This painting is folio no. 13 from a dispersed series of the Panchakhyana (a Jain recension of the Panchatantra). The Panchatantra (Five Treatises) is an ancient compendium of interwoven allegorical and moralistic fables, many involving anthropomorphized animals with human virtues and vices. The original Sanskrit text is indecisively ascribed to Vishnu Sharma and likely dates from 300-200 BCE, but the animal tales are presumably incorporated from a much earlier oral folklore tradition. The Panchatantra tales form one of the bases of Aesop’s Fables and numerous other renditions of the animal stories in myriad languages worldwide. The Panchakhyana, the Jain recension of the Panchatantra edited by the Jain monk Purnabhadra in 1199 CE, was particularly popular in western and central India. Here, although the descriptive text in the header has yet to be translated, the story appears to illustrate in what is likely continuous narration a merchant engaged in various commercial activities, a sleeping mother and child, an offering being made to an image of the goddess Durga, and an elephant battle. See also M.90.160.2.
