- Title
- Lalita Ragini, Fifth Wife of Bhairava Raga, Folio from a Ragamala (Garland of Melodies)
- Date Made
- circa 1650
- Medium
- Opaque watercolor, gold, and ink on paper
- Dimensions
- Sheet: 9 3/4 x 6 1/2 in. (24.77 x 16.51 cm); Image: 8 1/8 x 6 in. (20.64 x 15.24 cm)
- Accession Number
- M.87.278.11
- Collecting Area
- South and Southeast Asian Art
- Curatorial Notes
The Hindi inscription in the header is the first couplet of the Lalita Ragini section of the influential ragamala (garland of melodies) by the 17th-century poet Lachiman Das:
A tiger hero, swaggering and truculent, seeming to be the slave of Love,
Who can tell when he returns, roaring like an elephant?
(Translation by A. K. Coomaraswamy.)
Lalita Ragini is the fifth wife of Bhairava Raga in the predominant ragamala classification system generally known as the Rajasthani system. It is a devotional melody associated with the early morning. It is personified as the arrival of the errant lover.
Here, the returning lover rides his white stallion up the steps of a palatial pavilion in which the heroine lies sleeping in a bedchamber. He carries a sword against his right shoulder and has a punch dagger (katar) tucked into his waist sash. His left hand holds the reins of the horse. A water ewer is incongruously placed on the top step.
A comparable Lalita Ragini, attributed to Orchha, Madhya Pradesh, circa 1640-1650, is in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (17.2384). It is inscribed on the reverse with the same above verse by Lachiman Das, but varies visually by the returning lover being on foot instead of on horseback.
