Nine Miniature Paintings of South Indian Dancers in Procession: 1770-1785

By Donovan Roebert

The ensuing article ought to be viewed as an addendum to my earlier piece, Some Very Early Pictures of South Indian Dancers, Part 2: ca. 1695-1780, as it belongs to the same time-frame, and deals with indigenous paintings of Indian ritual and court dancers of the proto-company painting school. Indeed, it is advisable to consult the earlier article in order to gain contextual information regarding the pictures presented here.

The nine company-style miniature paintings presented in this article are found among the company paintings housed at the Bibliothèque national de France, and available for viewing online.

The album in which they are found is titled simply ‘Recueil factice . Dessins en couleurs de divinités indiennes.’, and there is no information as touching the author or the exact location in South India where these miniatures were produced. One may, however, safely conjecture that these were made in French India, and probably in Pondicherry in the last quarter of the 18^th century.

The paintings are found in a typical company-style album containing 109 miniatures, of which nine are devoted to ritual temple dancers and musicians accompanying a variety of religious processions.

The body and facial markings seen on the officiating persons in these depictions show that all these processions were attached to a Vishnuite (or, Vaisnavite) temple. In these representations various manifestations of Vishnu are given in the normal processional modes of the time, and there is one picture which shows a royal figure on horseback rather than the deity.

A unique item among these depictions is a procession devoted to the story of Krishna and his stealing of the milkmaids’ clothing. I say it is unique because this particular theme is found nowhere else, so far as I know, among company paintings or other depictions involving temple dancers in procession.

Not being knowledgeable as to the various processional manifestations of Vishnu, I am unable to offer precise descriptions of the nine processions with devadasi dancers which follow below. Indeed, I am able to do no more than present them to readers for further analysis by knowledgeable persons, and to offer a more complete set of the proto-company paintings given in my earlier article mentioned above.

Here are the pictures:

Figure 1

Figure 2

Figure 3

Figure 4

Figure 5

Figure 6

Figure 7

Figure 8

figure 9

The person of the king on horseback is seen in figure 7. The unique depiction of Krishna and the unclothed milkmaids (gopis) is seen in figure 9.

My thanks are due to Mr Vadivelou Kannan for pointing out to me that the symbolism in figure 7 is that of Vishnu himself in the manifestation of the king. This reading tends to confirm the strong identification of royalty with the deity in the temple-court axis of the agamic tradition. Mr Kannan further pointed out that the naked gopis in figure 9 are wooden statues sculpted for the celebration of this story. He also provided images of such sculpted figurines still used in brahmotsava processions today.

END