A lacquer mirror case decorated with three Ragamala subjects, India, Mughal, 17th century

Geoffrey Dyne, Fleet, Hampshire

Private Collection, London

Acquired in 2007

Sven Gahlin, (1934-2017), London

N. Haidar in Crill-Stronge-Topsfield 2004, p.186, (2), footnote 23

The Ragamala subjects depicted here are: on the recto of the mirror cover (bearing the erroneous signature and date), Dipaka Raga, a prince with a flame burning at the front of his turban sits on a small couch caressing a girl; on the verso of the cover, Patmanjari Ragini, a seated lady lonesome for her absent lover is consoled by the singing of her confidante; and on the verso of the mirror, Malkos Raga, a prince sits on a throne holding pan while a girl stands by him with a fly-whisk. The three miniatures are comparable in style to the two series of Bikaner Ragamala paintings, circa 1650, in the British Library (Falk-Archer 1981, pp.254-6, nos.505 i-xxiv & pp.527-531, reprs.). For a full discussion of seventeenth-century Mughal lacquer boxes and mirrorcases, see N. Haidar in Crill-Stronge-Topsfield, 2004, pp.176-189. For five other works bearing the signature ‘Manohar’, see ibid., p.186 (for the last of these, see Sotheby’s, London, 13 October 2004, lot 18); and another, Gierlichs-Hagedorn 2004, col.fig.1.