- Title
- ↳ in Ms.
-
f. 1a:
Genialogie des Empereurs
- ↳ Established form
-
[Album with Portraits of Rulers and Calligraphy]
- Region
-
- Content
-
The album was made for Antoine-Louis-Henri Polier de Bottens (1741–1795) between 1784
and 1787 in Lucknow (Awadh, present-day Uttar Pradesh). Polier travelled back to Europe
from Calcutta (Kolkata) in January 1788 after a thirty-year stay in India.
The margins decorated with floral motifs are typical of the album workshop that worked
exclusively for Polier in Lucknow. Most of the calligraphies (f. 2a, 3a, 4a, 5a, 9a,
10a, 13a, 16a, 17a, 20a) are signed by the contemporary calligrapher Muḥammad ʿAlī
or can be attributed to him (f. 8a, f. 21a); some are dated 1195/1780-81 and 1196/1781-82.
The dedicatory rosette on f. 22b indicates Polier's military rank as a colonel, to
which he was only promoted on 15 April 1782.
Most of the miniatures show portraits of the Mughal rulers and their Timurid ancestors,
as listed in the genealogical tree on f. 1a (f. 2b, 3b, 4b, 5b, 6b, 7b, 8b, 9b, 10b,
12b, 13b, 21b), beginning with Tīmūr (1336–1405) and ending with Shāh ʿĀlam II (r.
1760-1806). F. 17b contains a portrait of the Iranian conqueror of India Nādir Shāh
(1688–1747), f. 20b a portrait of Aḥmad Shāh Abdālī (1722–1772), the founder of the
Durrani Empire (present-day Afghanistan). The portrait of the Mughal crown prince
Mīrzā Javān Bakht (1749-1788) on f. 1b was created for Warren Hastings (1732–1818)
after an oil portrait dated June 1784 by the British painter of German origin Johan
Zoffany (1733–1810).
- Completeness
-
- Language
-
- Script
-
- Colophon
-
dedicatory rosette (shamsa) on f. 22b:
هوالله
این مرقع بیست ورق بخط نسختعلیق وغره
از خشنویسان روزکار بابت سرکار افتخار الملک
امتیاز الدوله کرنیل پولیر بهادو ارسلان جنک دام اقباله
Huwa Allāh
īn muraqqaʿ-i bīst varaq ba-khaṭṭ-i naskh-taʿlīq va naskh wa-ghayruhu
az khushnavīsān-i rūzigār bābat-i sarkār Iftikhār al-Mulk
Imtiyāz al-Dawlah Kurnīl Pūlīr Bahādur Arsalān Jang dāma iqbāluhu
dedicatory rosette on f. 22b:
God Himself!
This album of 20 leaves in Nask-taʿlīq (Nastaʿlīq) and Naskh and other [writing styles]
by contemporary calligraphers [was made] for the gentleman, the Pride of the Realm,
the Ornament of the Government, Colonel Polier, hero, Lion of the Battle – may his
fortune last forever.
-
- ↳ Name
- Mīrzā Muḥammad ʿAlī ibn Mīrzā Khayr Allāh
-
- میرزا محمد علی بن میرزا خیرالله
- ↳ form given in the source
-
محمد علی
- ↳ Data of life
- * in India
- ↳ Person remark
-
signatures of Muḥammad ʿAlī on f. 2a, 3a, 4a, 5a, 8a, 9a, 10a, 13a, 15a, 16a, 17a,
20a, 21a
-
- ↳ Name
- Mihr Chand Son of Gangā Rām
-
- ↳ form given in the source
-
مهرچند
- ↳ Person remark
-
ascription on f. 14b:
عمل مهرچند
ʿamal-i Mihrchand
work of Mihr-Chand
- Editions/Literature
-
Eighteenth-Century Indian Muraqqaʿs: Audiences – Artists – Patrons and Collectors
(Islamic Manuscripts and Books, vol. 23) / Friederike Weis (ed.). Leiden/Boston: Brill,
forthcoming.
[table 7.2; f. 8a = fig. 11.13; f. 21a = fig. 12.15]
*
Weis, Friederike:
Von zwei Seiten betrachtbar: Indische Alben für Antoine-Louis Polier.
In: Ordnen – Vergleichen – Erzählen: Materialität, kennerschaftliche Praxis und Wissensorganisation
in Klebebänden des 17. und 18. Jahrhundert / Elisabeth Oy-Marra und Annkatrin Kaul-Trivolis
(eds.). Merzhausen: ad picturam, 2024, pp. 125–153.
https://doi.org/10.11588/arthistoricum.1408.c20488
[f. 1a, 1b, 2a, 2b, 3a = figs. 4-6]
*
Weis, Friederike:
Cruel Conquerors and a Solomonic Saint: European Collectors’ Interests in Indian Muraqqaʿs.
In: Manuscript Albums and Their Cultural Contexts: Collectors, Objects, and Practices
(Studies in Manuscripts Cultures, vol. 34) / Janine Droese and Janina Karolewski (eds.).
Berlin: De Gruyter, 2023, pp. 125–165.
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783111321462-004
[f. 17b = fig. 17]
*
India’s Fabled City: The Art of Courtly Lucknow / Stephen Markel with Tushara Bindu
Gude (eds.). München et al.: DelMonico/Prestel, 2010.
[f. 9b = cat.no. 127; f. 10b = cat.no. 128]
*
Roy, Malini:
The Artist Mihr Chand Son of Ganga Ram (fl. 1759-86): Idiosyncrasies in the Late Mughal
Painting Tradition, PhD diss. (School of Oriental and African Studies, University
of London, 2009).
https://doi.org/10.25501/SOAS.00033847
[f. 5b = fig. 143; f. 14b = figs. 3 und 148]
*
Weber, Rolf:
Porträts und historische Darstellungen in der Miniaturensammlung des Museums für Indische
Kunst (Veröffentlichungen des Museums für Indische Kunst Berlin, vol. 6). Berlin:
Museum für Indische Kunst, 1982.
[= pp. 359-456; f. 1a,b; f. 2b-22b = figs. 69-91]
- External Link
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