MUGHAL INDIA, CIRCA 1590

INSCRIPTIONS:
Added cartouche in upper border: sultan sikandar lodi

This composition belongs to the artistic milieu of Akbar’s court, and was painted during the formative years of Mughal painting. Stylistically, parallels can be drawn between it and the illustrations of other early illustrated manuscripts, such as the Tutinama in the Chester Beatty Library, attributed to the 1580s. In particular, folio 66r. resembles the present painting in its composition: a small pavilion with a carpeted interior stands in a walled terrace with geometric paving. Another folio which seems to come from the same manuscript series as the present lot and also depicts the daily goings-on in a royal palace is in the Cleveland Museum of Art (acc.no.2013.317).

The cartouche at the top of the painting is almost certainly in a later hand, identifying the prince as the Delhi Sultan Sikander Lodi (r.1489-1517). In spite of this, the architectural setting of the painting is typically Mughal. The red sandstone palace bears a close resemblance with early Mughal palatial buildings such as the Agra Fort, Fatehpur Sikri, and the ‘Red Fort’ of Shahjahanabad. As well as being grand palaces, these buildings incorporated shops and market stalls, which became progressively sparser as one passed through a series of gates into the exclusive royal areas. Thus in this painting a monumental gate separates the street hawkers at the bottom of the painting from the courtiers thronging around in the prince in the centre.