Johnson 6,6

A Christian scene based on the Last Supper.

Deccan, c.1640-60.

Richard Johnson Collection. Purchased 1807.

Numbered 46 in Persian inventory note.

Drawing with gold for the halo; on an album leaf with gilt-decorated blue border and outer gilt-sprinkled margin.

167 by 97 mm; page 415 by 290 mm.

Reverse: a flowering shrub executed in gouache (unfinished).

Reproduced: Taylor (1975), pl.II.

Christ sits at a table with disciples on either side of him, he indicates to the right where Judas stands holding a round object representing the sop. Two dogs are at the foot of the table in the foreground and a figure is in a doorway behind.

Note: The iconography of this drawing is uncertain, although it can only be based upon the Last Supper or conceivably the Marriage at Cana. Judas holds his bag, as in the Gospel, but it approximates to the Indian hand-cloth; the sop has similarly become a spherical object, more like a fruit. While the drawing could have been cut at the edges, it appears that the total of twelve disciples was never depicted, and the presence of figures in female costume is strange.

An almost identical drawing was in one of the Warren Hastings Albums, recently in the Thomas Phillipps Collection (Sotheby, 27 November 1974, lot 812).