- Artist or Maker
- Dana
India, active circa 1810-1850 - Title
- Maharaja Takhat Singh II of Marwar (r. 1843-1873) and Women
- Date Made
- circa 1850
- Medium
- Opaque watercolor, gold, and silver on paper
- Dimensions
- Image: 10 1/8 x 14 in. (25.71 x 35.56 cm); Sheet: 12 x 16 in. (30.48 x 40.64 cm)
- Accession Number
- M.72.88.6
- Collecting Area
- South and Southeast Asian Art
- Curatorial Notes
Maharaja Takhat Singh II of Marwar (r. 1843-1873) was born in 1819 in Himmatnagar, Gujarat (formerly Ahmednagar) and died in 1873. He was the regent (1839-1841) and then the Maharaja of Ahmednagar (r. 1841-1843). In 1843 he ascended the empty Marwar throne through his patrilineal lineage in the Rathore Dynasty of Marwar (1226-1949). Takhat Singh II had thirty wives and is often shown surrounded by women of the palace. See also M.81.280.6.
Takhat Singh II is represented here standing under a porch awning in a palatial pavilion beside a lake He is accompanied by five women. The three standing in front of him carry a cup of wine, a serving tray with a wine flask, and a fan. The two behind him wave fans, one of which is an honorific peacock feather fan (morchal), a symbol of royalty. In the foreground are two dancing peacocks displaying their fan tails, which visually repeat the stylish hemispherical hems of the courtly garments. The dancing peacocks also prefigure the arrival of the rains, which is further indicated by the burgeoning clouds. In the distant landscape an ascetic is seated on a tiger skin rug before his thatch hut.
