tile
Tile
ca. 1650 (made)
ca. 1650 (made)
Artist/Maker | |
Place of origin |
This Mughal tile is one of a group acquired from Mr. Frederick H. Andrews in 1923. He had been living in Srinagar and wrote to the museum in 1922 offering to sell his collection before he left that year to return to the UK. All were acquired in Kashmir, and were stated to have come from the 'tomb of Madani' in Srinagar. The tomb is actually that of Sayyid Muhammad Hussain Madani whose mosque, dated 1444, is next to it. The tiles themselves are later, produced in the reign of the emperor Shah Jahan (r. 1628-58), for a ceremonial gateway to the tomb and mosque probably constructed in about 1640. The gateway was originally richly embellished with polychrome tiles. Details of what little remained in the early 20th century were recorded in the Annual Report of the Archaeological Survey of India for 1908-1909. Their photographs show tiles set into the walls that are closely similar to the panel of four tiles in the V&A to which this example belongs.
Object details
Categories | |
Object type | |
Title | tile (generic title) |
Materials and techniques | Earthenware with cuerda seca decoration |
Brief description | Architecture, ceramic, glazed, Mughal, c. 1650 |
Physical description | Part of a tile panel with a design which flows over the individual tiles. The tile has a green ground with a vase of white flowers with yellow centres, stems and leaves occupying the main portion with additional parts of orange flowers edged in white on either side at he lower edges. The baluster-shaped vase has a grey body with yellow foliate decoration embracing a stylised hanging orange flower outlined in white. |
Dimensions |
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Styles | |
Object history | This tile is one of a group acquired in 1923 from Mr Frederick H. Andrews. He had been living in Srinagar where he had been Director of the Technical Institute of Kashmir and wrote to the museum in 1922 offering to sell his collection before he left that year to return to the UK. The tiles are said to have come from the tomb of Madani near But Kadal in Srinagar, Kashmir. The building dates from the mid-fifteenth century, but it was refurbished by a Mughal nobleman in Shah Jahan's time. The tiles probably were made in Lahore. |
Subject depicted | |
Summary | This Mughal tile is one of a group acquired from Mr. Frederick H. Andrews in 1923. He had been living in Srinagar and wrote to the museum in 1922 offering to sell his collection before he left that year to return to the UK. All were acquired in Kashmir, and were stated to have come from the 'tomb of Madani' in Srinagar. The tomb is actually that of Sayyid Muhammad Hussain Madani whose mosque, dated 1444, is next to it. The tiles themselves are later, produced in the reign of the emperor Shah Jahan (r. 1628-58), for a ceremonial gateway to the tomb and mosque probably constructed in about 1640. The gateway was originally richly embellished with polychrome tiles. Details of what little remained in the early 20th century were recorded in the Annual Report of the Archaeological Survey of India for 1908-1909. Their photographs show tiles set into the walls that are closely similar to the panel of four tiles in the V&A to which this example belongs. |
Associated objects | |
Bibliographic reference | Skelton, Robert, et al, The Indian Heritage. Court life and Arts under Mughal Rule London: The Victoria and Albert Museum, 1982
p.26, no. 5
Susan Stronge, ‘Tile Revetments in the Reign of Shah Jahan’, in Ebba Koch in collaboration with Ali Anooshahr, eds, The Mughal Empire from Jahangir to Shah Jahan. Art, Architecture, Politics, Law and Literature, Marg Publications, Mumbai 2019, pp 220-245. See Plate 18, p. 236. |
Collection | |
Accession number | IM.266-1923 |
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Record created | June 25, 2009 |
Record URL |
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