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Eighteenth-Century Indian Muraqqaʿs
Audiences – Artists – Patrons and Collectors
Series: - Islamic Manuscripts and Books, Volume: 23
Volume Editor:
Fourteen essays and one appendix discuss numerous eighteenth-century Indo-Persianate albums (
muraqqaʿs) consisting of folios with paintings, calligraphic pieces, and elaborate decorative margins. These albums – now in Berlin, Baroda, London, Paris, and Manchester – were assembled for or collected by the Mughal nawabs of Awadh (Uttar Pradesh), local elites in Bengal and Bihar, as well as Europeans. The book not only presents hitherto rarely investigated material, but also provides general information and many new discoveries based on first-hand codicological study and historical research. It will significantly expand our knowledge of the production, collecting practices, and audiences of muraqqaʿs in eighteenth-century India.
Friederike Weis, PhD (2005), Freie Universität Berlin, is a specialist in Islamic albums and manuscripts. She has published extensively on cross-cultural exchanges in Persian and Indian art history and co-edited
The Diez Albums: Contexts and Contents (Brill, 2016).
List of Figures and Tables
Notes on Contributors
1 Introduction: Problems and Challenges in the Study of Eighteenth-Century Indian Albums
Friederike Weis
2 The Indian Paintings from the Collection of Archibald Swinton, Formerly at Kimmerghame House, Berwickshire
A Report by J.P. Losty, edited by Malini Roy and Friederike Weis
3 Obvious Narratives and Hidden Messages in the Large Clive Album
Axel Langer
4 Two Late Mughal Albums in the Royal Library at Windsor Castle: Further Evidence for the Collections of Nawab Asaf al-Dawla
Emily Hannam
5 Mughal Art on Its own Terms: Reflections on an Album Folio
Laura Parodi
6 Three Albums of Seigneur Gentil and Colonel Polier: Cultural Exchanges in Late Eighteenth-Century India
Susan Stronge
7 To Be Viewed from Both Ends: The Surviving Polier Albums
Friederike Weis
8 A Newly Identified Muraqqaʿ Assembled for Antoine-Louis-Henri Polier in the British Museum
Malini Roy with a contribution by Jake Benson
9 Like a Garden Bedecked: Floral Margins in the Muraqqaʿs of Antoine Polier
Isabelle Imbert
10 The Earlier Calligraphies in the Berlin Albums: Reflections on their Origins and Purpose in a Muraqqaʿ
Claus-Peter Haase
11 Polier’s Posterior Album: Rylands Persian MS10
Jake Benson
12 Expanding the Canon: Mir Muhammad Husayn ʿAta Khan and the Polier Albums
Will Kwiatkowski
13 Mihr Chand’s Copies and Adaptations of Earlier Mughal Paintings
John Seyller
14 The Spaces in Between: A Yogini of Lucknow for Antoine Polier
Molly Aitken
15 Building Worlds: Reading Spatiality, Power, and Gaze in Eighteenth-Century Paintings
Parul Singh
Appendix: Inscriptions and Seal Impressions in the Berlin AlbumsI. 4589, I. 4591, I. 4592, I5001, and I. 4600
Will Kwiatkowski and Friederike Weis
Credits
Bibliography
Index of Persons
Index of Places (Other than Places of Collections)
Index of Albums, Letters, Manuscripts, Works, and Calligraphic Styles
Notes on Contributors
1 Introduction: Problems and Challenges in the Study of Eighteenth-Century Indian Albums
Friederike Weis
Part 1 Albums Commissioned by Mughal Elites: Contents and Compilation Strategies
2 The Indian Paintings from the Collection of Archibald Swinton, Formerly at Kimmerghame House, Berwickshire
A Report by J.P. Losty, edited by Malini Roy and Friederike Weis
3 Obvious Narratives and Hidden Messages in the Large Clive Album
Axel Langer
4 Two Late Mughal Albums in the Royal Library at Windsor Castle: Further Evidence for the Collections of Nawab Asaf al-Dawla
Emily Hannam
5 Mughal Art on Its own Terms: Reflections on an Album Folio
Laura Parodi
Part 2 Albums of Foreign Elites: Changes and Challenges
6 Three Albums of Seigneur Gentil and Colonel Polier: Cultural Exchanges in Late Eighteenth-Century India
Susan Stronge
7 To Be Viewed from Both Ends: The Surviving Polier Albums
Friederike Weis
8 A Newly Identified Muraqqaʿ Assembled for Antoine-Louis-Henri Polier in the British Museum
Malini Roy with a contribution by Jake Benson
9 Like a Garden Bedecked: Floral Margins in the Muraqqaʿs of Antoine Polier
Isabelle Imbert
Part 3 Masters of Calligraphy and Painting: Between Historicism and Innovation
10 The Earlier Calligraphies in the Berlin Albums: Reflections on their Origins and Purpose in a Muraqqaʿ
Claus-Peter Haase
11 Polier’s Posterior Album: Rylands Persian MS10
Jake Benson
12 Expanding the Canon: Mir Muhammad Husayn ʿAta Khan and the Polier Albums
Will Kwiatkowski
13 Mihr Chand’s Copies and Adaptations of Earlier Mughal Paintings
John Seyller
Part 4 Spaces and Gazes: Reading Imagined Worlds
14 The Spaces in Between: A Yogini of Lucknow for Antoine Polier
Molly Aitken
15 Building Worlds: Reading Spatiality, Power, and Gaze in Eighteenth-Century Paintings
Parul Singh
Appendix: Inscriptions and Seal Impressions in the Berlin AlbumsI. 4589, I. 4591, I. 4592, I5001, and I. 4600
Will Kwiatkowski and Friederike Weis
Credits
Bibliography
Index of Persons
Index of Places (Other than Places of Collections)
Index of Albums, Letters, Manuscripts, Works, and Calligraphic Styles
This publication is primarily aimed at a specialist audience and students in the field of Islamicate manuscript traditions as well as experts in Indian, Mughal and Persianate art history. These can be art historians, scholars of cultural studies, philologists as well as codicologists. The book is also relevant for historians dealing with early British and French colonial rule in India. Moreover, it is of considerable value to collectors of Indo-Persian miniatures and calligraphy.