 371).
31 . Hamid Afaq Qureshi opposes Shaikh Abdur Rahim’s traditional biography
on genealogical grounds and offers indirect reasoning against his association
with the Macchi Bhawan; see Memoirs of Faizabad, Part – 1, 1:i–iii. For a
recent assessment of the historical development of the Macchi Bhawan and
the Panch Mahalla royal residence built later within its grounds by Safdar
Jang and Shuja al-Daula, and their demolition in the late nineteenth century,
see Sophie Gordon, “The Royal Palaces,” in Lucknow: City of Illusion, 31– 37,
ed. Rosie Llewellyn-Jones (New York: Alkazi Collection of Photography;
Munich: Prestel, 2006).
32 . Srivastava, The First Two Nawabs, 23.
33. Ibid., 21.
34. Ibid., 29.
35. Ibid., 33.
36. For example, Antoine-Louis Henri Polier records in a letter dated June 21,
1776, that Muhammad Ilich Khan, who briefly served as Asaf al-Daula’s
viceroy (naib), had been “honoured with mahi maratib.” See Muzaffar Alam
and Seema Alavi, A European Experience of the Mughal Orient: The I’jaz-i
Arsalani (Persian Letters, 1773–1779) of Antoine-Louis Henri Polier (New
Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2001), 376.
37. Sir Richard Burn, “The Coronation Medal of the First King of Oudh,”
Journal of the Numismatic Society of India 3:2 (December 1941): 113 –14.
38. Colin R. Bruce II et al., South Asian Coins and Paper Money Since 1556 AD
(Iola, WI: Krause Publications, 1981), 131– 34; and Shailendra Bhandare, “A
Metallic Mirror: Changing Representations of Sovereignty during the Raj,”
in Coins in India: Power and Communication, ed. Himanshu Prabha Ray
(Mumbai: Marg Publications, 2006), 87– 88.
39. In addition to the Mermaid Gateway at the Qaisar Bagh, there are also
depicts of mermen and boys with fish. See Llewellyn-Jones, A Fatal
Friendship, 263 n64.
40. Wynyard R. T. Wilkinson, Indian Silver 1858–1947: Silver from the Indian
Sub-Continent and Burma Made by Local Craftsmen in Western Forms
(London: W. R. T. Wilkinson, 1999), 125 –26.
41 . See Susan Stronge, Bidri Ware: Inlaid Metalwork from India (London: V&A
Museum, 1985); Krishna Lal, National Museum Collection: Bidri Ware (New
Delhi: National Museum, 1990); and Shahir M. Naqvi, “Bidri Ware with Spe-
cial Reference to Its Collection in the State Museum, Lucknow,” Journal of
Indian Museums 36 (1980): 101–7.
42 . Wilkinson, Indian Silver 1858–1947, 126; and Vidya Dehejia et al., Delight
in Design: Indian Silver for the Raj, exhibition catalogue (Ahmedabad:
Mapin Publishing in association with Timeless Books, 2008), 171.
43. Markel, “Mughal Jades: A Technical and Sculptural Perspective.”
44. For a discussion of non-Mughal, particularly Deccani, jade working, see
Stephen Markel, “Non-Imperial Mughal Sources for Jades and Jade
Simulants in South Asia,” Jewellery Studies 10 (2004): 68 –75.
45. Numerous literary accounts and pictorial depictions document the
sumptuous ornaments and accoutrements enjoyed by the Awadh aristocracy.
For example, Shuja al-Daula’s coronation robe was embellished with flowers
made of rubies, emeralds, and diamonds. See Memoirs of Faizabad, Part – II,
2:252 – 53.
46. Polier’s emerald seal was later remounted as the bezel of a diamond set gold
ring by Cartier (per maker’s inscription; see Christie’s, London, Art of the
Islamic and Indian Worlds, April 17, 2007, lot 179). Indian gemstones were
frequently reworked into jewelry by famous European firms such as Cartier
and Van Cleef & Arpels in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
47. Alam and Alavi, A European Experience, 97, 347, and 376 (folios 5b, 396b,
and 428a).
48. Simon Ray: Indian & Islamic Works of Art; November 2008, sale cat. Simon
Ray Ltd., London: 90 – 91, no. 40.
49. For example, massive jade bowls were recorded as being destroyed by British
soldiers during the looting of the Qaisar Bagh Palace. See Llewellyn-Jones,
A Fatal Friendship, 193.
50. “By the order of His High Excellency Nawab Asaf-ud-Daula, to be given to
General Martin of the East India Company, the year of 1201 of the hijra
(1786 –7).” Ricketts, Splendeur des armes orientales, 197, no. 221; 132 – 33.
51 . Facsimile of Claude Martin Estate Inventory obtained from the British
Library (India Office Library, Bengal Inventories, Vol. 1, LAG/34 /27/24, no.
76). Also see discussion in Rosie Llewellyn-Jones, A Very Ingenious Man:
Claude Martin in Early Colonial India (Delhi: Oxford University Press,
1992), 138 – 39; and Rosie Llewellyn-Jones, A Man of the Enlightenment in
Eighteenth-Century India: The Letters of Claude Martin 1766–1800 (Delhi:
Permanent Black, 2003), 5 – 9.
52 . Rock crystal objects are also listed. Significantly, no jade objects are
specified as such.
53. The inventory list of “agate” objects includes sword and dagger hilts, hookah
“bottoms” [bases] and mouthpieces [mukhnal], numerous boxes and
containers (some “mounted” with gold), fan and crutch handles, “looking
glasses” [handheld mirrors], cups, salvers, bracelets, belt buckles, and
engraved “pieces.” The typical size of hookah bases also suggests that the
Martin collection examples were actually made of jade because, as far as I
am aware, no agate hookah bases from South Asia have survived.
54. M. L. Nigam, Jade Collection in the Salar Jung Museum (Hyderabad: Salar
Jung Museum., 1979), 15. Therein are cited dictionaries published in 1810
and 1852 in which “yashm” is translated as “agate.”
55. I am indebted to Lucien de Guise, Acting Head Curator, Islamic Arts
Museum Malaysia, for bringing the previously unpublished inscription on
this important object to my attention, and to Rosie Llewellyn-Jones for
discussing the inscription’s historical context. Personal communications.
225 MaRkel : The LuxuRy ARts of Lucknow
 Ros e m ary C r i l l

Textiles and Dress in Lucknow in

the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries

The court of Awadh was well known for the flamboyance of its furnishings and the extravagance of its dress. Two
apparently contradictory aspects of the Awadhi style are typified on one hand by exquisitely light jamdani weaves
and chikan-work embroidery, and on the other by the heavy, gold-embroidered dress and furnishings that were
popular after European influence became dominant in Awadh in the first half of the nineteenth century. While
both men and women adorned themselves with elaborate costumes involving huge amounts of lavishly decorated
cloth, exquisite embroidered or woven cottons in shades of cream and white were still used on informal occasions
and continued to convey a sense of coolness and elegance.
The prevailing aesthetic influence at the Awadh court was basically Mughal, and in particular the Mughal
style as worn at Delhi, but overlaid on this were certain idiosyncratic elements that had been developed in Luck-
now. In addition, a Persian element was added to the mix, particularly during the later eighteenth century, leading
to the use of Persian-style head-wear and fur-trimmed coats and boots (30, p. 229; 154, p. 180). The Persians, like
the Lucknow rulers, who were of Persian descent, were adherents of the Shia sect of Islam, unlike the Sunni
Mughals, and were looked to as inspiration for several aspects of Awadhi court culture, from literature to dress.
We are fortunate that several different types of contemporaneous and later sources inform us about dress
in Awadh. These include paintings, by both Indian and western artists; written accounts, mainly by western
observers; and, from the later nineteenth century onward, photographs of rulers, nobles, and courtesans. From
these we can form an impression of the different styles that prevailed over the period between about 1750 and 1880.

226 227 CRill : Textiles and DRess in Lucknow

 Much of the information about eighteenth-century dress in Lucknow comes from
paintings by western artists who were either residents of or visitors to Lucknow. Works
by Tilly Kettle and Johann Zoffany in particular show both Indians and Europeans in
formal and informal dress. Zoffany’s well-known painting Colonel Mordaunt’s Cock Match
(fig. 34), painted in 1784 – 86, is a superbly observed depiction of a gathering of European
and Indian men (and a very few Indian women) from all levels of Awadhi society. The
Fig. 34. Johann Zoffany (1733 –1810), Colonel MoRdaunt’s
Cock Match; India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, and West
Bengal, Calcutta, 1784 – 86; oil on canvas; support: 103.9
x 150 cm; Tate Britain, 1994.T06856
Page 226: 84. Water Pipe Mat, 1800 – 50
228
western men are mostly wearing European dress with few
concessions to the local climate or culture. Some (like
Colonel Mordaunt himself) are dressed in white cotton
cloth, while others have stuck to their heavy-looking
woolen coats. The Indian men (like the nawab in the
center of the painting) are wearing white muslin jamas:
the classic tailored robe of Mughal India, usually tied at
the side of the chest and waist, or sometimes at the front,
but always with a well-defined waist and full, gathered
skirt. Throughout its history, the jama has been worn at
various lengths, but in eighteenth-century Awadh the
fashion was evidently for ankle-length jamas. Most of the
visible male waists in the painting are wrapped with a
“cummerbund” (kamarband or “waist tie”), either of plain
white cotton like the robe itself, or of patterned fabric,
which would quite likely be of Kashmir-shawl fabric, as
on the figure in the red turban in the foreground of the
scene. Headgear at this gathering is usually a colored or
white, wrapped cotton turban; the nawab, the central
Indian male figure, is wearing a small cotton cap. The
few female figures in the painting are wearing wrapped
garments of colored, fine muslin, but beyond that it is
impossible to distinguish quite what these garments are.
Tilly Kettle, the other major European artist working
in Lucknow in the eighteenth century, painted several
portraits of Nawab Shuja al-Daula that illustrate the
courtly fashion of the time. His portrait of the nawab in
1772 (28) shows the ruler in a Mughal-style jama, over
which he wears a Persian-style coat with fur tippet.
Elaborate sashes are tied around his waist, and he wears
around his turban the Lucknow style of turban band or
goshpech (30). The Persian-style coat (sometimes worn
also with boots) (154, p. 180), seems to have been popular
around 1750 –75. It was not unusual for western residents
of Lucknow in the eighteenth century to adopt Indian
dress to some degree, at least in their homes, which they
were likely to share with Indian wives or bibis. Colonel Top: 28. Tilly Kettle, Nawab Shuja al-Daula with the
Heir AppaRent, MiRza Amani, later Asaf al-Daula, 1772
Antoine-Louis Polier, for example, is shown in at least
two paintings in full Indian dress, in paintings done in Bottom: 30. TuRban Band (detail), c. 1800
1773 and the 1780s. He is shown in a white muslin jama,
complete with turban and turban band, while he watches
a nautch or dance performance at his home (106, p. 68).
When in the company of his European male friends,
however, Polier is more likely to wear western dress
229 CRill : Textiles and DRess in Lucknow
Fig. 35. PoRtRait of John Wombwell, in Indian DRess
and Smoking a Hookah; India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow,
c. 1790; opaque watercolor and gold on paper, 12 3⁄4 x 11 1⁄4 in.
(32.3 x 28.5 cm); Frits Lugt Collection, Institut Neerlandais,
Paris, 1970 -T.36

(Fig. 3, p. 54). Another European resident, John Wombwell, also chose to have his
portrait painted on at least two occasions in full Indian dress accessorized by a hookah
(fig. 35).
While fine white or colored muslin appears to have been the most popular fabric for
both male and female dress in the eighteenth century, the nineteenth century saw huge
changes in style in Lucknow. Both male and female dress developed in ways that were
particular to the Awadhi court. The costumes (and the word is appropriate to the theatri-
cality of much of the dress worn there) of the court females, dancing girls, and courte-
sans who appear in paintings and, latterly, photographs are some of the most elaborate
and apparently cumbersome of any Indian dress. The most characteristic of the flamboy-
ant garments used at the Awadhi court in the nineteenth century are probably the
immensely wide trousers known either as farshi paijama (literally, “spread-out” trousers)
or kalidar paijama (“paneled trousers,” which have straight, wide legs rather than the
flared shape of the farshi). These voluminous garments were supplemented with large
(although usually lightweight) shawls or head-covers called dupatta (literally “two pieces”).
Although much of our information about this type of dress comes from pictorial and
written evidence, a rare survivor of a full court costume of the mid-nineteenth century is
the so-called “Queen of Oudh’s dress” in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London (190). Top: 199. Pair of ear ORnaments,
The outfit, consisting of wide trousers, a front-opening long-sleeved robe, a bodice, a c. 1850

sleeveless tunic, and a large rectangular head-cover, was acquired from the Exposition Bottom: 198. FoRehead ORna-
ments, c. 1775 –1800
Universelle held in Paris in 1855, and it is not clear what the circumstances were that led
to its being sent to this exhibition. It is possible that it was made specifically for the Left: 190. The Gown of the
“Queen of Oudh,” mid-19th
exposition rather than belonging to a real person, but it does seem to have signs of wear. century

230 231 CRill : Textiles and DRess in Lucknow

 wearer freedom of movement and also allowed the legs to fine chintz,­—English manufacture having the preference,—silk and
be seen. For these reasons they were particularly favored cotton ginghams,—in short, all such materials are used for this

by dancers and courtesans. The jama was the other main
type of robe: while this is usually associated with the
side-fastening robe worn at the Mughal court, usually by
men, it was also used as the name for front-opening
garments in Lucknow.
Under the peshwaj or jama, women wore a hip-length
sleeveless tunic called a shaluka or kurti (“small shirt”)
over a short, tight bodice called a kanchli or angiya. The
whole outfit would be topped by a large, light, rectangular
article of female dress as of sufficiently firm texture, down to the
white calico of the country, suited to the means of the wearer. By the
most fashionable females they are worn very full below the knee, and
reach to the feet which are partially covered by the fullness, the
extremity finished and the seams are bound with silver riband
[gota]; a very broad silver riband binds the top of the pyjaamah;
this being double has a zarbund (a silk net cord) [ezarband] run
through, by which this part of the dress is confined at the waist. The
ends of the zarbund are finished with rich tassels of gold and silver,
curiously and expressly made for this purpose, which extend below

200. Darogah Abbas Ali, Husso Jan, Dancing GiRl
(Pl. 17; left) and Ameer Jan, Dancing GiRl of Biba Wali
(Pl. 18; right), from The Beauties of Lucknow, 1874
While it is unlikely that it ever belonged to a queen of Awadh, it could have been made for
one of the betrothal ceremonies of a very young bride connected with the court—the size
suggests that she would have been only about twelve years old. The paijama of the V&A’s
costume has a flat rectangular front panel and sixteen tapering panels (kali) in each leg,
and a circumference at the hem of each leg of 391 centimeters (154 inches). This particu-
lar paijama is made of a fine silk overlaid with a fish-scale pattern in gota work (couched
gold strips), but other examples, like those seen in Company paintings and photographs
such as those of the Beauties of Lucknow (200, Pl. 17), are made of slightly more manage-
able material, usually of satin with trim of woven gold-thread ribbon or gota work. Such
trousers usually had deep borders called gote, and these would form a sort of pool of
fabric spread out around the wearer’s feet when she was standing: hence the name farshi
or “spread out” for this style. If she needed to move about, the excess cloth would be
gathered up and thrown over an arm (40). Equally voluminous but cut with straight
panels in the leg, augmented by inserts, was the kalidar or kaliondar paijama, which
tended to have less excess length than the farshi type.
The full-length, high-waisted, and full-skirted robe often worn over the paijama was
usually of the type called a peshwaj (“open front”) or choga, although this term, of
Central Asian origin, is usually used for a very different and much less figure-hugging
robe in most other parts of North India. The full, swirling skirt of the peshwaj gave the
veil or shawl called an odhni, which would cover the head the knees: for full dress, these tassels are rendered magnificent with
pearls and jewels.
(but not the face) and fall down the back, and could if
One universal shape is adopted in the form of the ungeeah
necessary be tucked into the waistband of the trousers to
[angiya] (bodice), which is, however, much varied in the material
secure it. Head-covers like this were worn in many parts
and ornamental part; some are of gauze or net, muslin, etc., the more
of India, where the usual garb consisted of skirt or transparent in texture the more agreeable to taste, and all are more
trousers and bodice (as in Rajasthan, or at the Mughal or less ornamented with spangles and silver trimmings. It is made
court) rather than a sari. Paintings and photographs of
the period of Wajid Ali Shah show court ladies or dancing
girls wearing only a sheer dupatta (scarf) across their
upper bodies (200, Pl. 18), not the large head-cover.
One of the most informative observers of the Lucknow
scene in the early nineteenth century, and in particular
that of the world of women, was Mrs. Meer Hassan Ali, a
lady about whom few personal details are known except
that she was an Englishwoman who was married to an
Indian and who lived for a number of years in Lucknow.1
A resident of the city from 1816 until 1828, she wrote a
series of minutely detailed letters describing various
aspects of life in Lucknow, covering subjects ranging
from architecture to styles of ladies’ slippers. Ostensibly
written to friends (and indeed Fanny Parks, the self-
styled “pilgrim in search of the picturesque,” quotes one
of her “amusing and novel” letters in her own work),2 the
letters were obviously intended for publication. They are
full of fascinating information which would have otherwise
gone unrecorded. Her firsthand description of female
dress is so informative that it is worth quoting at length:
The ladies’ pyjaamahs are formed of rich satin, or gold cloth,
goolbudden [gulbadan, or “rose body,” a woven silk fabric often
with ikat patterning], or mussheroo [mashru, a satin-weave fabric
with silk warps and cotton wefts, often striped and also often with 40. Mah-i Alam stRikes a watchman with a golden whip in the
PRince’s pResence as penalty for making a false accusation,
ikat patterning] (striped washing silks manufactured at Benares), from the Ishqnamah, dated 1849/50 (AH 1266), folio 317r

232 233 CRill : Textiles and DRess in Lucknow

to fit the bust with great exactness, and to fasten behind with strong cotton cords; the sleeves are very short court. Another redoubtable observer of the Lucknow
and tight, and finished with some fanciful embroidery or silver riband. Even the women servants pride scene, Fanny Parks, tells us of an occasion in 1831 on
themselves on pretty ungeeahs, and will strive to have a little finery about them, however coarse the which King Nasir al-Din Haidar presented “four or five
material it is formed of may happen to be. They are never removed at night but continue to be worn a
dresses of honour, made of thick Benares gold and silver
week together, unless its beauty fades earlier, or the ornamental parts tarnish through extreme heat.
kimkhwab, which were all put upon [the recipient’s]
With the ungeeah is worn a transparent courtie [kurti] (literally translated shirt) of thread net; this
person one over the other.” This same man received a
covers the waistband of the pyjaamah but does not screen it; the seams and hems are trimmed with silver
or gold ribands. jeweled turban, a necklace of pearls and precious stones,
The depattah [dupatta] is a useful envelope, and the most graceful part of the whole female costume. and “over all these dresses of honour were placed four
In shape and size, a large sheet will convey an idea of the depattah’s dimensions; the quality depends on or five pairs of Cashmere shawls.” 7 Khilats could include
choice or circumstances; the preference is given to our light English manufacture of leno or muslin for up to 101 pieces, while the lowest possible number of
every-day wear by gentlewomen; but on gala days, gold and silver gauze tissues are in great request, as is pieces was five. Mrs. Meer Hassan Ali describes khilats
also fine India muslin manufactured at Decca [Dhaka]—transparent and soft as the web of the gossamer which include:
spider;—this is called shubnum [shabnam] (night dew) from its delicate texture, and is procured at great
expense, even in India; some depattahs are formed of gold-worked muslin, English crape, coloured gauze,
embroidered or cloth of gold chupkunds [chapkan: a type of tailored
etc. On ordinary occasions ladies wear them simply bound with silver riband, but for dress they are
coat]; shawl-stuff labaadahs (pelisses) [i.e., coats], trimmed with
richly trimmed with embroidery and bullion fringes, which add much to the splendour of the scene, when
sable; turbans of shawl or muslin; . . . shawls, always in pairs, of
two or three hundred females are collected together in their assemblies. The depattah is worn with much
more or less value; shawl kerchiefs; shawl cummerbunds (girdles);
original taste on the back of the head, and falls in graceful folds over the person; when standing, it is
shawl lahaafs (counterpanes); gold cloth, gold and silver muslins,
crossed in front, one end partially screening the figure, the other thrown over the opposite shoulder.3
and shawl stuff, in pieces, each being sufficient to form a dress;
... Benares silks, or rich satin for trousers; pieces of fine embroidered
The ladies never wear stockings, and only cover the feet with shoes when pacing across their court-yard, muslin for shirts. These are the usual articles of value given in
which bounds their view and their walks. Nevertheless, there is a fashion and taste about the ladies’ shoes, khillauts to the most exalted favourites.8
which is productive of much emulation in zeenahnah life;—they are splendidly worked in many patterns,
with gold and silver spangles, variously-coloured small seed beads and embroidery—the whole one mass
The lavish use of gold embroidery (zar-dozi) and other
of glittering metal;—they are made with sharp points curling upwards, some nearly reaching half way to
“trimmings” as described by Mrs. Ali was a striking
the knees, and always worn down at the heel, as dressing slippers; the least costly for their every-day wear
feature of much court wear in Lucknow, as at Delhi. This
are of gold embroidery on velvet; the less opulent condescend to wear tinsel work, and the meanest
servants yellow or red cloth with silver bindings. The same style of shoes are worn by the males as by the could come in many forms: gilt-metal strips (badla) that
females; I have seen some young men with green shagreen slippers for the rainy season; these are made would usually be crimped into a serrated form before
with a high heel and look unseemly. The fashion of shoes varies with the times in this country, as well as being couched or stitched onto the cloth of the garment;
in others, sometimes it is genteel to have smaller points to the shoes; at another, the points are long and flat metal sequins (sitara, literally “star”) or small domed
much curled; but they still retain the preference for pointed shoes whatever be the fashion adopted.4 sequins (katori, literally “cup”) that would be sewn
directly onto the cloth; embroidery or couching in silk
In another passage, Mrs. Meer Hassan Ali describes a bridal outfit: thread wrapped with a thin coil of flattened gilt-metal
strip (kalabattun); lengths of fabric woven with fine strips
The dress for a bride differs in one material point from the general style of Hindostaunie costume: a sort
of silver or silver-gilt as the warp threads (gota), which
of gown is worn, made of silver tissue, or some equally expensive article, about the walking length of an
English dress; the skirt is open in front, and contains about twenty breadths of the material, a tight body
was often used as a facing for a skirt or jacket, and was
and long sleeves. The whole dress is trimmed very richly with embroidered trimming and silver riband; frequently decorated with impressed patterns in the cloth
the depattah (drapery) is made to correspond.5 created by stamping with heated wires (uttu or uttusazi);
or as soft fringes made of finely cut metal strips, used to
Mrs. Meer Hassan Ali then recounts how she attended a marriage ceremony and was decorate the edges and hems of garments. Other decora-
persuaded to wear a full Awadhi costume of “gold dress and glittering drapery” for the tions like seed pearls and glass beads would also contrib-
occasion—which she wore on top of her usual clothes. Not surprisingly, she experienced ute to the lavish effect. The same style of embroidery was
“some suffering from the heat, for it was at the very hottest season of the year.” 6
also used for decorative domestic furnishings like the
Although it is not clear if Mrs. Meer Hassan Ali was expected to keep these clothes or mats and coverings for hookahs (84, p. 226; 85). Shoes 85. Water Pipe
Snake Cover ,
not, the bestowal of clothing as gifts, khilat, was a common practice at the Lucknow were usually embroidered with metal-wrapped thread or 1800 – 50

234 235 CRill : Textiles and DRess in Lucknow

 was in complete contrast to the heavy gold embroideries
worn for formal events and dances.
The exact origin of chikan embroidery is not known,
and even the etymology of its name remains mysterious,
but it is thought to have originated in Bengal, probably in
Dacca (Dhaka), in modern Bangladesh, during the later
Mughal period. The art, and presumably some practitio-
ners, moved to Lucknow probably no earlier than the
mid-eighteenth century, and it became extremely popular
under the nawabs. Its delicacy, and especially the fragility
of the muslin on which it is usually done, has meant that
little early chikan work has survived, and indeed no
surviving pieces seem to predate the mid-nineteenth
century. William Hoey notes in 1880 that chikan embroi-
dery is one of the few industries in Lucknow still to be
thriving at that date, and states that it “is in great
demand and the export of it to Calcutta, Patna, Bombay,
Haidarabad [Hyderabad] and other cities is an important
trade.” He suggests that chikan embroidery was a “not
irksome means of supplementing small incomes” and a
“natural vent for the labour of persons thrown out of
employ by failure of other trades.” 10 Hoey probably
underestimates the very high level of skill required for
good chikan embroidery, but no doubt he was right in

102. Shawl with Chikan WoRk (detail), early 19th century

101. Man’s GaRment with Chikan WoRk (detail), 19th century

metal strips. Slippers with extravagantly curling toes were popular with both men and
women at court, either with pointed toes or with broad or splayed ends. Although Wajid
Ali Shah is shown wearing these broad-toed slippers in the Ishqnamah, completed in
1849/50, (40, p. 233), they had evidently fallen out of favor with fashionable society by the
time William Hoey was making his survey of the crafts of Lucknow in 1878 –79. Hoey
writes of this “peculiar pattern of shoe” (called kafsh) that it is “broad at the toes, which
are curled up in fantastic style, and is very narrow at the heel which is very high and
protected by an iron tip round the rim. It is exceedingly difficult for one unaccustomed to
walk with kafsh to move steadily while wearing them. They give that shaky movement to
the wearer which is characteristic of old age. It may be for this reason that they are worn
chiefly by sanctimonious maulvis [clerics] carrying long walking sticks.”9
A complete contrast to the heavy, gold-embellished embroidery used on many gar-
ments was provided by the delicate and often incredibly finely worked embroidery known
as chikan or chikankari. This is worked on cotton, using cotton thread with occasional
highlights in natural light-brown or golden tussar silk. Chikan embroidery (chikandozi)
was popular with both men and women in Lucknow, where it was made by both male and
female professional embroiderers. Used for caps, kurtas, angarkhas, and small domestic
items like tray covers, chikan is characterized by small, complex floral designs in white on
white, and gives a supremely cool and airy effect to a garment (101, 102). Even if densely
embroidered all over a cap or robe, the subtlety of the monochrome palette and delicacy
of the materials and stitching gave chikan work an air of quiet understatement, which

236 237 CRill : Textiles and DRess in Lucknow

suggesting that it could be taken up by men and women (and even children) looking for
work. Chikan work is still a thriving cottage industry in Lucknow, where the traditional
stitches (although usually worked to a less high standard) are embroidered onto kurtas
and for furnishing fabrics which are sold throughout India and abroad.
The woven equivalent to chikan embroidery in lightness and fineness is a cotton
fabric called jamdani, which also appears to have originated in eastern India, with Dacca
as its main center. It has been suggested that weaver families from Dacca were given
grants enabling them to settle at Tanda and Jais near Faizabad under Nawab Shuja
al-Daula in order to weave fine muslins for the Awadhi court and elite.11 Fine muslin was
certainly being produced at Tanda by the 1770s, when Polier records ordering lengths of
it.12 Jamdani is woven in a supplementary weft technique, which involves adding the
isolated designs (usually stylized floral elements or botehs) into the weave by hand using
small spools of thread to weave under and over the warp threads to achieve the desired
pattern. C. A. Silberrad, in his 1898 Monograph on Cotton Fabrics Produced in the
North-West Provinces and Oudh, describes the jamdani weaving technique as used at
Left: 32. Possibly by Mihr Chand, Shuja al-Daula, Nawab
Tanda as somewhat different to that of Dacca, in that at Tanda the designs were inserted of Awadh, After a Painting by Tilly Kettle, c. 1775

using thread stored in spools hanging from the warps, while at Dacca, separate cut
Right: Fig. 36. Johann Zoffany (1733 –1810), Asaf
pieces of yarn were used to insert the designs.13 Diaphanous garments such as angarkhas Al-Daulah, Nawab of Awadh, Lucknow; India, Uttar
Pradesh, Lucknow, 1784; oil on canvas, 50 x 40 in. (127 x 101.5
and kurtas were especially suited to both the jamdani and chikan techniques, both cm); The British Library, London, F106

sometimes being embellished with strips of silver (called kamdani work) or with metal- Bottom Left: 103. CRown, c. 1850
wrapped thread embroidery. Both woven jamdani and chikan embroidery were worn by
Bottom Right: 104. Minister’s TuRban, c. 1850
nawabs and court women throughout the nineteenth century, and the well-known images
of Wajid Ali Shah in a white angarkha and jauntily placed cap (the small two-sided cap
called a dopalri) reflect this popularity.
The mainstream later Mughal style prevailed throughout the eighteenth and early
nineteenth centuries. The angarkha, a calf-length robe with an unusual semicircular
opening behind which a panel conceals most (but rarely all) of the wearer’s chest, was by
far the most popular type of male dress (101, p. 236) and occurs in many illustrations of
the nineteenth century. It was worn with a sash around the waist or, in the case of Wajid
Ali Shah, a larger shawl-like textile wrapped around the hips and tied in front (40, p. 233).
Servants, musicians, and other non-elite males wore flat turbans. Accessories like the
turban band (goshpech) became popular: the goshpech was a long, narrow band, usually
embroidered and often embellished with pearls or sequins which was wrapped around the
turban and tied at the front. It appears in portraits of Lucknow nobles during the 1770s
and, to a lesser extent, the 1780s (31, fig. 36). It seems to have enjoyed a revival under
Wajid Ali Shah, as some attendants in the Ishqnamah are seen wearing them wrapped
around flat turbans rather than the Mughal-style headgear of the previous century.
Head-wear became a focal point of Lucknow inventiveness (104). As Abdul Halim
Sharar explains in his informative account of Lucknow, this was partly because turbans
became smaller and smaller at the Mughal court and the caps worn underneath them
therefore were obliged also to become small.14 Eventually, people gave up wearing pagris
(turbans) altogether, and focused on creating new types of cap and other headgear. There
was a four-sided cap called a chaugoshia, a dome-shaped cap with four or five sections
which was produced in Delhi but which influenced Lucknow styles; the mandil, which

238 239 CRill : Textiles and DRess in Lucknow


179. Darogah Abbas Ali, from
An IllustRated HistoRical
Album of the Rajas and
TaluQdaRs of Oudh, 1880
240
Sharar describes as “a round cap like a tambourine”;15
the ever-popular dopalri, which was made up of two flat
half-moons joined along the curved sides, and the more
pointed version of this cap, called the nukkadar, which
was often embroidered in gold and silver thread. Some
extraordinary new shapes of hat were created, often out
of gold-embroidered fabric and sometimes in styles based
on western models, especially crowns. The enthusiasm for
crownlike hats was almost certainly inspired by the
bestowal of the title “king” on Ghazi al-Din Haidar in
1819 and Nasir al-Din Haidar in 1827, and both can be
seen sporting fanciful crowns in contemporaneous
paintings (2, p. 95; 36, p. 19; 103, p. 239).
Western styles infiltrated other aspects of male dress
as the nineteenth century progressed. Wajid Ali Shah’s
illustrated romance, the Ishqnamah, shows some remark-
able outfits clearly based on western military styles, with
elaborate frogging and gold braid epaulettes. Later
photographic albums like An Illustrated Historical Album
of the Rajas and Taluqdars of Oudh (1880) show men
dressed largely in a recognizably Lucknow style, often
with the elaborate headgear just described, including
tinsel “crowns,” turbans made of Kashmir-shawl mate-
rial, caps such as the four-sided chaugoshia, the pointed
nukkadar, and the large, round mandil (179).
exception is one Rampal Singh (upper right), who chose
to be photographed for the album in western dress with
no hat or turban. He is described in the text as “an
English scholar” who has “imbibed the manner and
customs of the West by a long residence in England.” 16
The interiors in which these outfits were worn also follow
the same trajectory from Mughal relative simplicity to
western-inspired excess. The halls and terraces in which
Polier is seen watching nautch parties in the 1770s and
1780s (106, p. 68) appear sparsely furnished with the
usual floor-based furniture of daris or satranjis (flat-
woven cotton rugs), floor-spreads and cushions (although
we know that Polier also possessed a western-style sofa,
as shown in the painting in [Fig. 26, p. 180]).
furnishing textiles would usually be of embroidered velvet
or plain white cloth for simpler occasions, just as at Delhi,
but by the middle of the nineteenth century, Wajid Ali
Shah was imitating Victorian interiors with chairs,
tables, and chandeliers.
Although the splendor of the courts of the flamboyant
nawabs and kings of Awadh such as Wajid Ali Shah may
have declined in the later nineteenth century after the
events of 1857 and British annexation, it is clear that
Lucknow continued to be a major center of craft and
textile production. William Hoey’s survey of trades and
manufactures lists an astonishing number of textile-
related crafts that were still being carried out in 1879 – 80,
even though he laments the fact that “the weavers of
Lucknow have been ruined by the import of European
goods.” Silk-weaving seems particularly to have suffered,
and he writes that the local silk products have been “quite
crushed out by the import of European silks and Indian
silks from other seats of manufacture.” Hoey also reports
that even the fine cotton weaving for which Lucknow and
its environs was so well known is “at its last gasp.” In
spite of this sad state of affairs, chikan embroidery,
dyeing, printing, dari weaving, silk-weaving, turban-
weaving, cotton-weaving, gota border–weaving, cord-mak-
ing, shoe-making, blanket-weaving, carpet-weaving,
darning, shawl-weaving, and gold embroidering are all
listed as trades actively pursued at the time in Lucknow.17
1 . On Mrs. Meer Hassan Ali, née Biddy Timms, see Rosie Llewellyn-Jones’s
A notable
essay in this volume.
2 . Fanny Parks, Wanderings of a Pilgrim, in search of the picturesque, during
four-and-twenty years in the East; with revelations of life in the zenana, 2 vols.
(London: Pelham Richardson, 1850), 87.
3. Mrs. Meer Hassan Ali, Observations on the Mussulmauns of India descriptive
of their manners, customs, habits and religious opinions made during a twelve
years’ residence in their immediate society (1832). 2nd edition, ed. W. Crooke
(London: Oxford University Press, 1917), 106 – 9.
4. Ibid., 111–12.
5. Ibid., 357– 58.
6. Ibid., 361.
7. Parks, Wanderings, 190.
8. Ali, Observations, 148 – 49.
9. William Hoey, A Monograph on Trade and Manufactures in Northern India
(Lucknow: American Methodist Mission Press, 1880), 127.
10. Ibid., 28.
11 . R. C. Sharma, K. Giri, and A. Chakraverty, eds., Indian Art Treasures:
Suresh Neotia Collection (Varanasi: Jnana-Pravaha, 2006), 250.
12 . Ibid., 251n3.
13. C. A. Silberrad, Monograph on Cotton Fabrics Produced in the North-West
These Provinces and Oudh (Allahabad: Government Press, 1898).
14. Abdul Halim Sharar, Lucknow: The Last Phase of an Oriental Culture, trans.
and ed. E. S. Harcourt and Fakhir Hussain (London: Elek, 1975), 171.
15. Ibid., 172.
16. Abbas Ali, Haji Darogah, An Illustrated Historical Album of the Rajas and
Taluqdars of Oudh (Allahabad: North-Western Provinces and Oudh
Government Press, 1880), 66.
17. Hoey, A Monograph, 28 –196, quotes on 28.
241 CRill : Textiles and DRess in Lucknow
 Pet er M an u e l

Music in Lucknow’s Gilded Age

In the nineteenth century Lucknow came to host an urban culture of extraordinary sophistication and rich-
ness, unparalleled not only in its exquisite elegance but also in its sheer amount of creative activity and output.
Music and dance played preeminent roles in this cultural efflorescence, ardently patronized by elite epicurean
aesthetes for whom the fine arts constituted an indispensable concomitant to refined dress, language, cuisine,
and the good life in general. Although twentieth-century music historians have written with ambivalence about
the era’s sybaritism and alleged cultural shallowness, Lucknow in the nawabi period constituted the primary
center for music patronage in North India and hosted a music culture of unique refinement and expressive
charm. In a period in which artistic patronage suffered from the disruptive effects of the Uprising (1857– 58)
and the dramatic decline of the feudal nobility, Lucknow played an essential role in sustaining and even rein-
vigorating the fine arts. Further, the dynamic innovations it fostered provided much of the foundation for the
lively flowering of Hindustani music in its modern era that can be said to have commenced in the early 1900s.
The visitor to Lucknow today can admire the joyously flamboyant imperial gateways and imambaras
built by the nawabs, and aficionados of Urdu literature still savor the ghazals penned by the era’s poets. How-
ever, in the absence not only of recordings but also of musical notations like those in the West, the sounds of
“Lakhnavi” or Lucknowi-era music are largely lost to us. Nevertheless, some forms of nawabi-period song and
instrumental style were perpetuated more or less faithfully by twentieth-century musicians and constituted
direct sources for other, more modern stylistic developments. Perhaps more substantially, we are able to learn
much about the epoch’s music culture from contemporary chronicles, especially two works in Urdu. One of
these is a treatise on music, Madan al-Mausiqi (Mine of Music), written in 1856 by Mohammad Karm Imam, a

242 243 Manuel : Music


Page 242: 19. Fath Chand, Todi Ragini,
c. 1750 – 60
courtier of Wajid Ali Shah’s. While most of this work consists of a fairly conventional
rehash of traditional Sanskritic music theory, in one chapter—felicitously translated into
English and published in 1959 – 60 —the author presents a detailed and engagingly
opinionated survey of musicians of his era, providing, indeed, a mine of data for music
historians. The other outstanding Urdu source is a series of articles written in the early
1900s by Abdul Halim Sharar, translated and published in English as Lucknow: The Last
Phase of an Oriental Culture, and containing informative chapters on music. Passing
references to music in the writings of British chroniclers provide different sorts of per-
spectives and information, as do other miscellaneous texts, recollections of elders, the
1905 novel Umrao Jan Ada about a courtesan, and “Company” paintings—especially of
dance performances. Among the works by modern music historians that have synthesized
such data, Allyn Miner’s Sitar and Sarod in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries is
particularly astute and thorough.
The Rise of Lucknow
The city of Delhi served, except for passing interludes, as the imperial capital of the
Muslim dynasties that ruled northern India from the twelfth century to the early eigh-
teenth century. After the death of the Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb in 1707, the empire
disintegrated rapidly, and a series of invasions, pillagings, and massacres undermined the
city’s ability to sustain patronage of the fine arts. While Delhi was declining, two hun-
dred miles to the southeast the city of Lucknow was emerging as the political, economic,
and cultural center of the North. Formerly a sleepy provincial town of no particular
distinction (and of which no particular musical activity has been documented), Lucknow
became the wealthy capital of the province of Awadh, whose substantial agricultural
surplus came to sustain the rise of an opulent and sophisticated elite. Allowed by the
newly empowered British to rule as irresponsibly as they wished while paying a heavy
tribute, the nawabs—at once protected and rendered impotent by British firepower—
found patronage of the arts to be one of the few arenas in which their court could achieve
renown. As a result, innumerable courtesans, artists, and musicians migrated from Delhi
and elsewhere to Lucknow to bask in the patronage of the new gentry.
Awadh’s musical efflorescence dates from the 1750s, when scores of professional
musicians went to Faizabad and Lucknow to benefit from patronage provided by Nawab
Shuja al-Daula, an ardent music lover. When his successor, Asaf al-Daula, moved the
Awadh capital from Faizabad to Lucknow in 1775, he established an extensive retinue of
court performers there. In this period, the most prominent Lucknow musicians were
1
refugees from Delhi, so that, as Sharar wrote, “Lucknow’s lamp was lit by that of Delhi.”
By the early nineteenth century, however, the culture of Lucknow had begun to acquire a
flavor of its own, which, while lacking the depth and grandeur of Mughal arts, displayed
what can be described as a sort of manneristic, rococo sophistication of exquisite refine-
ment, whether in architecture, poetry, or music.
Both the amount and character of Lucknow’s musical activity were conditioned by the
orientation and background of its patrons. At the apex of the patronage system were, of
course, the nawabs themselves, whose courts could constitute by far the largest single
244
employers of performers. Asaf al-Daula set the tone for the later rulers with his luxuri-
ous lifestyle and his neglect of administration. After the brief subsequent (mis)rule of
Wazir Ali Khan, and the musically quiescent period of his successor, the puritanical
Saadat Ali Khan, nawabi patronage rebounded under the energetic support of his son
Ghazi al-Din Haidar (d. 1827), and the latter’s son Nasir al-Din Haidar, whose frivolous
lifestyle was publicized through an 1855 British exposé entitled The Private Life of an
Eastern King. This sensationalist book, which enjoyed considerable popularity in Britain,
disparaged the nawab for his transvestism, his decadent extravagance, and his indiffer-
ence to administering his kingdom, a task that he delegated to a set of European mounte-
banks, especially his barber. At the same time, the author noted that Haidar’s court was
the most brilliant in India and his court performers the best. After the barber fled with
much of the treasury, Haidar was poisoned and replaced by the elderly and sober Muham-
mad Ali Shah, who died in 1842. His successor, Amjad Ali, reverted to the voluptuous
lifestyle of Nasir al-Din, and upon his death the throne passed to his son Wajid Ali, who,
having not been the heir-apparent, had been allowed to spend his youth primarily in the
company of courtesans and performers.
Wajid Ali Shah
Wajid Ali Shah’s nine-year rule (which ended with annexation by the British in 1856)
constituted a zenith of fine arts activity. Like several of his predecessors, Wajid Ali had
no patience for the tedium of administrative affairs, and instead devoted his energies and
expenses to sponsoring and personally mastering the arts of music, dance, drama, and
poetry. The British resident, Sir William Henry Sleeman, and other observers were
dismayed by Wajid Ali’s indifference to governing and the fact that he rarely ate, slept,
or conversed with anyone but musicians, concubines, poets, and eunuchs. Most disturbing
were the corruption, mischief, and chaos resulting from his tendency to award high
administrative and even military posts to low-caste musicians (of the dom and dhari
castes) and especially to a sitar player named Ghulam Raza Khan, who became his closest
adviser (while energetically defrauding the nawab at the same time). To a dour observer
like Sleeman, Wajid Ali represented the epitome of despotic decadence.
As a patron of the fine arts, however, Wajid Ali Shah was extraordinarily energetic,
innovative, and influential. His Urdu and Braj-bhasha Hindi poetry is engaging, his
dance-dramas (called rahas) sparked the emergence of folk music theater and modern
urban Urdu drama, and his court became the primary crucible for the flowering of kathak,
the North Indian classical dance style. Perhaps most outstanding was his contribution to
music. Wajid Ali enthusiastically employed and sustained many of the North’s most gifted
classical artists, whose names are extensively documented by Karm Imam. Even the wily
Ghulam Raza Khan, when not cuckolding and robbing the nawab, was developing and
popularizing a sitar style that would form much of the basis of modern instrumental
playing. Wajid Ali had more than two hundred concubines trained in music and dance,2
housing them in a palace called the “Fairy House” (Pari Khana). His energetic patronage
extended to folk music and theater as well as classical fine arts. Further, he was himself
an avid and reportedly skilled singer, composer, and percussionist; of his many light
245 Manuel : Music
classical compositions, his thumri “Babul mora naihar” remains one of the most popular
songs in the genre (although its modern form of rendering may be quite distinct from its
original style). While he clearly preferred the emerging, romantic, semiclassical genres to
the hoary and austere Mughal ones, it seems evident that he was in his way a sophisti-
cated connoisseur. Further, although he may not have devoted his days to administering
his kingdom, he evidently spent many if not most of them not in a drunken stupor but
rather in vigorous fine-arts production and promotion, as might befit an energetic Minis-
ter of Culture. Even after his exile in 1856 to Matiya Burj in Calcutta, arts patronage at
his ersatz court continued to be munificent and laid the foundation for Calcutta’s musical
preeminence in subsequent decades.
Elite Patronage outside the Court
While Wajid Ali Shah’s court would have constituted the single most substantial and best
documented source of Lucknow’s fine arts patronage, a prodigious and probably more
extensive amount of musical activity went on outside the court, as patronized by the elite
of the city and its environs. While the institution of public concerts for paying audiences
did not emerge until after 1900, fine arts performances took place in a variety of contexts,
especially the homes of the aristocracy and the salons of the city’s courtesans. Lucknow
became renowned for the sophistication and talent of its courtesans, some of whom
acquired considerable wealth and fame as singers or dancers. The 1905 Urdu novel by
Mirza Ruswa, Umrao Jan Ada, paints a colorful portrait—at once melodramatic and
realistic—of the courtesan milieu and the book’s heroine, a singer struggling to negotiate
the perversities of ephemeral successes and ardent lovers who are variously noble, impecu-
nious, or villainous. 3
Lucknow’s gentry in the nawabi era was in some respects diverse. Aside from the
nawabs themselves, many aristocrats would have been assorted princes or other dignitar-
ies associated in one way or another with the court. Another category would comprise the
remnants of the Mughal feudal landlords—the zamindars—who lived off the revenues of
land granted to them generations earlier. From the early 1800s, however, this social class
in Awadh and elsewhere was being increasingly bankrupted by a British land tenure
system which effected the summary eviction—rather than a traditional mere harass-
ment—of landowners who failed to pay their taxes, which under the British were becom-
ing ever more onerous. As such, the hereditary zamindars were being replaced by a new
class of protocapitalist landlords called taluqdars, many of whom also patronized the
arts, whether out of genuine interest, a desire to appear sophisticated, or a sense of
noblesse oblige.
Nawabi Lucknow, like the rest of contemporary India, lacked a broad-based bourgeoi-
sie that could have bridged the social gap between rich and poor, and there were neither
mass media nor regular public concerts to expose subalterns to the fine arts. Neverthe-
less, evidence suggests that access to and fondness for semiclassical music extended well
beyond the mansions of the rich. Sources like Sharar’s writings attest to the Lucknow
Muslims’ zeal for education, and the alleged musicality and refinement of ordinary
urbanites. As he wrote, “Sometimes bazaar boys have been heard singing bhairvin, sohni,
246
behag [classical rags or melodic modes], and other ragas with such excellence that those
who heard them were entranced and the greatest singers envied them.”4
Music in Mid-Nineteenth-Century Lucknow
In North Indian classical music history, nawabi Lucknow can be seen as a stage of
dynamic transition between the Mughal era and the modern period commencing in the
early twentieth century. The preeminent vocal music genre of the Mughal era, especially
as flourishing in Delhi and Gwalior, had been dhrupad, a relatively austere genre in which
a solo singer, with instrumental accompaniment, sang an improvisatory alap in free
rhythm in a given rag or melodic mode, segueing to a metered section based on a precom-
posed song, with drum accompaniment. Dhrupad could also be rendered instrumentally,
especially on the bin, a stick zither with two large resonating gourds. Karm Imam’s
Madan al-Mausiqi and other sources document the presence of several dhrupad perform-
ers in nawabi Lucknow, suggesting that the genre still enjoyed prestige and patronage.
Increasingly, however, dhrupad was being replaced by khyal, which allowed greater scope
both for leisurely elaboration of a rag as well as display of virtuoso technique. Khyal
performers were also well represented in Lucknow, and since the early twentieth century,
khyal has been the standard idiom of North Indian classical (“Hindustani”) music.
While the serious classical styles khyal and dhrupad held their own in Lucknow,
considerably more popular, whether in court, the courtesan salon, or the homes of the
elite, were semiclassical vocal genres, especially thumri and ghazal, which remain popular,
in somewhat differing styles, to this day. Prior to Wajid Ali Shah’s time, thumri had been
an obscure regional dance song, but as cultivated in Lucknow it rapidly evolved into a
sophisticated semiclassical art, linked to the concurrently developing kathak dance.
Thumri and ghazal are “lighter” in the sense that the rag may be maintained in a casual
and flexible manner rather than a scrupulous one, and there is less emphasis on either
virtuoso display or sober, meditative alap. Moreover, the sentiment of the song lyrics,
rather than being essentially ignored as in the serious, rag-oriented genres, is fore-
grounded as the singer brings out expressive nuances by subjecting the text lines to
melodic variation and elaboration.5 The Urdu ghazal, a sophisticated verse form typically
about unrequited love, also enjoyed phenomenal popularity during this period, both as
sung and as a purely literary genre. Thumri and ghazal performances could also incorpo-
rate dance, as a singer—whether seated or standing—might mimetically enact the action
or sentiment of the lyric, either while singing or during percussive interludes between
verses. Hence thumri and ghazal were the mainstays of the “nautch” (nach), a song-and-
dance session in which courtesan vocalists and dancers, accompanied by male instrumen-
talists, would perform for private audiences. Nautches are depicted in several paintings of
the era, and prior to the Uprising were often enjoyed, attended, and even sponsored by
British officers.
Many performers of thumri and ghazal were male, including Wajid Ali Shah himself.
However, as light, sensual styles they were more typically associated with courtesans (or
tawaifs), that is, professional female entertainers who were trained in these arts, as well
as in etiquette, genteel conversation, and refined culture in general. Courtesans had been
247 Manuel : Music
a fixture of urban Indian society for millennia, but the extent of their renown and promi- The Musical Legacy of Nawabi Lucknow

nence in nawabi Lucknow seems to have been unprecedented. Nobles wooed them and sent
Indian writers on Hindustani music history have tended to regard the Lucknow period
their sons to the tawaif’s salons to learn cultured habits. Salons of leading courtesans—
with deep ambivalence. While acknowledging the prodigious amount of musical activity
many of whom amassed great wealth—were centers of the high culture of the era, with
and patronage in the nawabi era, they have generally disparaged the incommensurate
poetry readings, concerts, and daily social gatherings of the city’s most urbane aesthetes.
orientation toward the lighter, more sentimental genres of thumri and ghazal rather than
Even the opinionated and conservative critic Imam, while at certain points disparaging
the serious classical dhrupad and khyal. The turn toward the sensuous and sentimental
tawaifs and their male teachers, lavishly praised some of them, saying of one Bi Rehman
in music can be seen to parallel the prevailing orientation of Lucknow Urdu poetry, in
Bai that she “sings better than any male singer of the age. . . . In fact, I have never heard
contrast to the more philosophical verse of earlier poets like Mir Taqi “Mir.” Hence
any ustad [maestro] who could equal her.”6 Ruswa’s novel Umrao Jan Ada depicted a
Sharar, for example, quotes an elderly music purist lamenting the great “harm” done by
private performance in which the heroine effectively used her ghazal-singing to ensnare
the captivating thumris of Lucknow composer Kadar Piya.8 In retrospect, it is difficult to
the heart (and purse) of a young nobleman in the audience, singing elegant Urdu love
empirically assess such criticisms, since, for one thing, the extraordinary vogue of thumri
lyrics while staring him in the eye. Lucknow’s courtesan culture, with thumri and ghazal
and ghazal may not have been at the expense of khyal and dhrupad, which are serious
at its core, enjoyed extraordinary renown, representing the zenith of the Indo-Muslim
classical idioms never destined for mass popularity.
aesthetic epicureanism, as later bowdlerized in several Bollywood films.
Perhaps equally problematic is the complaint, which recurs in modern Indian music
Instrumental music also flourished in Lucknow. Imam enumerates many exponents of
historiography, that the nawabs and even the Mughals before them had vitiated and
instrumental dhrupad, along with members of the less prestigious hereditary dom and
profaned music by depriving it of its (Hindu) spiritual orientation, turning it into a
dhari musician castes whose primary occupation was teaching and accompanying tawaifs.
vulgar “fleshly” art for the diversion of hedonistic, decadent kings and princes. It is true
Perhaps most important in the historical perspective was the extent to which the bases for
that the Muslim rulers of North India, in ardently patronizing the largely Hindu-oriented
modern Hindustani instrumental music were laid in nineteenth-century Lucknow. The
fine arts culture they inherited, on the whole secularized it, rather than attempting, for
dhrupad instruments—especially the stringed bin and the rabab, as well as the pakhavaj
example, to Islamicize it, much less ban it. Hence, if Wajid Ali Shah wrote verses about
barrel drum accompanying them—were gradually being upstaged by instruments more
Radha and Krishna and staged dance-dramas in which he himself played the role of
suitable to khyal style, with its greater expressive range and its scope for virtuoso display.
Krishna, he was evidently inspired less by a Hindu religiosity than by a purely aesthetic
The most popular instruments in modern Hindustani music have been the sitar, sarod,
fondness for the arts. Indeed, the secularization of Hindustani music’s aesthetics may
and tabla drum pair, which are louder and brighter sounding than their predecessors and
have facilitated its remarkably successful adaptation to modern patronage.
more suitable for pyrotechnics. All three instruments, far from being ancient, took their
Early-twentieth-century reformers like V. N. Bhatkhande and V. D. Paluskar
modern shape in the 1800s, and it appears that both their organological as well as stylistic
successfully campaigned to persuade the emerging Indian bourgeoisie to patronize
evolutions were to a large extent centered in Lucknow.7 The colorful Ghulam Raza Khan
Hindustani music, and to divest that music of its associations with the backward world
was evidently a founder of the emergent modern sitar style, which derived less from
of courtesans and effete feudal nawabs. Intrinsic to the success of such reformists,
dhrupad than as an adaptation of up-tempo contemporary thumri compositions to sitar.
however, was the fact that the music itself had remained vital, due in great part to the
Sarod playing, as cultivated by his contemporaries, appears to have developed along the
vigor of the Lucknow period.
same lines, while several basic aspects of modern tabla playing clearly evolved in tandem
with these instruments. Even the fast-tempo section of modern khyal evolved hand-in- 1. Abdul Halim Sharar, Lucknow: The Last Phase of an Oriental Culture, trans. E. S. Harcourt and Fakhir Hussain
hand with the closely similar Lucknow thumri style. (London: Elek, 1975), 134.
2. Mohammad Najam Al-Ghani Khan, Tarikh-e-Avadh, ed. Zaki Kakorvia (Lucknow: Idara-e-Farogh-e-Urdu, 1979), 526.
Aside from classical and semiclassical fine arts, nawabi Lucknow hosted a variety of
3. Mirza Mohammad Hadi Ruswa, The Courtesan of Lucknow (Umrao Jan Ada), trans. Khushwant Singh and M. A. Hadi,
genres which might today be categorized as “folk music” for their lack of abstract music (1905; Delhi: Hind Pocket Books, 1970).
4. Sharar, Lucknow, 139.
theory and because of their accessible nature. Several such genres, however, were sophisti-
5. See Allyn Miner, Sitar and Sarod in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries (Wilhelmshaven, Germany: Florian
cated and rich in their own way, as are their latter-day counterparts. Particularly Noetael, 1993).
6. See Peter Manuel, Thumri in Historical and Stylistic Perspectives (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidas, 1989).
dynamic under the patronage of the Shia royalty was the art of soz khwani, musical
7. Hakim Mohammad Karm Imam, “Melody through the Centuries: Being a Chapter from Ma’danul Moosiqui written in
renderings of Urdu verse typically lamenting the martyrdom of the Shia saints at Kar- 1856 by Hakim Mohammad Karam Imam, a courtier of Wajid Ali Shah of Lucknow,” trans. Govind Vidyarthi, Sangeet
Natak Akademi Bulletin 11–12 (1959): 21.
bala. Sufi qawwali, with its lively and rhythmic renditions of mystical Urdu poetry, also
8. Sharar, Lucknow, 137.
thrived in Muslim shrines and other contexts. Processions of various sorts, such as were
connected with weddings or Muharram, were also invigorated with music, especially
thunderous tassa drum ensembles with their virtuoso percussionists.

248 249 Manuel : Music

Glossary
alap: the introductory portion of a classical Indian
musical or vocal recital in which the performer
expounds the features of the raga, or melodic
framework, for the ensuing composition.
al-Hind: Arabic term for India, adapted from the
Persian word Hind, which referred both to the
land beyond the Indus (ancient Sindhu) River
(located in present-day Pakistan) and to the
Persian-Indian frontier zone of Sindh in which it
was located.
angarkha: a calf-length long-sleeved robe worn by
men, with a semicircular opening at the chest
revealing an inner cloth panel.
angiya: a sleeveless, tight bodice worn by women
beneath a covering scarf or robe.
bagh: garden.
Basant (also Vasant, Vasanta): the season of
spring. Also the name of various festivals
celebrating the spring.
basse-taille: an enameling technique featuring
low-relief, cut or hammered designs visible
beneath transparent enamel pastes.
begam (also begum): term used to denote a woman
of high or noble rank, usually Muslim.
bibi: wife or lady. From the late eighteenth century,
the term was frequently used to refer to the
female companions—Indian or European—of
European men.
bidri: decorative metalware made from a zinc-
and-lead alloy, and ornamented with inlaid or
overlaid sheets of precious metals and/or strands
of wire. Lucknow bidri ware often features raised
designs with carved motifs and a thin overlay of
silver or, rarely, gold.
bin: a type of stick zither with two gourd resonators.
Also known as the rudra vina, it is associated
with the classical musical genre of dhrupad and
rose to prominence during the reign of the
Mughal Emperor Akbar (r. 1556–1605).
boteh: also buta, literally “flower.” A decorative
motif, taking the form of a teardrop with a curled
tip, found especially on textiles. Popularly known
as paisley.
braj-bhasha: a Hindi language associated with the
region of Braj in northern India. It was the
primary language of the Hindu devotional
literature of northern India from the sixteenth
through eighteenth centuries.
champlevé: an enameling technique in which
designs are engraved or ground into a metal
surface. The designs are filled with a paste of
powdered glass and the particular metallic oxide
used to produce the desired enamel color.
Successive firings are needed because of the
different melting temperatures of the various
enamel pastes.
chattri: an umbrellalike dome or a pavilion with
such a dome.
chikan (chikankari, chikandozi): embroidery
employing white thread of cotton or silk on fine
white cotton cloth.
chinoiserie: the European adaptation of Chinese,
Japanese, Thai, and Indian–inspired designs and
motifs for use on a wide range of goods,
furnishings, and architecture.
chowk: marketplace or square.
darwaza: gateway.
dastan: a genre of Persian narrative poetry focused
largely on themes of heroism, adventure, and
courtly life.
dargah: a Muslim shrine often associated with the
tomb of a saint or with an object of veneration.
darogah: a title denoting a position of authority.
Deccan: the central plateau region of southern
India.
dev: also deva. A god or divinity.
dhari: a class of musicians who often performed as
accompanists to dancers. Today the term is
inclusive of a broad community of hereditary
musicians.
dhrupad: a genre of classical North Indian, or
Hindustani, vocal music, known for its austere
style.
diwan: a collection of poems, usually by one poet
dom: a class of hereditary musicians who provided
dance and musical entertainment.
dupatta: an unstitched length of fabric worn over
the upper body in the manner of a scarf or shawl.
Eid: Abbreviated form of Eid al-Fitr, the Muslim
festival marking the end of Ramadan, the month
of fasting.
farshi paijama: wide-legged trousers.
ganj: a marketplace or a town with a considerable
market or commercial nature.
ghazal: a genre of Persian poetry and song dealing
largely with themes of spiritual and worldly love.
goshpech: a decorative band of cloth wrapped
around a turban.
hauda: also howdah. A type of seat or conveyance
used atop elephants.
huqqa: also hookah or water pipe. A type of pipe in
which tobacco smoke is cooled and filtered by
passing through water.
imam: literally, “leader.” Generally refers to the
leader of congregational prayer within a Muslim
community or at a particular mosque. To Imami,
or Twelver, Shia Muslims, the term has special
importance, denoting twelve designated leaders of
the Muslim community who include Ali—the
Prophet Muhammad’s son-in-law—and several of
his descendants through the late ninth century.
imambara: literally, “house of the imam.” A
construction associated with the Shia Muharram
mourning ceremonies. Whether public or private,
such structures are used to store and display the
model shrines (taziyas) carried in mourning
processions. They may also serve as tombs.
Islamicate: a term referring to the cultural and
social dimensions of diverse Muslim communities,
rather than the religious.
Jain: a South Asian religion founded in the sixth
century BCE focused on the veneration of
twenty-four teachers, or jinas (“conquerors”), and
based upon the belief that liberation from the
cycle of existence can be achieved through strict
asceticism and meditation.
250
jama: a tailored robe with fitted waist and full skirt.
Tied usually at the side of the chest and waist.
jamdani: a weaving technique used to produce
figured muslin cloth.
Jami Masjid (also Jama Masjid): a congregational
mosque where official Friday prayer services are
conducted.
Jat: name of a diverse community of peoples residing
across northern India and Pakistan, historically
known for their agrarian lifestyles and martial
natures.
jawab: literally, “answer.” A building within an
architectural complex that serves as a symmetri-
cal double to another like structure.
kalidar/kaliondar paijama: trousers with
especially flared lower legs.
Karbala: site in Iraq where the third Imam,
Husain, and his followers were slain in battle in
680 CE. Also a name given to a type of building
where the model tombs (taziyas) that are carried
in procession during the mourning rituals of
Muharram are interred.
kathak: a classical North Indian dance tradition,
one important school of which is associated with
Lucknow, where the tradition was especially
popular in the eighteenth and nineteenth
centuries.
Kayastha: a Hindu caste, historically engaged in
administrative, record-keeping, or writing
occupations. Many converted to Islam during the
period of Muslim rule in northern India.
khana: house.
Khatri: a predominantly Hindu caste and
community historically associated with the region
of the Panjab in northwestern India and
Pakistan. Many converted to Islam during the
period of Muslim rule in northern India.
khilat: a robe of honor or set of garments
ceremonially bestowed by a ruler.
khwaja: an honorific title denoting respect.
khyal: a genre of classical North Indian, or
Hindustani, music, considered lighter and more
ornate than the genre of dhrupad.
kotha: house or mansion, referring especially to a
courtesan’s residences and salon.
kothi: a palatial residence or house.
kurta/kurti: a loosely stitched tunic, the kurti
being shorter in length.
mahal: palace, royal apartment, or house.
maharaja: literally, “great king.”
mahi-ye maratib (also mahi-maratib or
mahi-o-maratib): literally, “fish of dignity.” A
royal insignia of Persian origin. In India,
awarded by Muslim rulers as a sign of favor. A
pair of curved fish, often arranged head-to-head
with their bodies forming a circle, was adopted as
a state emblem by the nawabs of Awadh. Variant
forms were employed over time.
majalis: a gathering or assembly, especially for the
recitation of poetry during Shia Muharram
observances.
manzil: palace or house.
Maratha: a term describing various Hindu states
that rose to political and military prominence in
the region of present-day Maharashtra state
during the seventeenth century. By the late
eighteenth century, the Marathas had extended
their control into Gujarat and north-central
India, and had attacked Delhi. They were
subdued by the British in the early nineteenth
century.
marsiya: elegiac or heroic narrative poetry,
frequently honoring the martyrs of Karbala.
masjid: mosque. A Muslim place of worship.
masnawi: a Persian verse form associated with a
range of genres including literary epics, didactic
poetry, and romances.
matam: a song or poem expressing lament. Its
recitation during the mourning rituals of
Muharram is accompanied by a beating of the
chest.
mirza: Persian title designating a prince or honorifi-
cally denoting a high-ranking or esteemed male.
mufti: a Muslim cleric or expert in Islamic law.
Mughal: a Muslim dynasty founded in 1526 by the
Timurid Prince Babur (1483–1530). The dynasty
ruled over various regions of South Asia,
particularly northern India, until 1858. The
name of the dynasty refers to its rulers’ maternal
descent from the Mongol Chingiz (Genghis)
Khan.
Muharram: the first month of the Islamic calendar.
Heralds the beginning of the mourning period
observed by Shia Muslims for the third Imam,
Husain, and his fellow martyrs at Karbala, where
they died on the tenth (Ashura) of Muharram.
mujtahid: Shia Muslim scholars possessing the
authority to interpret religious law.
nautch: Anglicized version of the Hindi term nach,
meaning dance.
nawab: deputy or vice-regent/governor.
nawabi period: 1722–1856. Generally defined
herein as the time span from the appointment of
Saadat Khan Burhan al-Mulk (ruled 1722–39) as
the nawab of Awadh until its annexation by the
English East India Company in 1856. Techni-
cally, beginning in 1819, when Ghazi al-Din
Haidar was crowned king of Awadh, its
sovereigns ruled as kings rather than governors.
nim qalam: literally, “half pen.” A technique for
rendering lightly colored drawings.
nizam: deputy or governor. The term came to be
used as a royal title by the Muslim rulers of
Hyderabad, in southern India.
odhni: a large veil worn by women as part of a more
elaborate clothing ensemble.
Oude/Oudh: Anglicized terms for the region of
Awadh.
pakhavaj: a large barrel-shaped drum often played
as an accompaniment during dhrupad perfor-
mances.
pari: fairy.
Pari Khana: literally, “Fairy House.” At Lucknow
under Wajid Ali Shah, a palace dwelling for
women especially trained in dance and music
qawwali: a Sufi devotional song often sung at
dargahs.
Quran (also Koran): the sacred book of Islam.
rabab: a type of plucked string instrument.
raga: a melodic mode that serves as a framework
for musical and vocal compositions.
Ragamala: literally, “Garland of Ragas.” A series
of paintings illustrating a standardized grouping
of ragas. The ragas are personified as archetypal
heroes and heroines and are depicted in various
settings and situations.
rahas: a theatrical dance performance with themes
deriving from the exploits, especially amatory, of
the Hindu god Krishna.
rahas khana: a building constructed by Wajid Ali
Shah for theatrical entertainments.
raja: king or prince.
rekhta: classical Urdu ghazal, written in a male
voice.
rekhti: a genre of Urdu poetry, composed by men,
but written in a feminine voice.
Rohilla: from Roh, referring to a mountainous
terrain of Afghanistan and Pakistan. In the
eighteenth century, the term came to refer to the
Indo-Afghans of Rohilkhand, a region to the
northwest of Awadh.
Safavid: Persian dynasty of Shia Muslims who
ruled Iran and its border regions from 1502 to
1736.
sarod: a type of plucked string instrument,
descended in part from the rabab.
shaikh: Arabic and Persian title primarily
designating a learned scholar or, in the case of
mystical orders, a spiritual master.
shaikhzada: literally, descendant of the shaikh
(elder or chief). A predominately Sunni landed
agricultural community who controlled the region
of Lucknow before being defeated in 1722 by the
new Mughal governor (nawab) of Awadh, Saadat
Khan Burhan al-Mulk.
Shia: literally “partisans” or “followers.” Refers to
the Muslim followers of Ali, first cousin and
son-in-law of the Prophet Muhammad, whom
Shias regard as the Prophet’s legitimate
successor.
Sikh: an adherent of the Sikh faith, a South Asian
religion founded in the Panjab region of
northwestern India and Pakistan by Guru Nanak
(1469–1539). Sikhs maintain the existence of a
universal God and follow the teachings of Guru
Nanak and his successors as compiled in a text
known as the Adi Granth, or First Book.
sitar : the primary plucked string instrument of
classical Indian music.
soz khwani: the recitation of poetic laments,
typically at religious gatherings held during
Muharram.
subedar : governor.
subedari: from suba, or province. An administra-
tive area within the Mughal Empire.
Sufi: a practitioner of a Sufi path, a mystical
tradition which seeks union with God as its
ultimate goal.
251
Sunni: literally, “one of the path.” Refers to Muslims
who recognize the caliphs—leaders who were
elected by the Muslim community—as the
legitimate successors of the Prophet Muhammad.
Sunni Muslims recognize Ali, the cousin and
son-in-law of Muhammad, as the fourth Caliph.
tabla: pair of hand drums, each of different size
and musical tone, which today constitutes the
primary percussion instrument of classical Indian
music.
takhallus: a pen name.
taluqdar : a landowner or landholder belonging to
an originally rural, then urban, class of Muslim
and Hindu merchants and speculators that
emerged to prominence in Awadh in the early
nineteenth century. They assumed primary
patronage for the arts following the end of the
nawabi period in 1856, after the annexation of
Awadh.
tassa: a kettle drum or an ensemble containing
such drums.
tawaif: a courtesan. In South Asia the term
designates a range of professional female
entertainers, including an elite class of women
trained in the arts, etiquette, and culture.
taziya: literally, “consolation.” Model tombs that
are carried in procession during Muharram.
thumri: a semiclassical vocal genre of North Indian,
or Hindustani, music. Popularized at Lucknow
during the reign of Wajid Ali Shah.
Timurid: Turko-Mongol dynasty, established by the
chieftain Timur (1370–1405). Controlled vast
territories extending from Turkey into India
until its collapse in 1506.
ulama: a class of Muslim religious scholars.
Umayyad: the first Muslim dynasty which, at its
greatest extent, encompassed lands extending
from Spain to Pakistan. Ruled from their capital
at Damascus, Syria, from 661 to 750 CE.
Urdu: South Asian language combining Persian,
Arabic, and Hindi vocabulary. Written in
Perso-Arabic script.
ustad: a title of respect, especially denoting a
master of music or poetry.
Usuli: A school of Shia Muslim scholars who
advocated the role of intellectual reasoning and
the authority of mujtahid in the interpretation of
Islamic law.
wazir : chief minister.
wazir al-mamalik: literally, “chief minister of the
kingdom.”
zamindar : a hereditary landholder, and assessed
revenue–collector within the Mughal administra-
tion. Continued in a modified role under British
colonial rule.
zardozi: literally, “gold embroidery.” Embroidery
using metallic thread, sometimes also employ-
ing embellishments such as mirrors and gems.
zenana: women’s living quarters within a royal or
noble household.
Checklist of the exhibition
1. Introduction: Hybrid Visions
1. Tilly Kettle (England, 1735–1786)
Shuja al-Daula, Nawab of Awadh, Holding a Bow
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, 1772
Oil on canvas
50 1⁄ 8 x 40 1⁄ 8 in. (127.3 x 101.8 cm)
Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection,
B1976.7.48
p. 17
2. Muhammad Azam
Nasir al-Din Haidar
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1830
Oil on canvas
361⁄4 x 28 3⁄ 8 in. (92.1 x 72.1 cm)
Collection Drs. Aziz and Deanna Khan
pp. 14–15 (detail), 95
3. An Al Fresco Entertainment for Princes
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1768
Opaque watercolor with gold and silver leaf on paper
231⁄4 x 173⁄ 8 in. (59 x 44 cm)
British Museum, London, 2000-12-8.01
p. 172
4. A Turkish Sultana
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1810–20
Opaque watercolor on paper
Page 173⁄ 8 x 131⁄2 in. (44.3 x 34.1 cm);
image 131⁄4 x 91⁄2 in. (34.7 x 24 cm)
The Chester Beatty Library, In 69.19
pp. 2 (detail), 31
2. The Nawabs of Awadh as Sovereigns
and Heirs to Mughal Glory
A: A Mughal Province
5. Saadat Khan Burhan al-Mulk and Safdar Jang
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1750–60
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 18 5⁄ 8 x 13 3⁄4 in. (47.2 x 34.8 cm);
image 13 x 10 in. (35 x 25.3 cm)
Mohammed Rezai Collection
p. 70
6. Mausoleum of Safdar Jang, Delhi
India, Delhi or Agra, c. 1820–22
Watercolor on paper
20 11⁄16 x 2815⁄16 in. (52.5 x 73.6 cm)
The British Library, London, Add. Or. 1810
p. 122
7. A Royal Encampment Scene
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1780–85
Opaque watercolor on paper
211⁄4 x 30 in. (54 x 76 cm)
British Museum, London, 1974 6-17 05(1)
p. 75
8. Jagan (fl. c. 1582–1605) composition, and Asir
(fl. c. 1584–95) painting
Akbar Is Entertained by His Foster Brother
Azim Khan at Dipalpur
Left side of a two-page composition from an
Akbarnama manuscript
India, Mughal Empire, c. 1590–95
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
12 3⁄4 x 7 1⁄4 in. (32.4 x 18.6 cm)
Victoria and Albert Museum, IS.2:95-1896
p. 75
9. Jagan (fl. c. 1582–1605) composition, Sur Das
(fl. c. 1584–1605) painting, and Madhav (fl. c.
1582–1605) faces
Akbar Is Entertained by His Foster Brother
Azim Khan at Dipalpur
Right side of a two-page composition from an
Akbarnama manuscript
India, Mughal Empire, c. 1590–95
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
12 3⁄4 x 71⁄4 in. (32.4 x 18.6 cm)
Victoria and Albert Museum, IS.2:94-1896
p. 75
10. Attributed to Mihr Chand (fl. 1759–86)
Khwaja Muin al-Din Chishti
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1770
Opaque watercolor on paper
Page 10 3⁄4 x 7 3⁄4 in. (27.4 x 19.8 cm);
image 61⁄2 x 4 3⁄ 8 in. (16.4 x 11.2 cm)
The Chester Beatty Library, In 34.12
p. 79
11. Mir Kalan Khan (fl. c. 1734–70)
A Drowning Man Saved from Marine Monsters
by a Princely Boat
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad or Lucknow,
c. 1750–60
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 15 x 10 7⁄ 8 in. (38 x 27.6 cm);
image 10 11⁄16 x 77⁄16 in. (27.2 x 18.8 cm)
Collection Frits Lugt, Institut Néerlandais, Paris,
inv. no. 1971-T.76
Guimet only
p. 168
12. Style of Mir Kalan Khan
European Woman Seated on a Terrace Smoking a
Venetian-Style Water Pipe
Folio from an album that belonged to Shuja al-Daula
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow or Faizabad,
c. 1760–75
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 181⁄ 8 x 12 3⁄4 in. (46 x 32.4 cm); image 8 x 5 3⁄4 in.
(20.3 x 14.6 cm)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, purchased with
funds provided by Dorothy and Richard Sherwood,
M.72.88.5
p. 166
13. Portrait of a European Woman
Folio from an album containing specimens of
Persian calligraphy and Indian paintings
India, Mughal Empire, early 17th century
Illuminated manuscript; opaque watercolor and gold
on paper; lacquered binding
Book 161⁄2 x 11 in. (42.1 x 28.1 cm)
The Royal Collection, RCIN 1005068, f33r
p. 29
252
B: Painters from the Court of Muhammad
Shah and the Development of Painting
at Lucknow
14. Muhammad Shah and Nadir Shah
India, Mughal Empire, c. 1740
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
12 3⁄ 8 x 8 3⁄ 8 in. (31.5 x 21.3 cm)
Musée national des Arts asiatiques–Guimet, Paris
MA 3544
p. 16
15. Attributed to Mir Kalan Khan (fl. c. 1734–70)
A Princess Visiting a Forest Shrine at Night
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1760
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 1811⁄16 x 12 5⁄16 in. (47.5 x 31.3 cm);
image 10 1⁄2 x 611⁄16 in. (26.7 x 17 cm)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, purchased in
memory of Emeritus Professor Roy C. Craven, Jr.,
with funds provided by the Southern Asian Art
Council, Stephen Markel, Lorna Andreae Craven,
Pierre Andreae, Jay and Kathleen Craven, Ruth and
Bill Beesch, Mark Zebrowski and John Robert
Alderman, R. and Dharini Charudattan, Austin B.
Creel, Herbert H. Luke, Stephen Barry, Myra L.
Engelhardt and Lawrence E. Malvern, Toby Falk,
Claire and Earl Hale, Janice Leoshko, John and
Thanomchit Listopad, Carlotta and Peter NeSmith,
John F. Scott, Walter and Nesta Spink, Charles
Gleaves, B. N. Goswamy, John L. Ward, Marjorie
and Paul Burdick, Kenneth and Sarah Kerslake,
Diane Maxwell, Arthur Funk, Barbara A. Purdy,
Hiram and Avonell Williams, Mary Jeanette
Householder, Irmgard Johnson, an anonymous
donor, and the South and Southeast Asian
Acquisition Fund, AC1997.30.1
p. 164
16. Mir Kalan Khan (fl. c. 1734–70)
Lovers in a Landscape
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1760–70
Opaque watercolor on paper
Page 16 x 11 in. (40.5 x 28 cm); image 8 1⁄4 x 6 in.
(22.2 x 15.2 cm)
The David Collection, Copenhagen, 50/1981
p. 169
17. Mir Kalan Khan (fl. c. 1734–70)
Christ (Jesus) as a Child in the Temple
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1760
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 14 x 19 3⁄4 in. (35.5 x 25 cm); image 71⁄2 x 3 3⁄4 in.
(18.9 x 9.5 cm)
Catherine and Ralph Benkaim Collection
p. 168
18. Mir Kalan Khan (fl. c. 1734–70)
Village Life in Kashmir
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1760
Opaque watercolor on paper
Page 15 3⁄ 32 x 213⁄16 in. (38.7 x 54.3 cm);
image 111⁄4 x 131⁄16 in. (28.8 x 33.5 cm)
The British Library, London, Add. Or. 3
LACMA only
p. 170
19. Fath Chand (fl. c. 1750–60)
Todi Ragini, Second Wife of Hindola Raga
Folio from a Ragamala series
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1750–60
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 111⁄4 x 71⁄2 in. (28.6 x 19.1 cm);
image 51⁄2 x 3 in. (14 x 7.6 cm)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, purchased with
funds provided by the Nasli and Alice Heeramaneck
Collection, Museum Associates Purchase,
M.2004.180
p. 242
20. Nidha Mal (fl. c. 1735–75)
An Awadh Nobleman Reclining on a Couch by
Moonlight
India, Uttar Pradesh, Awadh, c. 1755–65
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 10 3⁄ 8 x 14 1⁄2 in. (26.4 x 36.8 cm);
image 9 x 131⁄ 8 in. (22.9 x 33.3 cm)
Cynthia Hazen Polsky
LACMA only
p. 171
C: Regional Painting Traditions
and Themes (Awadh, FarRukhabad and
Murshidabad)
21. A Dancer Balances a Bottle
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1770
Opaque watercolor on paper
Page 18 3⁄ 8 x 12 7⁄ 8 in. (46.6 x 32.6 cm);
image 18 x 127⁄ 8 in. (45.6 x 31.8 cm)
The Chester Beatty Library, In 69.6
p. 76
22. Layla and Majnun, and Khusrau and Shirin,
Illustrations of Themes from Persian Poetry
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1775
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 151⁄2 x 10 1⁄ 8 in. (39.4 x 25.7 cm);
image 14 3⁄ 8 x 87⁄ 8 in. (36.5 x 22.5 cm)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, from the Nasli
and Alice Heeramaneck Collection, Museum
Associates Purchase, M.83.105.22
pp. 26, 102 (detail)
23. Attributed to Faizullah (fl. c. 1760s–70s)
A Composite of Scenes from Persian Literature
entitled “Lovers and Beloved”
India, Uttar Pradesh, Awadh, c. 1765
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
16 1⁄4 x 115⁄ 8 in. (41.3 x 29.5 cm)
Catherine and Ralph Benkaim Collection
p. 28
24. Faizullah (fl. c. 1760s–70s)
The Women of Egypt Cut Their Fingers Peeling
Oranges When First Seeing Yusuf’s Beauty
India, Uttar Pradesh, Awadh, c. 1770
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 15 x 10 7⁄ 8 in. (38.2 x 27.6 cm);
image 131⁄2 x 8 7⁄ 8 in. (34.5 x 22.5 cm)
Musée national des Arts asiatiques–Guimet, Paris,
MA 12243
p. 173
25. Attributed to Muhammad Faqirullah Khan
(fl. c. 1720–70)
A Princess and Her Companions Enjoying a
Terrace Ambiance
India, Uttar Pradesh, Farrukhabad, c. 1760–70
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 161⁄ 8 x 113⁄4 in. (41 x 29.9 cm);
image 11 x 7 1⁄2 in. (27.9 x 19.1 cm)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Art Museum
Council Fund, M.2005.159
p. 73
26. Prince Hunting with Cheetah
India, West Bengal, Murshidabad, 1764 or earlier
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
14 1⁄4 x 213⁄4 in. (36.2 x 55.2 cm)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Bequest of
Edwin Binney, 3rd, M.90.141.4
p. 72
3. The Nawabs of Awadh as Patrons
of European and Indian Artists
27. Various Indian artists including Nevasi Lal
(fl. c. 1760–75) and Mohan Singh (fl. c. 1763–82)
Treaty of the Nawab with the British at Benares
in 1765
Folio from a Gentil Album Depicting Manners
and Customs of the People of India
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, 1774
Watercolor and opaque watercolor on paper
Album 14 7⁄16 x 20 7⁄ 8 in. (37 x 53.5 cm)
Victoria and Albert Museum, IS.25-1980 (1-58)
p. 174
28. Tilly Kettle (England, 1735–1786)
Nawab Shuja al-Daula with the Heir Apparent,
Mirza Amani, Later Asaf al-Daula
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, 1772
Oil on canvas
92 x 64 3⁄ 8 in. (235 x 165 cm)
Musée National du Château de Versailles et de
Trianon, MV 3888, INV 10053, LP 6412
p. 229
29. Nevasi Lal (fl. c. 1760–75)
Nawab Shuja al-Daula with His Ten Sons, after a
Painting by Tilly Kettle
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, 1774
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
181⁄4 x 15 1⁄2 in. (46.4 x 39.5 cm)
Musée national des Arts asiatiques–Guimet, Paris,
no. 35571
p. 174
30. Turban Band
India, Uttar Pradesh, Awadh, Lucknow, c. 1800
Silk with metal ribbon ornaments
L. 23 7⁄ 8 in. (64.5 cm); w. 4 1⁄4 in. (10.5 cm)
Victoria and Albert Museum, IS.85-1988
p. 229 (detail)
253
31. Mihr Chand (fl. 1759–86)
Shuja al-Daula
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad or Lucknow,
c. 1770–80
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Approx. 16 x 20 in. (40.6 x 50.8 cm)
Museum fur Islamische Kunst, Berlin, I.4594,
folio 38
Guimet only
32. Possibly by Mihr Chand (fl. 1759–86)
Shuja al-Daula, Nawab of Awadh, after a Painting
by Tilly Kettle
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1775
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 14 5⁄ 8 x 10 1⁄2 in. (37.8 x 26.6 cm);
image 93⁄4 x 51⁄4 in. (24.7 x 13.4 cm)
San Diego Museum of Art, Edwin Binney 3rd
Collection, 1990:0413
LACMA only
p. 239
33. Hasan Reza Khan
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1780
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 12 3⁄ 8 x 9 1⁄ 8 in. (31.5 x 23.1 cm);
image 9 1⁄ 8 x 16 1⁄4 in. (23 x 16.1 cm)
The San Diego Museum of Art, Edwin Binney 3rd
Collection, 1990:0415
LACMA only
34. After Emily Eden (England, 1797–1869)
The Nawab of Awadh’s Hunting Cheetahs and
Their Caretakers, from Portraits of the Princes
and People of India
England, 1844
Hand-colored lithograph on paper
22 x 171⁄2 in. (55.9 x 44.4 cm)
Asian Art Museum, The Kapany Collection
1998.63.15
p. 34
35. After Emily Eden (England, 1797–1869)
The Nawab of Awadh’s Hunting Dogs and Falcons
with Their Caretakers, from Portraits of the
Princes and People of India
England, 1844
Hand-colored lithograph on paper
22 x 171⁄2 in. (55.9 x 44.4 cm)
Asian Art Museum, The Kapany Collection,
1998.63.11
p. 34
36. Muhammad Azam
Ghazi al-Din Haidar
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1830
Oil on canvas
36 1⁄4 x 28 3⁄ 8 in. (92.1 x 72.1 cm)
Collection Drs. Aziz and Deanna Khan
p. 19
37. The Audience Chamber of the Kings of Awadh
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1850–1899
Watercolor on paper
Page 14 13⁄16 x 27 19⁄ 32 in. (37.5 x 70 cm);
image 12 13⁄ 32 x 26 7⁄ 32 in. (31.5 x 66.5 cm)
Nasser D. Khalili Collection of Islamic Art,
MSS 941.2
pp. 136–37
38. Medal of Ghazi al-Din Haidar
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1819
Silver
Diam. 21⁄2 in. (6.6 cm)
Kenneth and Joyce Robbins
p. 215
39. Hasan Riza ibn Ali Riza Khan (fl. c. 1845–55),
calligrapher
Wajid Ali Shah Enthroned
Opening folio from a Divan of Wajid Ali Shah
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, dated 1849–50
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper; bound
Page 16 1⁄ 8 x 10 1⁄ 8 in. (41.2 x 26 cm);
image 4 3⁄16 x 5 19⁄ 32 in. (10.7 x 14.2 cm)
Nasser D. Khalili Collection of Islamic Art,
MSS 916
p. 98
40. The Ishqnamah of Wajid Ali Shah
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, dated 1849/50
(AH 1266)
Illuminated manuscript; opaque watercolor
and gold on paper
Book 18 x 117⁄ 8 in. (46.2 x 30.2 cm)
The Royal Collection, RCIN 1005035
pp. 99, 233
41. Ahmad Ali Khan (fl. c. 1850s–60s)
Wajid Ali Shah, King of Oudh
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1855
Photograph mounted on card decorated with
opaque watercolor and gold
Page 113⁄4 x 8 1⁄2 in. (29.8 x 21.4 cm)
The British Library, London, Photo 500/(1)
p. 149
42. Ahmad Ali Khan (fl. c. 1850s–60s)
Mumtaz Alam Nawab Qaisar Mahal Sahiba
of Awadh
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1855
Photograph mounted on card decorated with
opaque watercolor and gold
Page 113⁄4 x 8 1⁄2 in. (29.8 x 21.4 cm)
The British Library, London, Photo 500/(4)
LACMA only
p. 149
43. Ceremonial Mace of Wajid Ali Shah
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1848–56
Agates, bloodstones, cornelians
H. 23 3⁄ 8 in. (59.1 cm)
Victoria and Albert Museum, IM.120-1922
p. 211
44. Presentation Cup with Coat-of-Arms of
Wajid Ali Shah
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1848–56
Repoussé silver
Overall 16 5⁄16 x 14 3⁄4 in. (41.5 x 37.5 cm)
Elizabeth and John Sequeira
p. 216
4. Awadh and the Capitals of Faizabad
and Lucknow
A: Faizabad
45. William Hodges (England, 1744–1797)
A View of Part of the Palace of the Late Nawab Shuja
al-Daula at Faizabad
From 90 original drawings for Choix de Vues de
l’Inde (vol. I, folio 21)
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1783
Gray wash, pen and black ink, and graphite on laid
paper
19 3⁄ 8 x 26 1⁄ 8 in. (49.3 x 66 cm)
Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection,
B1978.43.1742
p. 82
46. Residence of Shuja al-Daula at Faizabad
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1774
Watercolor on paper
18 5⁄ 32 x 55 19⁄ 32 in. (46.5 x 142.5 cm)
Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris, Est., Rés.
Od. 63-Ft-6, folio 24 (Collection Gentil)
LACMA only
47. Fortification of Shuja al-Daula on the Gogra
River at Faizabad
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1774
Watercolor on paper
18 5⁄ 32 x 55 19⁄ 32 in. (46.5 x 142.5 cm)
Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris, Est., Rés.
Od. 63-Ft-6, folio 22 (Collection Gentil)
Guimet only
48. Thomas Daniell (England, 1749–1840) and
William Daniell (England, 1769–1837)
Gate of the Lal Bagh at Faizabad, from Oriental
Scenery, Part 3, plate 3
England, 1801
Aquatint in color
16 23 ⁄ 32 x 23 13⁄16 in. (42.3 x 60.5 cm)
The British Library, London, X432/3(3)
p. 82
B: The Allure of Lucknow
49. Thomas Daniell (England, 1749–1840) and
William Daniell (England, 1769–1837)
The Palace of Nawab Shuja al-Daula from the
River Gomti (the Macchi Bhawan)
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1789
Pencil and watercolor on paper
111⁄4 x 18 1⁄2 in. (27.9 x 45.7 cm)
The British Library, London, WD 189
pp. 124–25
254
50. Thomas Longcroft (England, c. 1760–1811)
Gateway to Palace, Lucknow
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1798
Pencil and ink on paper
81⁄2 x 19 1⁄2 in. (20.3 x 48.3 cm)
The British Library, London, WD 1713
pp. 60–61
51. Thomas Longcroft (England, c. 1760–1811)
Shuja al-Daula’s Palace at Lucknow
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1798
Pencil and ink on paper
16 x 261⁄2 in. (40.5 x 67.5 cm)
The British Library, London, WD 4217
52. William Carpenter (England, 1818–1899)
Street Scene with Gateway and Mosque
(Ganj and Tripolia Gateway)
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1856
Pencil and watercolor on paper
10 x 13 5⁄ 8 in. (25.3 x 35 cm)
Victoria and Albert Museum, IS.187-1881
p. 123
C: Architecture and the Romance of
Faizabad and Lucknow
53. Captain Robert Smith (England, fl. c. 1809–45)
Panorama of Lucknow
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1832
Pencil on paper (8 sketches)
17 x 22 in. (43 x 56 cm) (each section)
Victoria and Albert Museum, D.182 to 189-1891
pp. 142–43
54. Lucknow from the Gomti
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1826
Watercolor on paper
Approx. 12 x 240 in. (30.5 x 609.6 cm)
Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection,
L 500 (8vo)
pp. 84, 85, 86
55. Unfinished Panorama of Lucknow from the
Reign of Muhammad Ali Shah
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1848
Opaque watercolor on paper
14 x 366 in. (35.6 x 929.6 cm)
The British Library, London, Add. Or. 739
pp. 88, 89, 90, 91
56. Procession of Ghazi al-Din Haidar through
the Streets of Lucknow
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1820
Opaque watercolor on paper, restored and
mounted on canvas in 3 sections
Overall 48 1⁄2 x 190 in. (123 x 483 cm); each panel
approx. 48 1⁄2 x 63 3⁄ 8 in. (123 x 161 cm)
Victoria and Albert Museum, I.M.2-1909
pp. 24–25 (detail), 96–97
57. Charles Shepherd and Arthur Robertson
(England, active 1862–63)
Distant View of the Bara Imambara Complex
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1862
Albumen print
10 1⁄4 x 17 7⁄ 8 in. (26 x 37.6 cm)
Howard and Jane Ricketts Collection
p. 127
58. Samuel Bourne (England, 1834–1912)
The Rumi Darwaza and The First Courtyard of the
Bara Imambara Complex
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1864–65
Albumen print
Approx. 9 x 12 in. (22.9 x 30.5 cm)
Musée national des Arts asiatiques–Guimet, Paris,
AP 15370
p. 129
59. Samuel Bourne (England, 1834–1912)
View of the Bara Imambara Complex
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1864–65
Albumen print
9 1⁄2 x 115⁄ 8 in. (24.1 x 29.5 cm)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Gift of Mr.
and Mrs. Philip Feldman, M.83.302.18
LACMA only
p. 120
60. Samuel Bourne (England, 1834–1912)
View of the Bara Imambara Complex
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1864–65
Albumen print
Image approx. 9 x 12 in. (22.9 x 30.5 cm)
Musée national des Arts asiatiques–Guimet, Paris,
AP15429
Guimet only
61. Felice Beato (Greece, 1832–1909)
Southwest View of the Bara Imambara
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1858
Albumen print
10 1⁄4 x 117⁄ 8 in. (25.9 x 30 cm)
Howard and Jane Ricketts Collection
p. 129
62. Charles Shepherd and Arthur Robertson
(England, active 1862–63)
The Asafi Masjid in the Bara Imambara Complex
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1862
Albumen print
Approx. 9 x 12 in. (22.9 x 30.5 cm)
Musée national des Arts asiatiques–Guimet, Paris,
AP 15447
63. John Edward Saché (probably Prussian,
1824–1882)
Husainabad Bazaar Gateway
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1867
Albumen print
Approx. 9 x 12 in. (22.9 x 30.5 cm)
Catherine Benkaim and Barbara Timmer Collection
LACMA only
p. 88
64. Samuel Bourne (England, 1834–1912)
Hussainabad Bazaar Gateway
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1865–66
Albumen print
Approx. 9 x 12 in. (22.9 x 30.5 cm)
Musée national des Arts asiatiques–Guimet, Paris,
AP 15358
Guimet only
65. Samuel Bourne (England, 1834–1912)
The Husainabad Imambara
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1865–66
Albumen print
Approx. 9 x 12 in. (22.9 x 30.5 cm)
Musée national des Arts asiatiques–Guimet, Paris,
AP 15361
p. 130
66. Samuel Bourne (England, 1834–1912)
Tomb of Zinat Algiya in the Husainabad Imambara
Complex
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1864–65
Albumen print
9 1⁄4 x 115⁄ 8 in. (23.5 x 29.5 cm)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Gift of Mr.
and Mrs. Philip Feldman, M.83.302.17
p. 130
67. Charles Shepherd and Arthur Robertson
(England, active 1862–63)
The Jawab Opposite the Tomb of Zinat Algiya in the
Husainabad Imambara Complex
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1862
Albumen print
101⁄ 8 x 14 1⁄ 8 in. (25.8 x 36 cm)
Howard and Jane Ricketts Collection
p. 130
68. Shah Najaf Imambara
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1880
Photographic print
8 5⁄16 x 10 13⁄16 in. (21.1 x 27.5 cm)
The British Library, London, Photo 50/2(119)
p. 131
69. Darogah Abbas Ali (fl. c. 1860s–70s)
The Lucknow Album: Containing a Series of Fifty
Photographic Views of Lucknow
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1874
Albumen prints bound in book
Book H. 10 1⁄4 in. (26 cm)
Getty Research Institute, DS486.L9 A5
pp. 93, 161
70. Samuel Bourne (England, 1834–1912)
View of the Chattar Manzil Palace Complex
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1864–65
Albumen print
9 1⁄ 8 x 111⁄2 in. (23.2 x 29.2 cm)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Gift of Mr.
and Mrs. Philip Feldman, M.83.302.15
p. 150
71. G. W. Lawrie and Company (Scotland,
active 1880–1920)
Bara Chattar Manzil from the Gomti River
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1895
Gelatin silver print
8 7⁄ 32 x 11 13⁄ 32 in. (20.8 x 29 cm)
The British Library, London, Photo 1205(1)
p. 144
255
72. Samuel Bourne (England, 1834–1912)
Darshan Bilas and Chota Chattar Manzil
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1864–65
Albumen print
Approx. 9 x 12 in. (22.9 x 30.5 cm)
Musée national des Arts asiatiques–Guimet, Paris,
AP 15366
p. 135
73. Charles Shepherd and Arthur Robertson
(England, active 1862–63)
Bara Chattar Manzil and Farhat Bakhsh, View from
the South
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1862
Albumen print
10 3⁄4 x 14 5⁄ 8 in. (27.4 x 37.3 cm)
Howard and Jane Ricketts Collection
p. 135
74. Samuel Bourne (England, 1834–1912)
West Gateway of the Qaisar Bagh Palace
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1864–65
Albumen print
Image approx. 9 x 12 in. (22.9 x 30.5 cm)
Musée national des Arts asiatiques–Guimet, Paris,
AP15369
p. 138
75. Samuel Bourne (England, 1834–1912)
View in the Qaisar Bagh Palace
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1864–65
Albumen print
9 1⁄ 8 x 117⁄16 in. (23.2 x 29.1 cm)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Gift of Mr.
and Mrs. Philip Feldman, M.83.302.16
LACMA only
p. 139
76. Samuel Bourne (England, 1834–1912)
View in the Qaisar Bagh Palace
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1864–65
Albumen print
Approx. 9 x 12 in. (22.9 x 30.5 cm)
Musée national des Arts asiatiques–Guimet, Paris,
AP 15367
Guimet only
77. Samuel Bourne (England, 1834–1912)
Qaisar Bagh, Vinery and Buildings
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1864–65
Albumen print
Approx. 9 x 12 in. (22.9 x 30.5 cm)
Victoria and Albert Museum, 53163
p. 138
78. Possibly by Robert Christopher Tytler
(England, 1818–1872) and Harriet Christina Tytler
(England, 1828–1907)
Qaisar Pasand
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1858–59
Paper negative
15 3⁄ 8 x 20 7⁄ 8 in. (39.1 x 53 cm)
Collection of the Sack Photographic Trust,
SFMOMA, ST1998.0348.1
p. 159
79. Samuel Bourne (England, 1834–1912)
Qaisar Pasand
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1864–65
Albumen print
151⁄4 x 2113⁄16 in. (38.7 x 55.4 cm)
Collection of the Sack Photographic Trust,
SFMOMA, ST1998.0348.2
LACMA only
p. 139
80. Samuel Bourne (England, 1834–1912)
Qaisar Pasand
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1864–65
Albumen print
Approx. 9 x 12 in. (22.9 x 30.5 cm)
Musée national des Arts asiatiques–Guimet, Paris,
AP 15362
Guimet only
81. Robert Christopher Tytler (England,
1818–1872) and Harriet Christina Tytler (England,
1828–1907)
View of the Upper Portion of the Qaisar Pasand
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1858
Albumen print from a paper negative
15 13⁄ 32 x 20 3⁄ 32 in. (39 x 51 cm)
The British Library, London, Photo 32/(10)
p. 159
82. Samuel Bourne (England, 1834–1912)
Dilkusha Kothi
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1865–66
Albumen print
9 13⁄ 32 x 11 19⁄ 32 in. (24 x 29.4 cm)
The British Library, London, 254/2(16)
p. 64
5. Courtly Opulence in Awadh
83. Water Pipe
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, late 18th
or early 19th century
Silver, partly gilt, with champlevé enamel in
translucent green, cobalt blue, and opaque
yellow and white
H. 33 in. (84 cm); diam. 191⁄4 in. (49 cm)
Indian Museum, Kolkata, 12931, s. no. 143
p. 209
84. Water Pipe Mat
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1800–1850
Cotton ground and silk velvet with metal thread
embroidery
Diam. 20 9⁄ 32 in. (52 cm)
Victoria and Albert Museum, IS.1-1999
p. 226
85. Water Pipe Snake Cover
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1800–1850
Silk velvet with metal thread embroidery
L. (including fringe) 33 5⁄ 8 in. (85.5 cm);
w. 37⁄ 8 in. (9.8 cm)
Victoria and Albert Museum, IS.3535
p. 235
86. Betel Box in the Form of an Ogival Dome
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1780
Enameled silver
5 x 51⁄4 in. (12.7 x 13.3 cm)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, purchased with
funds provided by Harry and Yvonne Lenart,
AC1993.137.1.1-.2
p. 204
87. Betel Box
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, early 18th century
Silver, partly gilt, with champlevé enamel
2 5⁄ 8 x 4 1⁄ 8 x 31⁄2 in. (6.7 x 10.5 x 8.9 cm)
Victoria and Albert Museum, IM.30-1912
p. 200
88. Tray and Matching Box with Four Scent Vials
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, late 18th century
Enameled silver inlaid with foil-backed pastes
4 7⁄ 8 x 10 1⁄ 8 x 8 in. (12.4 x 25.7 x 20.3 cm)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, from the Nasli
and Alice Heeramaneck Collection, Museum
Associates Purchase, M.76.2.27a-k
p. 212
89. Basin
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, late 18th
or early 19th century
Parcel gilt silver inlaid with blue, green,
and purple enamels
H. 5 23⁄ 32 in. (14 cm); diam. 12 5⁄16 in. (31.3 cm)
The David Collection, Copenhagen, 73/1980
pp. 206 (detail), 207
90. Water Pipe Base
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, late 18th
or early 19th century
Silver, partly gilt, enameled
H. 77⁄ 32 in. (18.5 cm); diam. 77⁄ 32 in. (18.5 cm)
Victoria and Albert Museum, 122-1886
p. 201
91. Water Pipe Base
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, late 18th–early
19th century
Gilt enameled silver
H. 77⁄ 8 in. (20 cm); diam. 71⁄2 in. (19.1 cm)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Gift of Dr. S.
Sanford Kornblum and Mrs. Charlene S. Kornblum
in honor of the museum's 40th anniversary and in
honor of Amy Poster, Dr. Pratapaditya Pal, Dr.
Robert Brown, and Dr. Stephen Markel, M.2005.95
p. 198
92. Two Pieces from a Water Pipe
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, late 18th or early
19th century
Silver, cast, pierced and partly gilt, enameled
with blue and green
Bowl, h. 3 5⁄16 in. (8.5 cm); cover, h. 211⁄ 32 in. (6 cm)
Private collection
p. 208
93. Sword and Scabbard
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 18th century
Silver, enameled and gilded
L. (overall) 39 in. (99 cm)
Lent by: Dar al-Athar al-Islamiyyah, The al-Sabah
Collection, Kuwait
LNS 1124 M
p. 205
256
94. Katar Sheath
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, late 18th century
Parcel gilt silver (velvet lined interior)
L. 9 3⁄4 in. (24.8 cm); w. 311⁄16 in. (9.4 cm);
diam. 13⁄16 in. (1.8 cm)
Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, 2003.49
p. 207
95. Tureen with Cover
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1775
Parcel-gilt silver, chased and engraved
H. 81⁄4 in. (21 cm); diam. 811⁄16 in. (22 cm)
The Collection of Julian Sands
pp. 202–3
96. Chape from a Sword Scabbard
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1780
Parcel gilt silver
L. 11 in. (28 cm); w. 19⁄16 in. (4 cm)
The Cincinnati Art Museum, Museum purchase:
given in honor of the 30th anniversary of the Art
Museum Docent Program; Gift of The Fleischmann
Foundation in memory of Julius Fleischmann; and
Bequest of Reuben Springer, by exchange, 1991.50
p. 202
97. Sword Belt Fitting
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1750–1800
Silver
51⁄4 x 4 x 1⁄2 in. (13.3 x 10.2 x 1.3 cm)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, purchased with
funds provided by the Nasli and Alice Heeramaneck
Collection, Museum Associates Purchase, M.2007.10
p. 207
98. Water Pipe Base
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1700–1750
Clear glass with polychrome enamel and gilding
71⁄ 8 x 6 1⁄4 in. (18.1 x 15.9 cm)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, from the
Nasli and Alice Heeramaneck Collection, Museum
Associates Purchase, M.76.2.13
p. 200
99. Water Pipe Base
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1780
Dark green glass with gold; light green enamel
on the interior
8 x 71⁄4 in. (20.3 x 18.4 cm)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, from the
Nasli and Alice Heeramaneck Collection, Museum
Associates Purchase, M.76.2.28
p. 203
100. Water Pipe Base
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1725–75
Clear glass with polychrome enamel and gilding
71⁄ 8 x 6 1⁄4 in. (18.1 x 15.9 cm)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, from the
Nasli and Alice Heeramaneck Collection, Museum
Associates Purchase, M.76.2.21
p. 208
101. Man’s Garment with Chikan Work
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 19th century
Cotton muslin with embroidery and appliqué
L. approx. 50 in. (127 cm); w. (at shoulder)
15 in. (38.1 cm)
Victoria and Albert Museum, IS.20-2008
p. 236 (detail)
102. Shawl with Chikan Work
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, early 19th century
Cotton and silk embroidery and pulled-thread
work on cotton plain weave
1831⁄2 x 41 in. (466.1 x 104.1 cm)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, from the Nasli
and Alice Heeramaneck Collection, Museum
Associates Purchase, M.83.105.27
pp. 217 (detail), 237 (detail)
103. Crown
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1850
Red fabric, silver thread, and tinsel
H. approx. 71⁄ 8 in. (18 cm); diam. approx. 71⁄ 8 in.
(18 cm)
Victoria and Albert Museum, IS.0339
p. 239
104. Minister’s Turban
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1850
Satin, embroidered with gold thread, tinsel,
and sequins
H. 7 in. (18 cm); diam. 11 in. (28 cm)
Victoria and Albert Museum, IS.0335
p. 239
6. A Cosmopolitan Culture: Personalities,
Lives, and Pursuits in Late-18th-Century
Lucknow
105. Colonel Mordaunt’s Cockfight, after a Painting
by Johann Zoffany
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1800
Opaque watercolor on paper
175⁄ 8 x 26 1⁄16 in. (44.7 x 66.2 cm)
Harvard Art Museum/Arthur M. Sackler Museum,
The Stuart Cary Welch Collection, Gift of Edith I.
Welch in memory of Stuart Cary Welch,
2009.202.225
p. 66
106. Colonel Antoine-Louis Henri Polier Watching a
Nautch, after a Painting by Johann Zoffany
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad or Lucknow,
c. 1786–88
Opaque watercolor on paper
9 13⁄16 x 12 5⁄ 8 in. (25 x 32 cm)
Bequest of Balthasar Reinhart,
Museum Rietberg, Zurich, 2005.83
p. 68
107. Sita Ram (fl. c. 1810–22)
General Claude Martin’s House Constantia Set
in Its Park at Lucknow
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1814–15
Watercolor on paper, in bound album
Album: 1815⁄16 x 12 3⁄4 in. (48 x 32 cm)
The British Library, London, Add. Or. 4750
p. 30
108. Charles Shepherd and Arthur Robertson
(England, active 1862–63)
La Martinière and the Lath
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1862
Albumen print
91⁄4 x 14 3⁄4 in. (23.4 x 37.4 cm)
Howard and Jane Ricketts Collection
p. 132
109. F. Frith & Co.; Francis Frith (England,
1822–1898)
La Martinière
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1870s
Albumen print
Approx. 9 x 12 in. (22.9 x 30.5 cm)
Musée national des Arts asiatiques–Guimet, Paris,
AP 15364
p. 58
110. Spoonbill
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1780
Opaque watercolor on paper
24 7⁄ 8 x 18 7⁄ 8 in. (63 x 47.8 cm)
Victoria and Albert Museum, IS.7-1955
p. 36
111.Pair of Silver-Barreled Pistols Presented by
Claude Martin to Lt. Col. Alexander Ross in
December 1786
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1786
Silver lock plates carved with foliage and engraved;
walnut half-stocks inlaid with silver wire
L. 131⁄2 in. (34.3 cm)
Lieutenant General Sir Philip Trousdell
p. 57
112. Sword Presented to Claude Martin by Asaf
al-Daula in 1786/87
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, dated 1786/87
Hilt: white nephrite inlaid with rubies and emeralds
set in gold; blade: watered steel inlaid with gold
L. 38 5⁄ 8 in. (99 cm)
Private collection by courtesy of Howard Ricketts
p. 221 (detail)
113. Mirror that Belonged to Claude Martin
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, dated 1782
Green nephrite inlaid with multicolored enamel
and gold
8 3⁄ 8 x 51⁄4 x 3⁄ 8 in. (21.2 x 13.5 x 1 cm)
Islamic Arts Museum Malaysia, 2008.1.14
pp. 222 (detail), 223
7. European Patrons and Collectors of
Indian Painting at Lucknow
A: From Polier Albums
114. Shamsa page
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1776
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Image: 8 3⁄ 8 x 8 3⁄ 8 in. (21.3 x 21.3 cm)
Museum für Islamische Kunst, Berlin I.4596,
folio 30
LACMA only
257
115. Mihr Chand (fl. 1759–86)
The Mughal Emperor Shah Alam II on a Palace
Terrace in Allahabad
India, Uttar Pradesh, Allahabad, c. 1759
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
93⁄4 x 71⁄ 8 in. (24.7 x 18.1 cm)
Museum für Islamische Kunst, Berlin, I.4594,
folio 32r
LACMA only
p. 178
116. Mihr Chand (fl. 1759–86)
Venus
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1773–76
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Image: 5 7⁄ 8 x 9 1⁄ 8 in. (15 x 23.1 cm)
Museum für Islamische Kunst, Berlin, I.4594,
folio 27
LACMA only
p. 35
117. Mihr Chand (fl. 1759–86)
A Dervish Receiving a Visitor
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad or Lucknow,
c. 1765–76
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Image: 10 1⁄4 x 7 1⁄2 in. (26 x 19.1 cm)
Museum für Islamische Kunst, Berlin, I.4594,
folio 40
LACMA only
p. 177
118. Style of Mihr Chand
A Partridge and an Iris
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad or Lucknow,
c. 1765–75
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Image 9 3⁄ 8 x 10 in. (16.3 x 25.4 cm)
Museum für Islamische Kunst, Berlin, I.4595,
folio 17
LACMA only
p. 9
119. Mihr Chand (fl. 1759–86)
Vishnu and Lakshmi on Garuda
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad or Lucknow,
c. 1770–80
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Image: 7 7⁄ 32 x 5 3⁄16 in. (18.3 x 13.2 cm)
Museum für Islamische Kunst, Berlin, I.4595,
folio 35
Guimet only
120. Mihr Chand (fl. 1759–86)
Venus (small version)
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad or Lucknow,
c. 1773–76
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Image: 313⁄16 x 5 29⁄ 32 in. (9.7 x 15 cm)
Museum für Islamische Kunst, Berlin, I.4595,
folio 22
Guimet only
121. Mihr Chand (fl. 1759–86)
Nilgai
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad or Lucknow,
c. 1770–76
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Image: 101⁄2 x 7 in. (26.6 x 17.7 cm)
Museum für Islamische Kunst, Berlin, I.4594,
folio 2
Guimet only
p. 35
122. Style of Mihr Chand
The Mughal Prince Mirza Jawan Bakht
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad or Lucknow,
c. 1786
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Image: 5 x 3 1⁄2 in. (12.8 x 8.9 cm)
Museum für Islamische Kunst, Berlin, I.4597,
folio 13
Guimet only
p. 178
123. Mihr Chand (fl. 1759–86)
The Qawwal Sheikh Shir Muhammad Debates with
His Followers
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad or Lucknow,
c. 1765–73
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Image 12 5⁄ 8 x 8 in. (32.1 x 20.2 cm)
Museum für Islamische Kunst, Berlin, I.4596,
folio 29
Guimet only
p. 179
124. Deva Gandhara Ragini
Folio from a Ragamala album
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad or Lucknow, c. 1780
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 12 1⁄2 x 9 1⁄ 8 in. (31.7 x 23.3 cm)
Museum für Asiatische Kunst, Berlin, Polier album
I 5062, folio 11
p. 177
125. Dipaka Raga
Folio from a Ragamala album
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad or Lucknow, c. 1780
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 12 1⁄2 x 9 1⁄ 8 in. (31.7 x 23.3 cm)
Museum für Asiatische Kunst, Berlin, Polier album
I 5062, folio 18
126. Khambhavati Ragini
Folio from a Ragamala album
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad or Lucknow, c. 1780
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 12 1⁄2 x 9 1⁄ 8 in. (31.7 x 23.3 cm)
Museum für Asiatische Kunst, Berlin, Polier album
I 5062, folio 28
127. Shah Jahan
Folio from a portrait album
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad or Lucknow, c. 1780
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 15 11⁄16 x 111⁄ 8 in. (39.8 x 28.2 cm);
image 8 x 5 in. (20.5 x 12.7 cm)
Museum für Asiatische Kunst, Berlin, Polier album
I 5063, folio 9b
pp. 63, 203 (detail)
128. Aurangzeb
Folio from a portrait album
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad or Lucknow, c. 1780
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 15 11⁄16 x 111⁄ 8 in. (39.8 x 28.2 cm);
image 51⁄2 x 3 3⁄4 in. (14 x 9.4 cm)
Museum für Asiatische Kunst, Berlin, Polier album
I 5063, folio 10b
p. 186
129. Muhammad Shah
Folio from a portrait album
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad or Lucknow, c. 1780
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 15 11⁄16 x 111⁄ 8 in. (39.8 x 28.2 cm);
image 8 1⁄2 x 51⁄2 in. (21.7 x 14.1 cm)
Museum für Asiatische Kunst, Berlin, Polier album
I 5063, folio 16b
130. Attributed to Mihr Chand (fl. 1759–86)
Jami Masjid, Delhi
India, Faizabad or Delhi, c. 1773–76
Opaque watercolor on paper
Page 18 x 24 19⁄ 32 in. (45.7 x 62.5 cm)
Museum für Asiatische Kunst, Berlin, I 5005,
folio 2
p. 80
131. Attributed to Mihr Chand (fl. 1759–86)
Taj Mahal
India, Faizabad or Delhi, c. 1773–76
Opaque watercolor on paper
Page 18 x 24 19⁄ 32 in. (45.7 x 62.5 cm)
Museum für Asiatische Kunst, Berlin, I 5005,
folio 16
p. 80
132. Palace Garden in a River Landscape
India, Uttar Pradesh, Awadh, c. 1785
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 18 x 24 19⁄ 32 in. (45.7 x 62.5 cm)
Museum für Asiatische Kunst, Berlin, I 5005,
folio 10
p. 62
B: from Johnson albums
133. Mir Kalan Khan (fl. c. 1734–70)
A Princess Watching a Maid Killing a Snake
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1770
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 159⁄16 x 1017⁄ 32 in. (39.9 x 27 cm);
image 8 5⁄16 x 6 9⁄16 in. (21.3 x 16.8 cm)
The British Library, London, J.15, 8
p. 39
134. Style of Mir Kalan Khan
A European Princess
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1770
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 1315⁄16 x 713⁄16 in. (35.7 x 20.1 cm);
image 9 7⁄ 32 x 7 in. (23.6 x 17.9 cm)
The British Library, London, J.12, 4
LACMA only
p. 39
258
135. Bahadur Singh (fl. c. 1760–90)
Portrait of a Mufti
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1775
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 19 7⁄ 8 x 133⁄4 in. (50.5 x 35 cm);
image 8 3⁄ 8 x 5 3⁄ 8 in. (21.2 x 13.5 cm)
The British Library, London, J.1, 20
LACMA only
p. 63
136. Patak Chand
Raja Anand Dev and Raja Dhrub Dev
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1770
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 14 5⁄ 8 x 191⁄2 in. (37.2 x 49.6 cm);
image 81⁄2 x 131⁄2 in. (21.8 x 31.4 cm)
The British Library, London, J.1, 18
LACMA only
p. 37
137. Mohan Singh (fl. c. 1770–82)
Story of the Elephants and Rabbits
Folio from an Iyar-i-Danish manuscript
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1770
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 12 5⁄ 8 x 8 in. (32.2 x 20.8 cm);
image 6 3⁄4 x 41⁄ 8 in. (17.2 x 10.6 cm)
The British Library, London, J.54, 26
p. 62
138. Mohan Singh (fl. c. 1770–82)
Story of the Elephants and Rabbits
Folio from an Iyar-i Danish manuscript
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1770
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 12 5⁄ 8 x 8 in. (32.2 x 20.7 cm);
image 6 3⁄4 x 41⁄4 in. (17.2 x 10.9 cm)
The British Library, London, J.54, 29
p. 62
139. Ghulam Reza (fl. c. 1780–82)
Bhairava Raga
Folio from a Ragamala series
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1780–82
Ink, watercolor, and gold on paper
9 x 5 3⁄ 8 in. (22.7 x 13.8 cm)
The British Library, London, J.42,1
p. 183
140. Ghulam Reza (fl. c. 1780–82)
Bhairavi Ragini
Folio from a Ragamala series
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1780–82
Ink, watercolor, and gold on paper
87⁄ 8 x 51⁄2 in. (22.5 x 14 cm)
The British Library, London, J.42.3
p. 183
C: from Gentil albums
141. Shuja Quli Khan and a Woman on a Terrace
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1760
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 1213⁄16 x 101⁄16 in. (32.8 x 25.8 cm);
image 77⁄ 32 x 71⁄ 32 in. (18.5 x 18 cm)
Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris, Estampes,
Rés. Od. 51 no.4, folio 20 (Collection Gentil)
LACMA only
p. 39
142. Muhammad Visited by the Archangel Gabriel
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1760
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 173⁄4 x 121⁄2 in. (45 x 32 cm);
image 8 x 6 in. (20.4 x 15 cm)
Bibliothèque nationale de France, Est., Rés. Od. 44,
folio 29
LACMA only
143. Style of Dip Chand
Shah Alam II in a Palanquin
Left side of a two-page composition
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1765
Opaque watercolor on paper
20 1⁄4 x 14 1⁄2 in. (51.5 x 37 cm)
Bibliothèque nationale de France, Est., Od. 32, t.1,
folio 2
LACMA only
144. Style of Dip Chand
Shuja ud-Daula Receives the Emperor Shah Alam II
Right side of a two-page composition
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1765
Opaque watercolor on paper
201⁄4 x 14 3⁄ 8 in. (51.5 x 36.5 cm)
Bibliothèque nationale de France, Est., Od. 32, t.1,
folio 3
LACMA only
145. Style of Mir Kalan Khan
Ibrahim Adham Served by Four Angels
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1770
Opaque watercolor, gold, and silver on paper
Page 173⁄4 x 121⁄2 in. (45 x 32 cm); image 71⁄2 x 51⁄4 in.
(19 x 13.3 cm)
Bibliothèque nationale de France, Est., Rés. Od. 44,
folio 39
Guimet only
146. Attributed to Bahadur Singh (?)
Voyage of Zulaikha
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1760
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 173⁄4 x 121⁄2 in. (45 x 32 cm);
image 1113⁄16 x 121⁄2 in. (30 x 32 cm)
Bibliothèque nationale de France, Est., Rés. Od. 44,
folio 15
Guimet only
147. Attributed to Bahadur Singh (?)
Yusuf Goes to Meet Zulaikha
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1760
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 173⁄4 x 121⁄2 in. (45 x 32 cm);
image 1113⁄16 x 121⁄2 in. (30 x 32 cm)
Bibliothèque nationale de France, Est., Rés. Od. 44,
folio 16
Guimet only
D: Polier, Gentil, and Johnson
148. Mihr Chand (fl. 1759–86)
Female Musician
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad or Lucknow,
c. 1765–73
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Image 8 5⁄ 8 x 5 7⁄ 8 in. (21.8 x 14.9 cm)
Museum für Islamische Kunst, Berlin, I.4595,
folio 2
LACMA only
p. 179
149. Female Musician
India, West Bengal, Murshidabad, c. 1760
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 15 7⁄ 8 x 10 3⁄4 in. (40.3 x 27.3 cm); image 7 19⁄ 32 x
4 5⁄16 in. (19.3 x 11 cm)
Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris, Est., Od.
43, folio 6 (Collection Gentil)
LACMA only
p. 179
150. Mihr Chand (fl. 1759–86)
A Female Hermit with Two Ascetics before a Hut
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad or Lucknow,
c. 1765–73
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Image 7 13⁄ 32 x 5 5⁄16 in. (18.9 x 13.5 cm)
Museum für Islamische Kunst, Berlin, I.4594,
folio 1
Guimet only
p. 35
151. A Female Hermit with Two Ascetics before a Hut
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow (?), c. 1760
Drawing; black ink highlighted with slight colors
Page 113⁄ 8 x 75⁄ 8 in. (29 x 19.5 cm);
image 611⁄16 x 4 7⁄ 8 in. (17 x 12.2 cm)
Musée national des Arts asiatiques–Guimet, Paris,
no. 35568
Guimet only
152. A Game of Polo
India, Uttar Pradesh, Awadh, c. 1785
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 18 x 24 19⁄ 32 in. (45.7 x 62.5 cm)
Museum für Asiatische Kunst, Berlin, I 5005,
folio 8
p. 37
153. Ram Sahai
A Game of Polo
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, c. 1770
Ink on paper
Page 19 x 14 3⁄ 8 in. (48.2 x 36.6 cm);
image 101⁄2 x 15 in. (26.8 x 38 cm)
The British Library, London, J.1, 27
p. 37
E: from The Eyre-Coote Album
154. Attributed to Mihr Chand (fl. 1759–86)
Nawab Shuja al-Daula, after a Portrait by Tilly
Kettle, and Two Pictures of Beauties
Page from the Lady Coote Album
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1780
Ink, transparent and opaque watercolor, and gold
on paper
Page 1711⁄16 x 24 1⁄ 8 in. (45 x 61.3 cm)
Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, Achenbach
Foundation for Graphic Arts Endowment Fund,
1982.2.70.1
p. 180
155. Asad Khan and Alamgir
Page from the Lady Coote Album
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1780
Ink, transparent and opaque watercolor, and gold
on paper
Page 177⁄ 8 x 24 3⁄4 in. (45.2 x 62.7 cm)
Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, Museum
259
purchase, Achenbach Foundation for Graphic Arts
Endowment Fund, 1982.2.70.2
p. 180
156. Women’s Dancing Party
Page from the Lady Coote Album
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1780
Ink, transparent and opaque watercolor, and gold
on paper
Page 173⁄ 8 x 24 1⁄ 8 in. (44.2 x 61.4 cm)
Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, Museum
purchase, partial gift of Mr. and Mrs. John D.
MacDonald and Achenbach Foundation for Graphic
Arts Endowment Fund, 1982.2.70.6
p. 6
F: from The Clive Collection
157. Mir Kalan Khan (fl. c. 1734–70)
A Royal Lion Hunt at Allahabad
India, Uttar Pradesh, Allahabad, c. 1760–65
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Image 28 3⁄ 32 x 3315⁄16 in. (72 x 84.5 cm)
Powis Castle, The Powis Collection (National Trust)
pp. 4–5
G: from The Wellington Album
158. The Lovers Elope
Folio from the Wellington Album
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1800
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 17 x 121⁄2 in. (43.2 x 31.8 cm);
image 107⁄ 8 x 73⁄4 in. (27.6 x 19.7 cm)
Dr. Bonnie Sturner in memory of Peter Silton
p. 38
159. Shirin Discovers the Body of Farhad
Folio from the Wellington Album
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1800
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Page 17 x 121⁄2 in. (43.2 x 31.8 cm);
image 107⁄ 8 x 73⁄4 in. (27.6 x 19.7 cm)
Dr. S. Sanford Kornblum and Mrs. Charlene S.
Kornblum
p. 38
H: Decorative Arts: Polier and Clive
160. Emerald Seal Belonging to Antoine-Louis
Polier
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1774/75 (AH 1188);
ring/setting: Cartier early 20th century
Emerald, diamonds, and gold
Emerald: 11⁄16 x 23⁄ 32 in. (1.7 x 1.8 cm)
Collection of Galerie Minerva, Zurich
p. 220
161. Betel Set Belonging to Edward Clive,
Governor of Madras
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, late 18th or early
19th century
Silver, partly gilt and enameled, with silver filigree,
foiled glass, and turquoises
Casket (largest component): h. 6 7⁄16 in. (16.5 cm),
diam. 11 in. (28 cm)
Powis Castle, The Powis Collection (National Trust)
p. 210
8. Lucknow and the Great Uprising
of 1857: European Visions
A: “Mutiny,” Pilgrimage, and Memory
162. Felice Beato (Greece, 1832–1909)
Panorama of Lucknow, Taken from the Qaisar Bagh
Palace
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1858
Albumen print
9 5⁄ 8 x 697⁄ 8 in. (24.5 x 177.5 cm)
Howard and Jane Ricketts Collection
pp. 154–55
163. Felice Beato (Greece, 1832–1909)
Panorama of Lucknow, Taken from the Bara
Imambara
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1858
Albumen print
91⁄2 x 931⁄2 in. (24 x 237.5 cm)
Howard and Jane Ricketts Collection
pp. 87 (detail), 154–55
164. Felice Beato (Greece, 1832–1909)
Bara Chattar Manzil with the King’s Fish-Shaped
Boat
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1858
Albumen print
91⁄4 x 117⁄ 8 in. (23.4 x 30 cm)
Howard and Jane Ricketts Collection
p. 85
165. Felice Beato (Greece, 1832–1909)
Ruins of the Battery in the Residency Compound
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1858
Albumen print
10 x 117⁄ 8 in. (25.3 x 30 cm)
Howard and Jane Ricketts Collection
p. 156
166. Felice Beato (Greece, 1832–1909)
Interior of the Sikander Bagh, after the Slaughter of
2,000 Rebels by the 93rd Highlanders, and the 4th
Punjab Regt.
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1858
Albumen print
101⁄2 x 113⁄4 in. (26.8 x 29.7 cm)
Howard and Jane Ricketts Collection
p. 157
167. Felice Beato (Greece, 1832–1909)
Baillie Guard Gate
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1858
Albumen print
Approx. 10 x 12 in. (25.4 x 30.5 cm)
Catherine Benkaim and Barbara Timmer Collection
LACMA only
p. 153
168. Samuel Bourne (England, 1834–1912)
Baillie Guard Gate
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1864–65
Albumen print
Approx. 9 x 12 in. (22.9 x 30.5 cm)
Musée national des Arts asiatiques–Guimet, Paris,
AP 15357
Guimet only
169. Samuel Bourne (England, 1834–1912)
Ruins of the Residency
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1864–65
Albumen print
91⁄ 8 x 111⁄2 in. (23.2 x 29.2 cm)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Gift of Mr.
and Mrs. Philip Feldman, M.83.302.19
LACMA only
p. 140
170. Samuel Bourne (England, 1834–1912)
Ruins of the Residency
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1864–65
Albumen print
Approx. 9 x 12 in. (22.9 x 30.5 cm)
Bibliothèque nationale de France, Département des
Estampes et de la photographie, VH 271, folio 15
Guimet only
B: Imagining the “Mutiny”: Paintings for the
British Public
171. Thomas Jones Barker (England, 1815–1882)
The Relief of Lucknow, 1857
England, 1859
Oil on canvas
411⁄2 x 713⁄ 8 in. (105.4 x 181.3 cm)
Lent by the National Portrait Gallery, London, 5851
pp. 42–43
172. Frederick Goodall (England, 1822–1904)
Jessie’s Dream (The Relief of Lucknow)
England, 1858
Oil on canvas
315⁄ 8 x 48 in. (80.4 x 121.9 cm)
Sheffield Galleries and Museum Trust (U.K.),
Inv. No. 1586
p. 45
173. Abraham Solomon (England, 1824–1862)
The Flight from Lucknow
England, 1858
Oil on canvas
24 x 18 in. (61 x 45.7 cm)
Leicester Museums and Galleries: New Walk
Museum and Art Gallery, Inv. No. L.F.13.1891.0.0
p. 45
174. Chevalier Louis-William Desanges (1822–1887)
Thomas Henry Kavanagh VC (1821–1882) Being
Disguised as a Native during the Indian Mutiny at
the Siege of Lucknow, 9 November 1857
England, 1859–62
Oil on canvas
Approx. 24 x 36 in. (61 x 91.4 cm)
Council of the National Army Museum, London
p. 45
175. William Simpson (Scotland, 1823–1899)
View of the Qaisar Bagh in Lucknow
India, Uttar Pradesh, 1864
Watercolor on paper
14 x 10 in. (35.6 x 25.4 cm)
Victoria and Albert Museum, 1156-1869
p. 41
176. William Simpson (Scotland, 1823–1899)
The Shah Najaf
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1861
260
Watercolor with gouache over graphite on paper
14 3⁄4 x 20 7⁄ 8 in. (37.5 x 53 cm)
Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection,
B1975.3.262
p. 40
177. Rosewater Casket
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, late 18th century
Gilt silver
4 x 4 3⁄4 x 31⁄4 in. (9.5 x 12 x 8.5 cm)
Islamic Arts Museum Malaysia, 2004.12.12
p. 210
9. Epilogue: Post-Uprising Artistic Produc-
tion at Lucknow
178. Shield Presented to Edward VII When Prince of
Wales by the Maharaja of Kashmir during the Winter
of 1875–76
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, early 19th century
Silver-gilt, brass, enamels, diamonds, and lac
Diam. 18 23 ⁄ 32 in. (48 cm)
The Royal Collection, RCIN 11278
Guimet only
p. 211
179. Darogah Abbas Ali (fl. c. 1860s–70s)
An Illustrated Historical Album of the Rajas and
Taluqdars of Oudh
India, Uttar Pradesh, Awadh; published in
Allahabad, 1880
Albumen prints
Each 31⁄4 x 2 in. (8.4 x 5.2 cm); bound album approx.
8 x 10 x 2 in. (20.3 x 25 x 5 cm)
Kenneth and Joyce Robbins
pp. 21, 240
180. Plate with Emblematic Pairs of Fish
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1880
Bidri ware
H. 1⁄2 in. (1.3 cm); diam. 6 3⁄4 in. (17.2 cm)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, purchased with
funds provided by Kiran Wadhwani Samuels in
loving memory of Mulchand Navalrai Wadhwani,
M.2001.100
p. 219
181. Wine Decanter
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1880
Bidri ware
H. 9 3⁄16 in. (23.5 cm); diam. 5 3⁄ 32 in. (13 cm)
Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya
(formerly Prince of Wales Museum), Mumbai,
28.5533
p. 218
182. Ewer with Coriander Flower Pattern
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1860
Parcel-gilt silver with cast and applied palmettes
and heads
73⁄4 x 5 in. (19.7 x 12.7 cm)
Richard Milhender
p. 22
183. Bowl with Fish Designs
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1880–1900
Silver
61⁄4 x 8 3⁄ 8 in. (15.9 x 21.3 cm)
Richard Milhender
p. 219
10. Legacy of Glory: Lucknow in the 191. Hair Ornament 199. Pair of Ear Ornaments
Popular Imagination India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. mid-19th century India, Uttar Pradesh, Varanasi (Benares), c. 1850
Gold set with rubies, emeralds, and diamonds, and Gold and silver set with diamonds, pendants of seed
184. Acrobats Performing on a Tightrope for a
with strings of pearls and red glass beads pearls, and green glass
Women’s Dancing Party
Length of coiled pendants 915⁄16 in. (23 cm) H. 61⁄2 in. (16.5 cm)
Page from the Lady Coote Album
Victoria and Albert Museum, IS.03209 Victoria and Albert Museum, IS.03254&A
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1780–85
p. 47 p. 231
Ink, watercolor, and gold on paper
Page 171⁄2 x 24 in. (44.4 x 60.7 cm) 192. Woman's Head Ornament 200. Darogah Abbas Ali (fl. c. 1860s–70s)
Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, Museum India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1800–1850 Gummoon Jan, Dancing Girl
purchase, partial gift of Mr. and Mrs. John Repoussé silver From The Beauties of Lucknow, consisting of
MacDonald and Achenbach Foundation for Graphic 513⁄16 x 4 3⁄ 8 in. (14.8 x 11.2 cm) twenty-four selected photographed portraits, cabinet
Arts Endowment Fund, 1983.2.12 Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Southern Asian size, of the most celebrated and popular living
LACMA only Art Council in memory of Ranjit and Aruna Roy, histrionic singers, dancing girls and actresses of the
p. 77 M.2006.133 Oudh Court and of Lucknow
p. 213 India, Uttar Pradesh, Awadh, 1874
185. Acrobats Performing on a Tightrope
Albumen prints
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1785 193. Forehead Ornament
Album approx. 10 x 8 in. (25 x 20.3 cm)
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper India, Uttar Pradesh, Awadh, c. 1870
Victoria and Albert Museum, IS.1050-1883
Image: 9 3⁄ 8 x 14 11⁄16 in. (23.8 x 37.1 cm) Glass beads and brass
pp. 162, 232
Museum für Asiatisches Kunst, Berlin, I 5005 5 3⁄ 8 x 21⁄ 8 in. (13.5 x 5.5 cm), excluding pendants
folio 14 Victoria and Albert Museum, 1096-1872 201. Vasudeo, designer
Guimet only
p. 47 Film poster, Umrao Jaan (1981)
p. 49
India, Maharashtra, Bombay (Mumbai), 1981
194. Pair of Earrings
Color lithograph on paper
186. Attributed to Nevasi Lal (fl. c. 1760–75) India, Uttar Pradesh, Awadh, c. 1870
32 x 22 in. (81.2 x 56 cm)
Noblewomen Playing Chess Glass beads, brass and iron wire, wrapped with
Victoria and Albert Museum, IS.112-1986
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1780–1800 silver foil
p. 48
Opaque watercolor and gold on paper Diam. 31⁄4 in. (8.2 cm)
181⁄2 x 24 1⁄2 in. (47 x 62 cm) Victoria and Albert Museum, 1091&A-1872 202. Raj Tilak, designer
Musée national des Arts asiatiques–Guimet, p. 47 Film poster, Najma (1943)
Paris A 12112
India, Maharashtra, Bombay (Mumbai), c. 1980–90
p. 49 195. Finger Ring
Color lithograph on paper
India, Uttar Pradesh, Awadh, c. 1870
421⁄2 x 321⁄4 in. (108 x 82 cm)
187. Attributed to Nevasi Lal (fl. c. 1760–75) Glass beads, brass and iron wire, wrapped with
Victoria and Albert Museum, IS.11-2001
Two Nautch Girls Dancing the Kuharwa before a silver foil
Nobleman and His Courtiers Diam. 11⁄4 in. (4.5 cm); depth with hoop 11⁄ 8 in. 203. Satyajit Ray (1921–1992), director
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, c. 1780 (3 cm) Shatranj Ke Khilari (The Chess Players) (excerpt)
Opaque watercolor on paper Victoria and Albert Museum, 1079A-1872 India, 1977
193⁄16 x 271⁄16 in. (48.8 x 68.7 cm)
p. 47 Distributed by Shemaroo Video Pvt. Ltd., Mumbai
Private collection
p. 48 196. Hand Ornament 204. Muzaffar Ali (b. 1944), director
North India, 19th century Umrao Jan (excerpt)
188. Tilly Kettle (England, 1735–1786) Gold, diamonds, and pearls India, 1981
An Indian Dancing Girl with a Hookah 77⁄ 8 x 2 3⁄ 8 in. (20 x 6 cm) Distributed by Eagle Video, Jorden Electronics,
India, Uttar Pradesh, Faizabad, 1772 Musée national des Arts asiatiques–Guimet, Paris, New Delhi
Oil on canvas MA 6764
205. Kamal Amrohi (1918–1993), director
76 x 47 in. (193 x 119 cm) p. 47
Pakeezah (excerpt)
Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection,
B1981.25.385 197. Nose Ornament India, 1972
p. 48 North India, 19th century Distributed by Shemaroo Video Pvt. Ltd.
Gold, pearls, blue stones, and rock crystal
189. Egron Lundgren (Sweden, 1815–1875) 2 x 13⁄4 in. (5.2 x 4.5 cm)
Nautch Entertainment by Man Singh in Honor of Musée national des Arts asiatiques–Guimet, Paris,
Lord Clyde, the Commander-in-Chief MA 6772
India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, 1859 p. 47
Watercolor on paper
198. Forehead Ornament
Page 13 3⁄4 x 22 3⁄4 in. (34.9 x 57.7 cm)
The Royal Collection, RL 19185 North India, c. 1775–1800
pp. 52–53 Gold, diamond, ruby, and pearl
H. (with pendant pearls): 27⁄ 8 in. (7.3 cm);
190. The Gown of the “Queen of Oudh” w. 11⁄16 in. (2.6 cm)
India, Uttar Pradesh, Awadh, mid-19th century Victoria and Albert Museum, IS.1-1976
Silk with metal ribbon ornaments p. 231
peshwaz–length 4111⁄ 32 in. (106 cm); kaliondar
paijama–length 4111⁄ 32 in. (106 cm)
Victoria and Albert Museum, 0645 IS (peshwaz),
1646 IS (kaliondar paijama)
p. 231
261
Selected Bibliography
Abu Talib. History of Asafu’d Daulah, Nawab Wazir
of Oudh: Being a Translation of “Tafzihu’l Ghafilin,”
A Contemporary Record of Events Connected with
His Administration. Trans. W. Hoey. Allahabad:
North-Western Provinces and Oudh Government
Press, 1885.
Alam, M. The Crisis of Empire in Mughal North
India: Awadh and the Punjab, 1707–48. New Delhi
and New York: Oxford University Press, 1986.
Alam, M., and S. Alavi, trans. and intro. A
European Experience of the Mughal Orient: The
[Persian Letters, 1773–1799] of Antoine-Louis Polier.
New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2001.
Ali, Mrs. M. H. Observations on the Mussulmauns of
India. 1832. Reprint, London: Oxford University
Press, 1917.
Ansari, Usamah. “‘There Are Thousands Drunk by
the Passion of These Eyes.’ Bollywood’s Tawa’if:
Narrating the Nation and ‘The Muslim.’” South
Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies n.s. 31:2
(2008): 290–316.
Archer, M. “Tilly Kettle and the Court of Oudh.”
Apollo (1972): 96–106.
———. India and British Portraiture, 1770–1825.
Totowa, NJ: Sotheby Parke Bernet, 1979.
———. Company Paintings: Indian Paintings of the
British Period. London: Victoria and Albert
Museum, 1992.
Archer, M., C. Rowell, and R. Skelton. Treasures
from India: The Clive Collection at Powis Castle. New
York: Meredith Press, 1987.
Barnett, R. North India Between Empires: Awadh,
the Mughals, and the British 1720–1801. Berkeley
and Los Angeles: University of California Press,
1980.
———, ed. Rethinking Early Modern India. New
Delhi: Manohar, 2002.
Barylski, P. B. “Painting in Avadh in the 18th
Century.” In Islam and Indian Regions, Vol. 1. Ed.
A. L. Dallapiccola and S. Zingel-Avé Lallemant,
351–66. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1993.
Bautze, J. K. “The ‘Inevitable Nautch Girl’… On the
Iconography of a Very Particular Kind of Woman in
19th-Century British India.” Journal of Bengal Art
9:10 (2004–5): 187–246.
———. “Umrao Jan Ada: Her Carte-de-visite.” In
Prajnadhara: Essays on Asian Art, History,
Epigraphy, and Culture in Honour of Gouriswar
Bhattacharya. Ed. G. Mevissen and A. Banerji, Vol.
1: 137–46. New Delhi: Kaveri Books, 2009.
Bayly, C. A., ed. The Raj: India and the British
1600–1947. London: National Portrait Gallery
Publications, 1990.
Bhatnagar, G. D. Awadh under Wajid Ali Shah.
Varanasi: Bharatiya Vidya Prakashan, 1968.
Blackmore, H. L. “General Claude Martin, Master
Gunmaker.” The Canadian Journal of Arms
Collecting 27:1 (February 1989): 3–12.
Blunt, A. “The Flight from Lucknow: British
Women Travelling and Writing Home, 1857–8.” In
Writes of Passage: Reading Travel Writing. Ed. J.
Duncan and D. Gregory, 92–113. London:
Routledge, 1999.
———. “Embodying War: British Women and
Domestic Defilement in the Indian ‘Mutiny,’
1857–8.” Journal of Historical Geography 26:3
(2000): 403–28.
———. “Spatial Stories under Siege: British
Women Writing from Lucknow in 1857.” Gender,
Place, and Culture 7:3 (2000): 229–46.
Cole, J. R. I. Roots of North Indian Shi‘ism in Iran
and Iraq: Religion and State in Awadh, 1722–1859.
Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California
Press, 1988.
Das, N. Indian Architecture: Problems in the
Interpretation of 18th- and 19th-Century Architec-
ture. A Study of Dilkusha Palace, Lucknow. Delhi: B.
R. Publishing Corporation, 1998.
De Almeida, H., and G. H. Gilpin. Indian
Renaissance: British Romantic Art and the Prospect
of India. Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2005.
Dehejia, V. Delight in Design: Indian Silver for the
Raj. Ahmedabad: Mapin Publishing, 2008.
Eaton, N. “Critical Cosmopolitanism: Gifting and
Collecting Art at Lucknow, 1775–97.” In Art and the
British Empire. Ed. T. Barringer, G. Quilley, and D.
Fordham, 189–204. Manchester, UK: Manchester
University Press, 2007.
Eden, E. Up the Country: Letters Written to Her
Sister from the Upper Provinces of India. London:
Virago, 1983.
Edwardes, M. The Orchid House: Splendours and
Miseries of the Kingdom of Oudh 1827–1857. London:
Cassell and Company, 1960.
———. A Season in Hell: The Defence of the
Lucknow Residency. New York: Taplinger, 1973.
Falk, T., and M. Archer. Indian Miniatures in the
India Office Library. London: Sotheby Parke
Bernet, 1981.
Fisher, M. H. “Political Marriage Alliances at the
Shi’i Court of Awadh.” Comparative Studies in
Society and History 25:4 (1983): 593–616.
———. “The Imperial Coronation of 1819: Awadh,
the British and the Mughals.” Modern Asian Studies
19:2 (1985): 239–77.
262
———. A Clash of Cultures: Awadh, The British,
and the Mughals. New Delhi: Manohar Publications,
1987.
———. “The Resident in Court Ritual, 1764–
1858.” Modern Asian Studies 24:3 (July 1990):
419–58.
———. “Women and the Feminine in the Court and
High Culture of Awadh, 1722–1856.” In Women in
the Medieval Islamic World. Ed. G. R. Hambly,
489–513. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1998.
Ghosh, D. Sex and the Family in Colonial India: The
Making of Empire. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2006.
Godrej, P., and P. Rohatgi. Scenic Splendors: India
through the Printed Image. London: The British
Library, 1989.
Gordon, S. “A City of Mourning: The Representation
of Lucknow, India, in Nineteenth-Century
Photography.” History of Photography 30:1 (Spring
2006): 80–91.
Graff, V., ed. Lucknow: Memories of a City. New
Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1997.
Hay, S. Historic Lucknow. New Delhi: Asian
Educational Services, 2001.
Hickmann, R. Indische Albumblatter: Miniaturen
und Kalligraphien aus der Zeit der Moghul-Kaiser.
Leipzig and Weimar: Kiepenheuer, 1979.
Hurel, R. Miniatures et peintures indiennes:
Collection du département des estampes et de la
photographie de la Bibliothèque nationale de France,
Vol. 1. Paris: Bibliothèque nationale de France, 2010.
Irwin, H. C. The Garden of India; or Chapters on
Oudh History and Affairs. 1880. Reprint, New
Delhi: Asian Educational Services, 2001.
Jafri, S. Z. H. Studies in the Anatomy of a
Transformation: Awadh from Mughal to Colonial
Rule. New Delhi: Gyan Publishing House, 1994.
Keene, M. “The Enamel Road, from Siena, Paris,
London, and Lisbon, Leads to Lucknow.” Jewellery
Studies 10 (2004): 99–126.
Kesavan, M. “Urdu, Awadh, and the Tawaif: The
Islamicate Roots of Hindi Cinema.” In Forging
Identities: Gender, Communities, and the State. Ed.
Z. Hasan, 244–57. New Delhi: Kali for Women,
1994.
Keshani, H. “Architecture and the Twelver Shi’i
Tradition: The Great Imambara Complex of
Lucknow.” Muqarnas 23 (2006): 219–50.
Kidwai, R. R. Lucknow: The Lost Paradise.
Lucknow: SR Publications, 1993.
Knighton, W. The Private Life of an Eastern King.
Compiled for a Member of the Household of His Late
Majesty King Nuseer-u-Deen, King of Oude. 2nd ed.
London: Hope and Co., 1855.
Kumar, R. Costume and Textiles of Royal India.
London: Christie’s Books, 1999.
Leach, L. Y. Mughal and Other Indian Paintings
from the Chester Beatty Library. 2 vols. London:
Scorpion Cavendish, 1995.
Llewellyn-Jones, R. A Fatal Friendship: The
Nawabs, the British, and the City of Lucknow.
Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985.
———. A Very Ingenious Man: Claude Martin in
Early Colonial India. New Delhi: Oxford University
Press, 1992.
———. Engaging Scoundrels: True Tales of Old
Lucknow. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2000.
———. The Lucknow Menagerie: Natural History
Drawings from the Collection of Claude Martin
(1735–1800). London: Hobhouse, 2001.
———. A Man of the Enlightenment in Eighteenth-
Century India: The Letters of Claude Martin
1766–1800. Delhi: Permanent Black, 2003.
———, ed. Lucknow Then and Now. Mumbai: Marg
Publications, 2003.
———, ed. Lucknow: City of Illusion. New York:
Prestel in association with Alkazi Collection of
Photography, 2006.
———. The Great Uprising in India, 1857–58.
Woodbridge, UK: The Boydell Press, 2007.
———, ed. Portraits in Princely India 1700–1947.
Mumbai: Marg Publications, 2008.
Losty, J. P. “Towards a New Naturalism:
Portraiture in Murshidabad and Avadh, 1750–80.”
In After the Great Mughals: Painting in Delhi and
the Regional Courts in the 18th and 19th Centuries.
Ed. B. Schmitz, 34–55. Mumbai: Marg Publica-
tions, 2002.
———. “Painting at Lucknow 1775–1850.” In
Lucknow: Then and Now. Ed. R. Llewellyn-Jones,
118–33. Mumbai: Marg Publications, 2003.
Manfredi, P. “In Search of Perfection: Chikankari of
Lucknow.” In Threads & Voices: Behind the Indian
Textile Tradition. Ed. L. Tyabji, 18–29. Mumbai:
Marg Publications, 2007.
Manuel, P. Thumri in Historical and Stylistic
Perspectives. Delhi: Motilal Banarasidass, 1989.
Markel, S. “Luxury Arts of Lucknow.” Arts of Asia
23:2 (March–April 1993): 108–20.
———. “A New Masterwork by Mir Kalan Khan.”
In The Ananda-Vana of Indian Art: Dr. Anand
Krishna Felicitation Volume. Ed. N. Krishna and M.
Krishna, 399–410. Varanasi: Indica Books and
Abhidha Prakashan, 2004.
Memoirs of Faizabad (1772–1781/82): Being a
Translation of “Tarikh-i-Farahbakhsh” of Muham-
mad Faiz Bakhsh, Part – I, Part – II. Trans. W.
Hoey. Ed. H. A. Qureshi. 1889. Reprint, Lucknow:
New Royal Book Co., 2004, 2005.
Metcalf, T. R. Land, Landlords, and the British Raj:
Northern India in the Nineteenth Century. Berkeley
and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1979.
Mishra, S. Musical Heritage of Lucknow. New Delhi:
Harman Publishing House, 1991.
Misra, A. Lucknow: Fire of Grace: The Story of Its
Renaissance, Revolution, and the Aftermath. New
Delhi: HarperCollins India, 1998.
Mookerjee, P. C. Pictorial Lucknow. 1883. Reprint,
New Delhi and Chennai: Asian Educational
Services, 2003.
Mukherjee, R. Awadh in Revolt 1857–1858: A Study
of Popular Resistance. London: Anthem Press, 2002.
Nilsson, S., and N. Gupta. The Painter’s Eye:
Egron Lundgren and India. Stockholm: Nationalmu-
seum, 1992.
Oldenburg, V. T. The Making of Colonial Lucknow
1856–1877. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
Press, 1984.
———. “Lifestyle as Resistance: The Case of the
Courtesans of Lucknow, India.” Feminist Studies
16:2 (Summer 1990): 259–87.
———, ed. Shaam-e-Awadh: Writings on Lucknow.
New Delhi: Penguin, 2007.
Pal, P., and V. Dehejia. From Merchants to
Emperors: British Artists and India, 1757–1930.
Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1986.
Parks, F. Wanderings of a Pilgrim in Search of the
Picturesque, during Four and Twenty Years in
the East; with Revelations of Life in the Zenana.
2 vols. 1850. Reprint, New Delhi: Munshiram
Manoharlal, 1999.
Petievich, C. Assembly of Rivals: Delhi, Lucknow,
and the Urdu Ghazal. New Delhi: Manohar, 1992.
Polier, A.-L. H. A European Experience of the
Mughal Orient: The “I’jaz-i Arsalani” (Persian
Letters, 1773–1779) of Antoine-Louis Henri Polier.
Trans. M. Alam and S. Alavi. New Delhi: Oxford
University Press, 2001.
Quilley, G., and J. Bonehill, eds. William Hodges,
1744–1797: The Art of Exploration. London: National
Maritime Museum, 2004.
Ricketts, H. J. Splendeur des armes orientales.
Trans. P. Missillier. Paris: ACTE EXPO-EPAD,
1988.
Roy, M. “Some Unexpected Sources for Paintings
by the Artist Mihr Chand (fl. c. 1759–86), Son of
Ganga Ram.” South Asian Studies 26:1 (2010):
21–29.
263
Reeves, P. D., ed. Sleeman in Oudh: An Abridgement
of W. H. Sleeman’s “A Journey through the Kingdom
of Oude in 1849–50.” Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1971.
Ruswa, M. M. H. The Courtesan of Lucknow: Umrao
Jan Ada. Trans. K. Singh and M. A. Husaini. Delhi:
Orient Paperbacks, 2005.
Santha, K. S. Begums of Awadh. Varanasi: Bharati
Prakashan, 1980.
Schimmel, A. Islam in the Indian Subcontinent.
Leiden: Brill, 1980.
Sharar, A. H. Lucknow: The Last Phase of an
Oriental Culture. Ed. and trans. E. S. Harcourt and
F. Hussain. 1975. Reprint, New Delhi: Oxford
University Press, 1994.
Sleeman, Maj. Gen. Rambles and Recollections of an
Indian Official. 2 vols. Ed. V. A. Smith. 1893.
Reprint, New Delhi: Asian Educational Services,
1995.
Srivastava, A. L. Shuja-ud-Daulah, Vol. I,
1754–1765. Calcutta: The Midland Press, 1939.
———. Shuja-ud-Daulah, Vol. II, 1765–1775.
Lahore: Minerva Book Shop, 1945.
———. The First Two Nawabs of Awadh. 2nd ed.
Agra: Shiva Lal Agarwala & Co., 1954.
Stronge, S. Bidri Ware: Inlaid Metalwork from
India. London: Victoria and Albert Museum, 1985.
Subrahmanyam, S. “The Career of Colonel Polier
and Late-Eighteenth-Century Orientalism.” Journal
of the Royal Asiatic Society, Series 3, 10:1 (2000):
43–60.
Tandan, B. The Architecture of Lucknow and Its
Dependencies 1722–1856. A Descriptive Inventory
and an Analysis of Nawabi Types. New Delhi: Vikas
Publishing House, 2001.
Trivedi, M. “Encounter and Transition—European
Impact in Awadh (1765–1856).” In Art and Culture:
Endeavours in Interpretation. Ed. A. J. Qaisar and
S. P. Verma, 17–48. New Delhi: Abhinav Publica-
tions, 1996.
Ward, A. Our Bones Are Scattered: The Cawnpore
Massacres and The Indian Mutiny of 1857. New York:
Henry Holt, 1996.
Weber, R. Portrats und historische Darstellungen
in der Miniaturernsammlung des Museums für
Indische Kunst Berlin. Berlin: Museum für Indische
Kunst, 1982.
Welch, S. C. Room for Wonder: Indian Painting
during the British Period, 1760–1880. New York:
American Federation of Arts, 1978.
Wilkinson, W. R. T. Indian Silver 1858–1947: Silver
from the Indian Subcontinent and Burma Made by
Local Craftsmen in Western Forms. London: 1999.
acknowledgments
As with any exhibition of this magnitude (more than two hundred
works of art, almost fifty worldwide lenders, and many years in the
making), India’s Fabled City: The Art of Courtly Lucknow required
the participation and assistance of numerous institutions and
individuals. It is not possible here to thank everyone for their
specific contributions to the exhibition and its accompanying
publication, but we wholeheartedly acknowledge their collective and
invaluable support, which enabled this project to be transformed
from a mere gleam in the curator’s eye to a successful reality.
In particular, special thanks must be given to the following: in
Australia, at the Art Gallery of South Australia, James Bennett; in
Canada, at the Centre Canadien d’Architecture, Louis Désy and
Nathalie Roy; at the Royal Ontario Museum, Deepali Dewan; in
Denmark, at The David Collection, Director Kjeld von Folsach and
Mette Korsholm; in France, at the Bibliothèque nationale de
France, Thomas Cazentre, Olivier Loiseaux, Marie-Helene
Petitfour, and Francoise Simeray; at the Fondation Custodia,
Collection Frits Lugt, Director Mària van Berge-Gerbaud, Rhea
Sylvia Blok, and Cécile Tainturier; Philippe Missillier; at the
Musée du quai Branly, Christine Barthes and Nicholas Twarog; at
the Musée national des Arts asiatiques–Guimet (the second venue
of the exhibition), President Jacques Giès, former president Jean
Francoise Jarrige, chief curator Amina Okada, Caroline Arhuero,
Jerome Ghesquiere, Katia Mollet, and Céline Morisseau; at the
Musée national des Château de Versailles, Director General Pierre
Arizzoli-Clémentel and Frédéric Lacaille. In Germany, at the
Museum für Asiatische Kunst, chief curator Raffael Gadebusch,
Katherine Israel-Koedel, and Martina Stoye; at the Museum für
Islamische Kunst, Director Stefan Weber, former director Claus-
Peter Haase, Almut von Gladiß, Julia Gonella, Gisela Helmecke,
and Christa Kienapfel.
In India, at The Alkazi Collection of Photography, Rahaab
Allana; at the Government of India, Ministry of Culture, Secretary
Jawhar Sircar and Joint Secretary Vijay Madan; at La Martiniere
School for Boys, Supriyo Dhar; at the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj
Vastu Sangrahalaya (formerly the Prince of Wales Museum of
Western India; served as the Indian “Nodal Agency”), Director
Sabyasachi Mukherjee, Vandana Prapanna, and K. Sridhar; at the
Indian Museum, Director Kishor K. Basa; at the Victoria Memorial
Hall, secretary and curator Chittaranjan Panda; in Indonesia,
Thomas M. Hunter; in Ireland, at The Chester Beatty Library,
Elaine Wright; in Kuwait, at the Dar al-Athar al-Islamiyyah, the
al-Sabah Collection, Director General Sheikha Hussah Sabah
Salem al-Sabah, Abdulkareem al-Ghadban, Budour al-Qassar, and
Manuel Keene; in Malaysia, at the Islamic Arts Museum Malaysia,
Director Syed Albukhary and Lucien de Guise; in the Netherlands,
at the Rijksmuseum, Director Wim Pijbes, Jan van Campen,
Pauline Lunsingh Scheurleer (formerly), and Arlette Swart; in
Portugal, at the Calouste Gulbenkian Museum, Deputy Director
264
Nuno Vassallo e Silva; in Switzerland, Princess Catherine Aga
Khan and Nicolas Sursock; at the Aga Khan Trust for Culture,
Director, Museums and Exhibitions Unit, Benoit Junod; at the
Galerie Minerva, Laura Pfenninger; at the Museum Rietberg,
Director Albert Lutz, Jorrit Britschgi, and Andrea Kuprecht.
In the United Kingdom, at the Bodleian Library, Bruce
Barker-Benfield and Gillian Evison; Joost van den Bergh; at The
British Library, Jody Butterworth, John Falconer, Laura Fielder,
Jennifer Howes, Barbara O’Connor, and Malini Roy (author and
curatorial consultant); at The British Museum, Dean Baylis,
Richard Blurton, and Philippa Kirkham; Francesca Galloway;
Edward Gibbs; Charles Greig; Amin Jaffer; at the Leicester
Museums and Galleries, New Walk Museum & Art Gallery, senior
curator Simon Lake, Claire Cooper, and Nick Gordon; Rosie
Llewellyn-Jones (author and primary historical consultant); J. P.
Losty; Peter Marshall; at the National Media Museum, Charlotte
Cotton, Ruth Kitchin, and Brian Liddy; at the Museums Sheffield,
Chief Executive Nick Dodd and Liz Waring; at the Nasser D.
Khalili Collection of Islamic Art, Nahla Nassar; at the National
Army Museum, Director A. J. Guy, assistant director, collections,
Peter Boyden, Justin Addington, Emily Dodd, and Juliet McCon-
nell; at the National Portrait Gallery, Director Sandy Nairne,
Sophie Clark, Peter Funnell, David McNeff, and Sarah Tinsley; at
the National Trust, Jill McNaught-Davis; Susan Ollemans; Indar
Pasricha and Taimur Palanpur; Anastasia Phillips; at Powis
Castle, Margaret Gray; Simon Ray; Howard Ricketts; at The Royal
Collection, Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, librarian and curator
of the print room the Hon. Lady Roberts, Sophie Gordon (author
and curatorial consultant), Theresa-Mary Morton, Sarah Murray,
and Emma Stuart; Andrew Topsfield; at the Victoria and Albert
Museum, Nick Barnard, Rosemary Crill (author and curatorial
consultant), Divia Patel (curatorial consultant), Susan Stronge,
and Deborah Swallow (formerly); Wynyard Wilkinson.
In the United States, Muzaffar Alam and Sanjay Subrahman-
yam (authors); at the Ali Akbar College of Music, Robin Sukhadia;
at the Asian Art Museum, Forrest McGill, Sharon Steckline, and
Saleema Waraich (formerly); Catherine Benkaim; John H. Bowles;
at the Brooklyn Museum of Art, Amy Poster (formerly); Jassi
Cheema; at Christie’s, Katherine Drake and Allison Whiting; at the
Cincinnati Art Museum, Glenn Markoe; Carlo Coppola; Robert J.
Del Bontà; at the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, Martin
Chapman and Maria Reilly; at the J. Paul Getty Museum, Acting
Director David Bomford, Erin Garcia, Anne Lacoste, and Anne
Lyden; at the Getty Research Institute, Irene Lotspeich-Phillips
and Fran Terpak; at the Harvard Art Museums, Director Thomas
W. Lentz, Karoline Mansur, Kimberly Masteller (formerly), and
Mary McWilliams; at the Huntington Library, Director David S.
Zeidberg and June Li; Gloria Katz and Willard Huyck; Maxine and
Ron Linde; Peter Manuel (author).
At the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Michael Barry (formerly),
Sheila Canby, Navina Haidar, Donald J. LaRocca, and Daniel
Walker (formerly); at the Museum of Photographic Arts, Tom
Callas, Scott Davis, and Barbara Pope (formerly); at the Paul Sack
Collection, Cindy Herron; Joseph N. Newland (editor); at the
Peabody Essex Museum, Karina Corrigan and Christine Michelini;
Cynthia Hazen Polsky and Taryn Adinolfi; at DelMonico Books–
Prestel, Mary DelMonico; Kenneth X. and Joyce Robbins; at the
San Diego Museum of Art, Julia Marciari-Alexander and Sonya
Rhie Quintanilla; at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art,
Maria Naula, Erin O’Toole, and Holly Robbins; Julian Sands;
Elizabeth and John Sequeira; Donald M. Stadtner; Wheeler M.
Thackston (translations); the Stuart Cary Welch family and Jude
Ahern; at the University of California, Irvine, Karen B. Leonard
and Alka Patel; at the University of California, Los Angeles, Amy
Catlin, Nazir Jairazbhoy (deceased), Allen F. Roberts, and Mary
Nooter Roberts; at the University of Minnesota, Catherine Asher,
(author), Sugata Ray, and Atreyee Gupta; at the University of
Texas, Austin, Janice Leoshko and Carla Petievich (author and
linguistic consultant); at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Joseph
M. Dye III and Mary Sullivan; at the Yale Center for British Art,
Director Amy Meyers, Abigail Armistead, Elisabeth Fairman,
Gillian Forrester, Timothy Goodhue, John Monahan, Angus
Trumble, and Scott Wilcox.
Finally, special thanks must be given to the professional staff
and volunteers of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, who
have executed myriad responsibilities with their customary
diligence and enthusiasm. To be commended in particular are Chief
Executive Officer and Wallis Annenberg Director Michael Govan,
President and Chief Operating Officer Melody Kanschat, Deputy
Director, curatorial administration, Nancy Thomas, and Vice
President and General Counsel Fred Goldstein.
In the South and Southeast Asian Art department, curatorial
administrator Nancy Fox, assistant curator Julie Romain, curator
Robert L. Brown, intern Jessica Farquhar, former assistant
curator Rochelle Kessler, and former curatorial administrator
Deanna Kashani. In Advertising and Promotion, former editor
Tom Drury; in Art Preparation and Installation, manager Jeffrey
Haskin and Jeffrey Ono; in Audiovisual: manager Elvin Whitesides
(deceased) and Megan Mellbye; in Communications and Marketing,
vice president, communications, Barbara Pflaumer, junior commu-
nications associate Annie Carone. In Conservation, head of
conservation Mark Gilberg; senior conservators Joseph Fronek,
John Hirx, Catherine C. McLean, Janice Mae Schopfer, and
Virginia Rasmussen; associate conservators Natasha Cochran and
Soko Furuhata; assistant conservators Silviu Boariu and Chail
Norton; and Mellon Fellow Erin Jue.
In the Costume and Textiles department, senior curator and
department head Sharon Takeda, curator Kaye Spilker, adminis-
265
trative assistant Nancy Lawson Carcione, administrator Fionn
Zarubica Lemon, and former curator Dale Gluckman. In Develop-
ment, vice president of development Terry Morello, Melissa Bomes,
associate vice president Chelsea Hadley, associate vice president
Diana Veach, Daniel Thomas (formerly), director of special projects
Erin Wright, director of government and foundation grants
Stephanie Dyas, and senior grant writer Amanda Lipsey. In
Education, vice president of education Jane Burrell, Asian
specialist Kristin Bengtson, and manager of contemporary public
programs and new media Amy Heibel. In Exhibition Design, senior
exhibition designer Victoria Turkel Behner and exhibition designer
Eileen Dikdan. In Exhibition Programs, head of exhibitions Zoë
Kahr, Irene Martín, Sarah Minnaert (formerly), and financial
analyst Marciana Broiles. In Finance, Chief Financial Officer
Ann Rowland and budget and investment officer Mark Mitchell. In
Film Programs, department head Ian Birnie and coordinator
Bernardo Rondeau. In Gallery Services, manager of construction
William Stahl.
In Graphic Design, associate director Amy McFarland and
senior graphic designer Jin Son. In Music Programs, director
Mitch Glickman. In Photographic Services, supervising photogra-
pher Peter Brenner, senior photographer Steven Oliver, senior con-
servation photographer Yosi Pozeilov, and administrative assistant
Breanne Sallee. In the Photography department, department head
and curator Britt Salvesen, associate curator Edward Robinson,
and senior collections administrator Eve Schillo. In Publications,
head of publications Nola Butler, editor in chief Thomas Frick, and
coordinator and editorial assistant Monica Paniry.
In Registrar, head registrar Nancy Russell, associate registrar
Alexandra Moran, senior assistant registrar Amy Wright, registra-
tion administrator Jennifer Smith, database specialist Robin
Chung, and Laura Benites (formerly). In Rights and Reproduc-
tions, manager Cheryle T. Robertson and assistant Piper Sever-
ance. In Risk Management and Collections Information, assistant
director Renée Montgomery, coordinator Jonathan Alfi, database
manager Delfin Magpantay, and systems manager Diana Folsom.
Our thanks to all.
Stephen Markel
Tushara Bindu Gude
lenders to the exhibition Illustration Credits
Asian Art Museum, San Francisco Most images are reproduced courtesy of the creators or
lenders of the material depicted. For some photographs
Catherine and Ralph Benkaim Collection
we have been unable to trace copyright holders. The
Catherine Benkaim and Barbara Timmer Collection publishers would appreciate notification of additional
Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris credits for acknowledgement in future editions.
The British Library, London Front cover (detail), 169, 206 (detail), 207 bottom:
The British Museum, London photo courtesy The David Collection, Copenhagen,
The Chester Beatty Library, Dublin © Pernille Klemp 2010
Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya, Mumbai Back cover, 2 (detail), 31, 76, 79: photo © The
The Cincinnati Art Museum Trustees of the Chester Beatty Library, Dublin
Dar al Athar al Islamiyyah, The al Sabah Collection, Kuwait pp. 4–5 (detail), 208 top, 210 bottom: photo courtesy
The David Collection, Copenhagen Powis Castle, The Clive Collection (The National
Trust), by Paul Highnam
Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco
Collection Frits Lugt, Institut Néerlandais, Paris p. 6 (detail), 77, 180 bottom left and right: photo
© the Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco
Galerie Minerva, Zurich
Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles p. 9, 35, 174 top, 177 left and bottom right, 178, 179
top and bottom right, 239 top left: photo © Museum
Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Cambridge, Massachusetts
für Islamische Kunst, Staatliche Museen, Berlin/
Indian Museum, Kolkata Bildarchiv Preussischer Kulturbesitz, Germany/Art
Islamic Arts Museum Malaysia, Kuala Lampur Resource, NY
Nasser D. Khalili Collection of Islamic Art pp. 14–15, 19, 95 left: photo courtesy Collection
Collection of Drs. Aziz and Deanna Khan Drs. Aziz and Deanna Khan, © Museum Associates/
LACMA, Inc.
Dr. S. Sanford Kornblum and Mrs. Charlene S. Kornblum
Leicester Museums and Galleries: New Walk Museum and Art Gallery, United Kingdom p. 16, 47 bottom left and center, 49 top, 130 top left
and bottom, 135 bottom, 138 top, 173: photo © Musée
Richard Milhender
national des Arts asiatiques Guimet, Paris/Réunion
Musée national des Arts asiatiques–Guimet, Paris des Musées Nationaux, Paris/Art Resource, NY
Musée national des Château de Versailles et de Trianon, France
p. 17, 40, 48 bottom left, 64–66, 82 top: photo © Yale
Museum für Asiatische Kunst, Berlin Center for British Art, USA/Bridgeman Art Library,
Museum für Islamische Kunst, Berlin NY
Museum Rietberg, Zurich pp. 20, 29, 52–53, 78, 99, 211 top, 233: photo The
National Army Museum, London Royal Collection © 2010, Her Majesty Queen
Elizabeth II
National Portrait Gallery, London
Cynthia Hazen Polsky pp. 21, 30, 37 top right and bottom, 39 right and
bottom left, 60–61, 62 top right and left, 63 left, 64,
Powis Castle, The Powis Collection (National Trust), United Kingdom
82 bottom left, 88–91, 92, 122, 124–125, 131, 144,
Private collection by courtesy of Howard Ricketts
149 top left and right, 159 bottom, 160, 170, 175, 183
Mohammed Rezai Collection bottom left and right, 184, 239 top right:, 240: images
Howard and Jane Ricketts Collection © British Library Images, The British Library Board.
All rights expressly reserved.
Kenneth and Joyce Robbins
The Royal Collection, United Kingdom p. 22: photo © 2010 President and Fellows of Harvard
College, courtesy of Richard Milhender
Sack Photographic Trust of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
San Diego Museum of Art, California pp. 24–25 (detail from center panel), 36, 41, 47 top left
and right, 47 bottom right, 75 bottom left and right,
The Collection of Julian Sands
96–97, 123, 128–129, 129 top, 138 bottom, 142–143,
Elizabeth and John Sequeira 162, 174 bottom, 200 left, 201, 211 bottom, 214, 215
Sheffield Galleries and Museum Trust, United Kingdom bottom, 226, 229 bottom (detail), 231, 232, 235, 236,
Dr. Bonnie Sturner 239 bottom left and right: photo © V&A Images. All
rights reserved. Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Lieutenant General Sir Philip Trousdell
Victoria and Albert Museum, London pp. 26, 72, 73, 102 (detail), 120, 130 top right, 139 top,
140, 150 bottom, 164, 166 left, 198, 200 right, 203
Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond
center left (detail) and top right, 204, 207 top right,
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, Connecticut
208 bottom, 212, 213, 217, 219 bottom, 237, 242:
photo © 2010 Museum Associates/LACMA, Inc.
and several private collections
p. 28, 88: photo courtesy Catherine Glynn Benkaim
Collection
266
p. 33: photo © La Martiniere College Collection, pp. 98, 136–137: photo courtesy Nasser D. Khalili
Lucknow Collection
p. 34: photo © Asian Art Museum, San Francisco p. 139 bottom, 159 top: digital image © 2010 SFMOMA
pp. 37 top left, 49 bottom, 62 bottom, 63 right, 80 pp. 146–147, 156: photo © CCA, Montréal
bottom, 172 bottom left, 177 top right, 186, 203 top
p. 149 bottom: as reproduced in W. L. Low, Lieuten-
left (detail of border): photo © Museum für Asiatische
ant-Colonel Gould Hunter-Weston of Hunterston,
Kunst, Berlin/Bildarchiv Preussischer Kulturbesitz,
Selkirk, 1914
Germany/Art Resource, NY
p. 153: photo courtesy Catherine Benkaim and
p. 38 left: photo courtesy of Dr. Bonnie Sturner, ©
Barbara Timmer Collection
Museum Associates/LACMA, Inc.
p. 166 bottom right, 181: photo © Museum für
p. 38 right: photo courtesy of Dr. S. Sanford Kornblum
Indische Kunst, Bildarchiv Preussischer Kulturbesitz,
and Mrs. Charlene S. Kornblum, © Museum
Germany/Art Resource, NY
Associates/LACMA, Inc.
p. 168 left: photo courtesy Catherine and Ralph
pp. 39 top left, 81, 166 top right, 179 top and bottom
Benkaim Collection
right, 183 top left: photo © Bibliothèque nationale de
France 2010 p. 168 right, 230: photo Courtesy Collection Frits
Lugt, Institut Néerlandais, Paris
pp. 42–43: photo © National Portrait Gallery, London
p. 45 top left: photo © Leicester Arts & Museums
p. 171: photo courtesy Collection of Cynthia Hazen
Polsky
p. 45 top right: photo © 2006 National Army Museum
(NAM)
p. 172 top: photo courtesy of Virginia Museum of Fine
Arts, Richmond, on behalf of private collection
p. 45 bottom: photo © Sheffield Galleries and Museum (L.10.2004)
Trust
p. 180 top: photo courtesy the collection of Prince and
p. 48 top, 82 bottom right, 83, 183 top right: photo Princess Sadruddin Aga Kahn
courtesy private collection
p. 202 top and middle (detail): photo © 2010
p. 48 bottom right: poster © Mehboob Film Studios, Cincinnati Art Museum
India
pp. 202 bottom, 202–203: photo courtesy of Mr.
pp. 54, 95 right: photo © Victoria Memorial and Mrs. Julian Sands, © Museum Associates/
Management. Board of Trustees. All rights reserved. LACMA, Inc.
pp. 57, 221 left (detail): photograph courtesy of private p. 205: photo © 2010 Kuwait National Museum
collection, Museum Associates/LACMA, by Gary
p. 207 top left: photo © 2010 Virginia Museum of Fine
Ombler
Arts, by Katherine Wetzel
pp. 58, 87 bottom, 133, 150 top: digital image ©
p. 209: photo © The Indian Museum, Kolkata
Alkazi Foundation for the Arts, New Delhi, India
p. 66: photo © 2010 President and Fellows of Harvard
p. 210, 222 (detail), 223: photo © Islamic Arts
Museum Malaysia
College
p. 68: © Foto Rainer Wolfberger, courtesy Museum
p. 215 top (recto) and middle (verso): photo courtesy
the Collection of Kenneth and Joyce Robbins
Rietberg, Zürich
p. 70 top: photo © Bodleian Library, University of
p. 216: photo courtesy of Elizabeth and John Sequeira,
© Museum Associates/LACMA, Inc.
Oxford
p. 70 bottom: photo © Mohammed Rezai Collection, by
p. 218: photo courtesy Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj
Vastu Sangrahalaya
Thomas DuBrock
p. 75 top, 172 bottom right: photo © 2010 British
p. 219: photo courtesy Richard Milhender
Museum Images, The British Museum p. 220: photo © Christie's Images Limited
pp. 84–6: photo © Yale Center for British Art, USA p. 221 right (detail): photo © 2010 The Metropolitan
(Rare Books & MSS, L 500) Museum of Art/Art Resource, NY
p. 85 bottom, 87 top, 127, 129 bottom right, 132, 135 p. 228: photo © 2010 President and Fellows of
top, 154–155, 157: photo courtesy of Howard and Jane Harvard College
Ricketts Collection, London
p. 229 top: photo © National des Château (et des
pp. 93, 161: photo © Research Library, Special Trianons) de Versailles//Réunion des Musées
Collections, Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles, Nationaux, Paris/Art Resource, NY
California
267
Index
Numbers in BOLDFACE indicate illustrations.
Abbas Ali, 160–62; work by, 21, 93, 161, 162, 232,
240, 255, 260, 276
Abdur Rahim Bijnauri, 188, 213–14, 224n31
Abul Fazl, 71, 214
Agra, 32, 71, 163n21, 214; Taj Mahal, 79, 80, 81,
131, 258
Ahmad Ali Khan, 145, 148, 151; work by, 149, 150,
254
Ahmad Shah, 10
Akbar, 75, 188, 213, 214, 250; Akbarnama, 74, 75,
252; establishes Awadh province, 10, 14, 71, 165
Alam Bagh, 58, 152, 161
Ali (first Imam), 91, 94, 106, 250, 251; shrine in
Najaf, 93, 131
Ali Khan (Nawab wazir), 11, 245
Ali Khan (Nizam of Hyderabad), 17
Ali, Mrs. Meer Hassan. See Timms, Biddy
Allahabad: fort, 18, 168; royal lion hunt at, 4 – 5,
168, 260; treaty, 10, 17
Amanat Ali (Agha Hasan Amanat): Indar Sabha,
114, 116, 161–62
Amjad Ali Shah, 11, 20, 99, 245; Sibtainabad
Imambara, 11
Anis, Mir Babar Ali, 44, 106, 107, 117(nn20, 21),
189
Antoine, Ambrose Pierre, 56
Arabic, 105, 117n12
Asaf al-Daula, 101n23, 132, 167, 182, 194–96,
224n1, 244, 245; depicted, 92, 172, 183, 229,
253; and Europeans, 32, 33, 56, 58, 59, 81, 141,
188; and Jains, 141; moves capital, 10, 17, 81, 92,
103, 105, 123, 181, 188, 244; as patron, 10,
17–18, 33, 58, 61, 65, 78, 104, 122, 126, 182, 191,
193, 201, 204, 244, 245; sword presented by, 220,
221 (detail)
Asaf al-Daula. BUILDING SPONSORED BY: Asafi
Masjid, 90, 92, 148, 255; Bara Imambara, 10, 84,
86, 89, 92, 120, 126, 129, 131, 146 – 47, 152, 255;
Daulat Khana, 10, 61, 67, 142 – 43; Macchi
Bhawan, 84, 92, 123, 124 –25, 126, 127, 213, 214,
215, 224n31, 254, 255; Rumi Darwaza, 10, 90,
126, 129, 148, 151, 152, 255
Asafi Masjid, 90, 92, 148, 255
Ashiq, Muhammad, 182
Ashura, 115, 251
Asir, painting by, 75, 252
Atish, Khwajah Haidar Ali, 32, 107, 110
Aurangzeb, 186, 188, 244, 258; mosque of, 123, 146
Awadh: annexation of, 11, 20, 23n16, 31, 50n13, 59,
71, 103, 116, 118n42, 121, 141, 217, 251; map of,
175, 175; migration to, 10, 14, 18, 27
Azad, Muhammad Husain, 112–13, 115, 117n8,
118n46
Azam, Muhammad, 95; work by, 15, 19, 95, 252, 253
Azfari, Ali Bakht, 193–96
B Chitarman, work attributed to, 70, 71
Baghdad: Al-Kadhimiya Masjid, 93
Bahadur Shah, 213
Bahadur Singh, work, by, 63, 259
Baillie Guard Gate, 153, 260
Bakhsh, Ilahi, 195, 196
Bakhsh, Husain, 195
Bara Imambara (Asafi Imambara; Great Imam-
bara), 10, 84, 86, 89, 92, 120, 126, 129, 131,
146 – 47, 152, 255; gateway, 129, 255; panorama
taken from 87 (detail), 154 – 55, 260
Basit, Khwaja, 190
Barker, Robert, 176
Barker, Thomas Jones, 40; work by, 42 – 43, 260
Beach, Milo Cleveland, 79
Beato, Felice, 11, 86, 152–58, 161, 163(nn17, 18,
21); work by, 85, 87 (detail), 129, 153, 154 – 55,
156, 157, 255, 260
Beechey, George Duncan, 61
begam, 117n33, 149, 224n10, 250; Akhtar Mahal
Sahiba, 149, 149; Bahu, 17, 81, 103, 201; Rabia,
141; Sikander, 20; Short, Mary Angela (Sultan
Mariam), 67
begamati zaban, 110, 111
Benares, 141, 195, 233, 235
Bengal Photographic Society, 151, 152, 153, 158
bibi, 33, 59, 229, 250
Bollywood, 50, 248
Bourne, Samuel, 158; work by, 64, 120, 129, 130,
135, 138, 139, 140, 150, 160, 255, 256, 260
Bristow, John, 56
British: anti-, 11, 18, 40; rule, 11, 14, 27, 31, 33, 40,
44, 46, 244, 245; land-tenure system, 246;
military, 17, 44, 104, 151, 152, 153, 167, 176; sub-
sidies to, 10, 17, 18. See also Company-school
painter; East India Company; Great Uprising;
Residency; Resident
Brown, Percy, 51n14, 74, 100n15
Buddhist art, 206
Burhan al-Mulk. See Saadat Khan Burhan al-Mulk
Buxar, battle of, 10, 17
c Hering, Henry, 153, 163n23
Calcutta, 21, 145, 148, 246; Fort William, 176
Campbell, Colin, 44, 46, 153; second attack of, 129,
153
Carpenter, William, work by, 123, 254
Cartier, 225n46, 259
Chand, Dip, work in style of, 259
Chand, Fath, work by, 242, 253
Chand, Mihr, 10, 23n9, 77, 79, 167, 176, 178, 181;
work attributed to, 79, 80, 178, 180, 252, 258,
260; work by, 35, 177, 178, 179, 180, 181, 203
(detail), 239, 257, 258, 259; work in style of, 9,
258; work possibly by, 257, 258
Chand, Patak, work by, 37, 258
Chattar Manzil, 11, 20, 84, 134, 148, 151, 158;
depicted, 85, 135, 144, 150, 255, 260; view from,
150
chikan textile, 217, 217 (detail), 227, 236–38, 236
(detail), 237 (detail), 241, 250
children, 33, 44, 51n2, 58, 59, 67, 132, 141, 238
Chinnery, George, 23n13
Chota Chattar Manzil, 20
Clive, Robert, 10, 17; collection, 259
Compagnie des Indes Orientales, 171; Gentil and,
10, 175; Martin and, 57
268
Company-school painter, 55, 86, 92, 100, 175, 182,
232, 244
Constantia (La Martinière), 11, 30, 33, 55, 58, 58,
132, 132, 133, 134, 152, 153, 257
Coomaraswamy, Ananda K., 74
Coote, Eyre, 77; Lady Coote Album, 77, 259, 261
courtesan, 118n62; culture, 46, 50, 51n35, 111, 113,
116, 119n67, 246, 247, 248; dress, 233, 247–48;
poet, 110, 115, 118n56. See also tawaif; taiwaif
bazi
d Jami Masjid, 11, 79, 80, 81, 84, 92, 250, 258
Dacca, 237, 238
Daniell, Thomas and William, 23n13, 29, 83, 123,
148; work by, 82, 124 –25, 254
Dannenberg, John, 148, 158, 163n4
Dara Shikoh, 10
Darshan Bilas, 86
Daulat Khana, 10, 61, 67
De Boigne, Benoit, 59
Delhi, 8, 72, 121, 126, 190; Dihlavis, 105, 112, 113;
Jami Masjid, 11, 79, 80, 81, 84, 92, 250, 258;
mausoleum of Safdar Jang, 121–22, 122, 252;
migration from, 14, 27, 78, 105, 109, 165, 168,
187, 188, 189, 194, 201, 244; Red Fort, 79,
101n28, 114; remittance to, 71; sack of, 10, 71;
sultan, 71, 213
Derusett, George Harris, 65
Desanges, Louis-William, 44; work by, 45, 260
Dilkusha Kothi, 11, 64, 65, 86, 134, 152, 256
E presented by Maharaja of, 211, 261; Village Life in
East India Company, English, 10, 11, 14, 17, 21, 29,
55, 94, 121, 251; financial control, 18, 20, 56, 67,
71; military academy (Addiscombe), 67, 163n12.
See also Company-school painter; Residency;
Resident
Eden, Emily, 50n10; work after, 34, 253
Exposition Universelle, Paris (1855), 230
F female musician, 179; god, 114, 115, 141, 182,
Faizabad, 10, 16–17, 23n3, 24, 27, 56, 69, 103, 122,
188–89, 191, 201; fortification, 81, 254; Lal Bagh
Gate, 82, 122, 254; palace of Shuja al-Daula, 81,
82 , 83, 122, 123, 124 –25, 126, 175, 254
Faizullah, 77, 171; work attributed to, 28, 76, 253;
work by, 173, 253
Faqirullah Khan, Muhammad, 72; work attributed
to, 253
Farangi Mahal, 188
Farhat Bakhsh, 57, 84, 135, 255
Farrukhabad, 71, 72, 253
Fatehpur Sikri, 126
fish emblem, 92, 131, 212–19, 224n25; mahi-ye
maratib, 212, 213, 214, 215, 224(nn19, 22, 24,
25, 36), 250
Fitzgerald, Patrick, 152, 163n13
Frith, Francis, work by, 58, 133, 257
Fullarton, William, 72
G 126, 129, 131, 146 – 47, 152, 255; Husainabad, 11,
Gandhara, 206
Gentil, Jean-Baptiste-Joseph, 10, 175–76; albums,
174, 175, 253, 259; atlas, 175; collection, 10, 36,
81, 175–76, 178, 182, 185; memoir, 176; Palais
Indiennes, 29; studio, 175–76, 185n9
Ghalib, Asadullah Khan, 113
ghazal, 107–11, 116, 117n22, 243, 247, 248, 249
Ghazi al-Din Haidar, 11, 20, 215, 241, 245; coat of
arms, 99, 215; coronation, 11, 18, 61, 94–95, 251;
crown, 217; and East India Company, 18; medal,
215, 215, 254; procession of, 25, 96 – 97, 254;
throne given by, 215, 215; wife of, 67
Ghazi al-Din Haidar. BUILDING SPONSORED BY:
Chota Chattar Manzil, 20; Darshan Bilas, 86;
Moti Mahal, 20, 86; Qadam Rasul, 84; Shah
Najaf (imambara; masjid), 11, 20, 41, 73, 73, 84,
93, 131, 131, 255
Ghulam Rasool, 23n11
Ghulam Raza Khan, 245, 248
Ghulam Reza, 182; work by, 183, 258
Gobind Singh, 167, 182
Goodall, Frederick, work by, 45, 260
gota work, 232, 233, 235, 241
Great Uprising, 11, 50n9, 148, 151–53, 156, 162,
163n21, 260; destruction following, 21, 27, 44,
134, 141, 148, 151, 243
H Marsack, Captain, 65
Haidar Beg Khan, 57, 183
Hasan, Mir, 23n10, 27, 115, 117n201, 188–93,
197n19
Hasan Reza Khan, 32, 56, 183, 253
Hastings, Warren, 181, 182, 188
Hazratganj, 158, 160, 160
head-wear: chaugoshia, 238, 241; crown, 18, 20, 61,
94, 95, 99, 217, 239, 241, 257; dopalri, 238, 241;
dupatta, 230, 233, 234, 250; goshpech, 229, 238,
250, 257; mandil, 238, 241; nukkadar, 241; odhni,
233, 251; turban, 67, 167, 229, 235, 238, 239,
241, 257; veil, 46, 233
Hindu, 92, 94, 100, 181, 249, 250; caste, 250;
251; landowner and merchant, 11, 21, 46, 251;
temple, 21, 141
Hodges, William, 11, 23n13, 29, 81–83, 122, 148;
work by, 82, 254
Hoey, William, 236, 237, 241
Holi festival, 194, 195
Home, Robert, 11, 20, 23n13, 61, 94, 95, 215; work
by, 95, 214
Humphry, Ozias, 61, 77, 182
Husain (third Imam), 23n8, 91, 92, 93, 106–7, 126,
151, 190, 250, 251
Husainabad Imambara, 11, 20, 86, 87, 89, 130, 131,
145, 148, 151, 255
Husainabad Bazaar Gateway, 86, 88, 151, 255
Hyderabad, 74, 126, 187, 201, 237, 251
I
imambara, 17, 89, 90, 92, 126, 131, 141, 151, 243,
250; Bara (Asafi; Great), 10, 84, 86, 89, 92, 120,
20, 86, 87, 89, 130, 131, 145, 148, 151, 255; Shah
Najaf, 11, 20, 41, 73, 73, 84, 93, 131, 131, 255;
Sibtainabad, 11
Insha, Allah Khan, 111–13, 117n32, 118n38
Iran, 14, 71, 91, 93, 106, 126, 188
Iraq, 56, 93, 250
islah-i zaban, 105, 116
J
Jagan, composition by, 75, 252
Jahandar Shah, 194
Jain, 21, 141, 250
Jais, 238
Jalal al-Din, 194
Jan Sahib, Mir Yar Ali Khan, 112–13, 118n43
Jawan Bakht Jahandar Shah, 178, 182, 195, 258
jharoka scene, 79
Johnson, Richard, 11, 61, 181, 182; collection, 11,
36, 61, 175, 182
Jones, E. W. (Lance Corporal), 152, 163n14
Jurat, Qalandar Bakhsh, 44, 109–10, 113, 117n30
K
Kadar Piya, 249
kafsh, 236
kalabattun, 235
kamarband, 229
kanchli, 233
Karbala, 23n8, 99, 106, 117n15, 126, 248, 250, 251
Karbala buildings: Kazmain, 93, 161; Talkatora,
161
Karm Imam, Muhammad, 243, 245, 247
Kashmir, 191; -shawl fabric, 229, 241; shield
Kashmir, 170, 252
Kashmiri Painter, 78; work attributed to, 78
kathak dance, 114, 115, 119n71, 245, 247, 250
katori, 235
Kavanagh, Thomas Henry, 44, 45, 51n28, 260
Kettle, Tilly, 10, 23n13, 29, 59, 61, 176, 178, 181,
228, 229; work by, 17, 48, 229, 253, 261
Khan, Mir Kalan, 10, 23n9, 165, 168, 170, 171; work
attributed to, 164, 252, 258; work by, 4 – 5, 39,
168, 169, 170, 252, 259; work in style of, 39, 166,
252, 259
Khizr, Khwaja, 118n44
Khosrau II, 212–13
Khurshid Manzil, 58, 65, 86
Knighton, William, 50n13, 104
kotha, 115, 118n33, 250
Kufa, 190
kurta/kurti, 233, 234, 236, 238, 250
L Cockfight, 228, 257
La Grange, Alexis de, 148; work by, 146 – 47
Lakh-i Pera, 11
Lal Bagh Gate, 82, 122, 254
Lal Barahdari, 11, 163n4
Lawrence, Honoria, 30, 31
Lawrie, G. W., and Company, 160; work by, 144, 255
London Photographic Society, 153
Longcroft, Thomas, 61; work by, 60 – 61, 254
Lucknow: Aliganj, 141; arsenal, 11; Beauties of
Lucknow, The, 161, 162, 232, 276; Chowk, 141;
decadence, 108–9, 114; criticism of, 191–93;
destruction of, 40, 41, 44, 140, 141, 148, 153,
269
153, 156, 158; film set in, 50; Flight from
Lucknow, The, 45, 260; Jessie’s Dream (The Relief
of Lucknow), 45, 260; Lakhnawiyat, 107–8, 112,
113, 115, 118n50; Lucknow Album, The, 21, 93,
161, 161, 162, 255; Relief of Lucknow, The, 40,
41 – 42 , 260; Sahedetganj, 141
Lundgren, Egron, 40, 46, 51(nn25, 28), 153; work
by, 52 – 53, 262
Lyon, Edmund David, 163n24
M
Macchi Bhawan, 84, 92, 123, 124 –25, 126, 127, 213,
214, 215, 224n31, 254
Macfarlane, Donald Horne, 163n24
Madar al-Daula, 194
Madhav, faces painted by, 75, 252
majalis, 106, 115, 250
Majaz, Asrar al-Haq, 13, 24, 50
Mallitte, Oscar, 163n24
Man Singh, 46; Nautch Entertainment by Man Singh
in Honor of Lord Clyde, the Commander-in-Chief,
52 – 53, 262
Marathas, 14, 17, 251
markaz, 105
Martin, Claude, 11, 23n12, 32, 51n20, 54, 57–59,
65, 132, 196; estate inventory, 220, 222, 225n53;
mirror belonging to, 222, 222 (detail), 223;
mistress of, 33, 33, 59, 134; as patron, 33, 57, 58,
59, 220–21; pistols presented by, 57; sword
presented to, 220, 221 (detail); will, 132
Martin, Claude. BUILDING SPONSORED BY:
Constantia (La Martinière), 11, 30, 33, 55, 58,
58, 132, 132 , 133, 134, 152, 153, 257; Farhat
Bakhsh, 57, 84, 135, 255; Lakh-i Pera, 11
matam, 251
Martinière, la. See Constantia
McLeod, Duncan, 65
Meer Hassan Ali, Mrs., 233–34, 235
Middleton, Nathaniel, 10, 56, 182
Milliken, John, 152, 163n14
Miner, Allyn, 244
Mir, Ghulam Hasan, 23n10
Mir Muhammad Taqi, 23n10, 27, 109, 188, 249
Mir Qasim, 10, 17, 72
Mohan Singh, 167, 175, 182, 185n9; work by, 62,
174, 253, 258
Mookherjee, P. C., 148, 151
Moore, Thomas, 31
Mordaunt, John, 32, 65, 228, Colonel Mordaunt’s
Moti Mahal, 20, 86
Mughal: architecture, 17, 29, 32, 79, 92, 100n4, 122,
126, 131, 134; clothing, 229, 233, 238, 241;
decline, 14, 17, 61, 74, 244; floral imagery, 199,
200, 201, 206; insignia, 92, 212–13; music, 247,
249; painting style, 51n14, 71, 72, 74, 77, 79, 100,
100n8, 149, 165, 167–68, 170, 175; “white
mughals,” 67
Muhammad, Prophet, 23n8, 84, 94, 105, 107, 126,
131, 250, 259
Muhammad Ali Shah, 11, 20, 86, 93, 99, 245; royal
procession of (unfinished panorama of Lucknow),
 86, 88 – 91, 254; wife of, 141
Muhammad Ali Shah. BUILDING SPONSORED BY:
Husainabad Imambara, 11, 20, 86, 87, 89, 130,
131, 145, 148, 151, 255; Jami Masjid, 11, 79, 80,
81, 84, 92, 250, 258
Muhammad Shah, 10, 16, 71, 74, 79, 165, 168, 170,
214, 215; depicted, 16, 70, 252, 258
Muharram, 23n8, 126, 251; festival, 92; imambara,
17, 92, 126, 151, 250; procession, 93, 106, 115,
118n61, 126, 151, 161, 248, 250, 251
Muin al-Din Chishti, Khwaja, 79, 79, 252; shrine of,
78, 78
Munro, Hector, 17
Murray, John, 158, 163n18
Murshidabad, 71, 72, 182, 187, 253
Musa Bagh, 152
Musa al-Kazim, 94
Mushafi, Ghulam Hamdani, 105, 109
N rekhti, 106, 110–13, 115, 116, 117(nn13, 32), 118n48
Nadir Shah, 10, 14, 16, 16, 27, 94, 252
Najaf, 93, 101n45
Nasikh, Imam Bakhsh, 108, 113, 117n26
Nasim, Daya Dhaukar, 118n54
Nasir al-Din Haidar, 20, 50n10, 65, 67, 95, 104,
106, 235, 241, 245; depicted, 16, 95, 252; wives
of, 50n10
nautch dance, 56, 69, 229, 241, 247; depicted, 48,
52 – 53, 68, 180, 261
nawabi dynasty, 10, 56, 215
nazakat, 107, 109
Nevasi Lal, 167, 175, 176, 181, 185n9; work
attributed to, 48, 49, 261; work by, 174, 253
Nidha Mal, 23n9, 165, 168, 170–71; work by, 171,
172 , 253
Nishapur, 90
O Sur Das, painting by, 75, 252
Ouseley, Gore, 11, 65, 134
P Taikatnagar, 141
padshah, 94
Padshahnama, 78, 79
paijama: farshi, 230, 232, 250; kalidar (kaliondar),
230, 232, 250
Pari Khana (parikhana), 114, 115, 245
Parks, Fanny, 50n10, 233, 235
Persian: language, 59, 105, 107–8, 117(nn12, 22),
126; -style clothing, 227, 229
peshwaj, 232, 233
Plowden, Elizabeth, 56–57, 59
Plowden, Richard, 56
Polehampton, Henry, 148, 163n3
Polier, Antoine-Louis Henri, 10, 23n12, 32–33,
51n20, 54, 59, 65, 67, 196, 224n36, 238, 241;
depicted, 54, 66, 67, 68, 69, 180, 229, 230, 241,
252; emerald seal ring belonging to, 220, 220,
224n36, 225n46, 260; manuscript and painting
collection of, 36, 61, 77, 79, 175, 176, 178, 181,
182, 185n17, 196, 201, 258; wives of, 33, 59
Premchand, Munshi, 51n37, 109, 118n52, 196
Punj Mahalla Gate, 82
Q 84, 93, 131, 131, 255, 260
Qadam Rasul, 84
Qaisar Bagh, 11, 21, 55, 58, 67, 83, 114, 134, 138,
139, 148, 159, 255, 260; destruction of, 41 , 51n25,
225n49; gateway, 138, 217, 225n39, 255; Sharar, Abdul Halim, 115–16, 118n51, 119n65, 187, U
panorama taken from, 152, 154 – 55, 260 188, 213–14, 238, 241, 244, 246, 249 Udgir, 79
Qaisar Pasand, 139, 159, 256 Shepherd, Charles, and Arthur Robertson, 134, 158; Udwat Singh, 182
Quilley, Geoff, 83 work by, 127, 129, 130, 132, 135, 255, 257 Umayyad, 126
shers, 107 Umrao Jaan, 50, 116, 118n57, 244, 246, 248; poster
R
Shia, 23n8, 91–92, 94, 126; Hidden Imam, 91; for film, 48, 261
raga, 182, 183, 247, 251, 258
monument and shrine, 86, 92, 94; musical Urdu, 104, 251; drama, 114–15, 245; fiction, 116,
Ragamala painting, 167, 182, 251, 258
preference, 248; Twelver Shiism, 90–91, 250 246; literary criticism, 108, 112, 117n32; poetry,
ragini: Bhairava, 182, 183, 258; Bhairavi, 182, 183,
Shir Muhammad, 179, 258 24, 27, 40, 50, 67, 105–7, 111, 113, 117n12, 126,
258; Deva Gandhara, 177, 258; Todi, 242, 253
Shore, John, 18, 101n23 247–49
rahas, 245
Shori Miyan, Ghulam Nabi Shori, 23n11 Usuli, 92
Rahas Khana, 114
Shuja al-Daula, 10, 14, 17, 185n4, 201, 220, 238,
Rampur, 112, 118n42, 193 V
244; coronation robe, 225n45; depicted, 17,
Ram Sahai, 182; work by, 37, 259 Vanbrugh, John, 65
101n27, 166, 167, 168, 172, 174, 176, 178, 180,
Rangin, Saadat Yar Khan, 110, 111, 112, 113, Vasudeo, film poster designed by, 48, 261
181, 181, 229, 229, 239, 252, 253; and East India
117n32, 118n33
Company, 10, 17, 23n18, 56, 141; and Faizabad, W
Rawdon-Hastings, Francis (Lord Moira; Marquis of
10, 17, 23n13, 59, 122, 188, 191; as patron, 10, Wajid Ali Shah, 11, 20–21, 27, 99, 148, 185, 241,
Hastings), 18, 59, 184, 185
61, 122, 167, 168, 176, 244; wife of, 17, 81, 201 245–46, 247; accession seal, 220; ceremonial
Ray, Satyajit, 46, 109, 118n52, 196, 261
Shuja al-Daula. BUILDING SPONSORED BY: mace, 211, 254; coat of arms, 217; concubine of,
fortification, 81; palace, 81, 82, 83, 122, 123, 245; coronation, 99, 99; depicted, 98, 99, 149,
Renaldi, Francesco, 23n13
124 –25, 126, 175, 254 185, 233, 236, 238, 254; Diwan, 99, 254; exile,
Residency, 55, 86, 160; Baillie Guard Gate, 153, 260;
Sikander Bagh, 44, 153, 157, 260 11, 21, 27, 199, 246; Ishqnamah, 99, 100, 185,
battery in, 156; dinner and parties at, 56–57, 67;
Simpson, William, 50n25; work by, 40, 41, 260 238, 241; as poet, 27, 67, 99, 185, 249;
Ruins of the Residency, 140, 260, 261; siege of,
Sinclair, J. Munro, 59 presentation cup with coat of arms, 216, 217, 254
21, 44, 141, 158
Sital Das, 182 Wajid Ali Shah. BUILDING SPONSORED BY: Pari
Resident, 10, 20, 23n18, 58, 65, 94, 99; Middleton,
Sita Ram, 29, 141; work by, 30, 257 Khana (parikhana), 114, 115, 245; Qaisar Bagh,
Nathaniel, 10, 56, 182; Sleeman, William H.,
Sleeman, William H., 50n13, 67, 212–13, 245 11, 21, 41, 51n25, 55, 58, 67, 83, 114, 134, 138,
50n13, 67, 212–13, 245
Smith, Charles, 61 139, 148, 159, 217, 225(nn39, 49), 255, 261;
riayat-i lafzi, 108
Smith, Robert, 61, 141; work by, 142 – 43, 254 Rahas Khana, 114
Riza ibn Ali Riza Khan, Hasan, calligraphy by, 98,
Solomon, Abraham, work by, 45, 261 wedding: celebration, 201; dress, 234; procession,
254
soz khwani, 248 248; veil, 113
Rohilla(s), 14
stucco, 55, 100, 122–23, 131, 134, 141 Wellesley, Arthur, 36
Royal Engineers, 152, 163n12
Sufi, 79, 251; qawwali, 248 Wellesley, Richard Colley, 11, 18
royal observatory, 20, 55
Sulaiman Shikoh, 105, 195 Wombwell, John, 32, 54, 65, 67, 181, 230, 230
rubai, 109, 117n22
sultana, Turkish, 2 (detail), 31, 252 women: Beauties of Lucknow, The, 161, 162, 163n29,
Rumi Darwaza, 10, 90, 126, 148, 151, 152; depicted,
Sunni, 23n8, 90–92, 100, 123, 126, 151, 227 232, 232, 262; clothing, 191, 230–38; European,
129, 255
29, 44, 51, 67, 141, 166, 252; harems, 59, 67, 114,
Russell, William H., 30, 31, 50n9, 51n25, 148
171; ornaments worn by, 47, 191, 213, 231;
Ruswa, Hadi, 116, 246, 248 T
secluded, 65, 67, 106; terrace scene with, 39, 73,
S 77, 166, 167, 171. See also begam; bibi; courtesan;
Taj Mahal, 79, 80, 81, 131, 258
Saadat Ali Khan, 11, 18, 56, 58, 65, 67, 84, 118n39, tawaif; taiwaif bazi; zenana
taluqdar, 11, 21, 46, 199, 246; crown presented by,
188, 194
20; illustrated album of, 21 , 240, 241, 260 Z
Saadat Ali Khan. BUILDING SPONSORED BY:
Tanda, 238 Zamir, Mir Muzaffar Husain, 117n20
Chattar Manzil, 11, 20, 84, 85, 134, 135, 144,
tawaif, 46, 50, 110–11, 115, 119(nn70, 71), 247–48; zenana, 46, 59, 100, 110, 111
148, 150, 151, 158, 255, 260; Dilkusha Kothi, 11,
film, 50, 116. See also courtesan Zoffany, Johann, 11, 23n13, 32, 54, 61, 65, 67, 69,
64, 65, 86, 134, 152, 256; Khurshid Manzil, 58,
taiwaif bazi, 116, 119n67. See also under courtesan: 182, 229; work after, 228, 257; work by, 33, 54,
65, 86; Lal Barahdari, 11, 163n4
culture 239
Saadat Khan Burhan al-Mulk, 10, 16, 71, 74, 90, 91,
tawaifi zaban, 110, 117n33
100(nn8, 9), 188, 200, 214, 215, 251; depicted,
tax, 51n20, 246
70, 251
taziya, 93, 126, 250
Saché, John Edward, 160; work by, 88, 255
tehzib, 109
Safavid dynasty, 90, 93, 106, 170
Tennent, William, 199, 224n1
Safdar Jang, 10, 16, 17, 71, 74, 200, 201; depicted,
thumri, 114, 115, 246, 248, 249
70, 252; mausoleum of, 121–22, 122 , 252
Tikait Rai, 141
Sangster, John, 59
Tillotson, Giles H. R., 81
Sauda, Rafi, 23n10
Timms, Biddy, 67. See also Meer Hassan Ali, Mrs.
Sayyid Dildar Ali Nasirabadi, 101n45
Tipu Sultan, 17
Shah Alam II, 10, 17, 185n4, 187; depicted, 178, 257,
trade: duty-free concession, 10, 17; export, 157, 236;
259
import, 59, 204, 222, 241
Shah Jahan, 63, 78, 78, 79, 94, 258
trousers, 67, 233, 235; farshi paijama, 230, 232,
Shah Najaf (imambara; masjid), 11, 20, 41, 73, 73,
250; kalidar (kaliondar) paijama, 230, 232, 250
Tytler, Robert Christopher, and Harriet Christina,
Shah Pir Muhammad Masjid, 84
158, 163n18; work by, 159, 256; work possibly by,
shaikhzada, 10, 16, 188, 213, 215
159
shaluka, 233
Shamsa page, 177, 257
270 271
Los Angeles County Los Angeles County Peter Norton
Board of Supervisors, Museum of Art Geoffrey Palmer
2010 Board of Trustees, Anthony N. Pritzker
2010–2011 Janet Dreisen Rappaport
Gloria Molina
Mrs. Stewart Resnick
Supervisor, First District Board Officers
Tony Ressler
Mark Ridley-Thomas Andrew Gordon Edward P. Roski Jr.
Supervisor, Second District Co-Chair of the Board Steven F. Roth
Carole Bayer Sager
Zev Yaroslavsky Terry Semel Terry Semel
Supervisor, Third District Co-Chair of the Board
Florence Sloan
Don Knabe William H. Ahmanson Eric Smidt
Supervisor, Fourth District Vice Chair Michael G. Smooke
Barbra Streisand
Michael D. Antonovich Robert A. Kotick Sandra W. Terner
Supervisor, Fifth District Vice Chair
Steve Tisch
William T Fujioka Mrs. Stewart Resnick Casey Wasserman
Chief Executive Officer Vice Chair Dasha Zhukova

Trustees Life Trustees

Los Angeles County
Museum of Art William H. Ahmanson Daniel N. Belin
Executive Officers Wallis Annenberg Mrs. Lionel Bell
Frank E. Baxter Donald L. Bren
Michael Govan
Willow Bay Eli Broad
CEO and Wallis Annenberg Director
Colleen Bell Robert A. Day
Melody Kanschat William J. Bell Julian Ganz Jr.
President and COO Dr. Rebecka Belldegrun Mrs. Dwight M. Kendall
Nicolas Berggruen Eric Lidow
David C. Bohnett William A. Mingst
Suzanne Deal Booth Mrs. Lillian Apodaca Weiner
Brigitte Bren Walter L. Weisman
Gabriel Brener
Eva Chow
Ann Colgin
Kelly Day
Joshua S. Friedman
Camilla Chandler Frost
Andrew Gordon
Tom Gores
Brian Grazer
Ghada Irani
Victoria Jackson
Suzanne Kayne
Robert A. Kotick
Mrs. Harry Lenart
Robert Looker
Michael Lynton
Robert F. Maguire III
Jamie McCourt
Richard Merkin, MD
Wendy Stark Morrissey
Jane Nathanson

272