Draupadi's Meeting with Queen Sudeshna, Folio from a Mahabharata ([War of the] Great Bharatas)

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Draupadi's Meeting with Queen Sudeshna, Folio from a Mahabharata ([War of the] Great Bharatas)

India, Karnataka, Mysore, Srirangapatna (Seringapatam) (?), 1670
Manuscripts
Opaque watercolor, gold, and ink on paper
Image: 4 1/8 x 6 1/2 in. (10.48 x 16.51 cm); Sheet: 8 x 19 1/4 in. (20.32 x 48.9 cm)
Purchased with funds provided by Dorothy and Richard Sherwood (M.88.29.2)
South and Southeast Asian Art
Not currently on public view

Curator Notes

This folio from a dispersed Mahabharata ([War of the] Great Bharatas) has been attributed by Stuart Cary Welch (1985) to Srirangapatna (formerly Seringapatam), which was the capital of the Mysore king...
This folio from a dispersed Mahabharata ([War of the] Great Bharatas) has been attributed by Stuart Cary Welch (1985) to Srirangapatna (formerly Seringapatam), which was the capital of the Mysore kingdom under Sultan Hyder Ali (r. 1761–1782) and Tipu Sultan (r. 1782-1799). The Sanskrit manuscript’s colophon states that it was copied by Govind Sharma, son of Ratnaker, from the village of Chalitgram in 1670. The episode is from the Book of Virata, chapter eight. It depicts Queen Sudeshna, the wife of King Virata, seated on a balcony. Before her stands Draupadi, the common wife of the five Pandava brothers who is disguised as the chambermaid Sairamdhri seeking employment, and two accompanying women. Queen Sudeshna doubts Sairamdhri’s identity because she is too beautiful and cultivated to be a servant, but hires her as her handmaiden. The illustration differs from the textual account in that Sairamdhri is dressed in similar finery as Queen Sudeshna and the two woman rather than in a “long, black, very dirty robe.” (Mahabharata 4.8.1; translation by J. A. B. van Buitenen, 1978.) Additional folios are in the Jagdish and Kamla Mittal Museum of Indian Art, Hyderabad (76.528 and .529), Freer Gallery of Art, Washington (F1975.5), Salar Jung Museum, Hyderabad, and National Museum, New Delhi.
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