Johnson 12,1

A composite horse and rider.

Mughal, c.1760.

Richard Johnson Collection. Purchased 1807.

Numbered 3 in Persian inventory note; numbered ‘22’ on border; inscribed on reverse: ‘asp-i jadu’ (a magic horse); pasted on reverse from cover-paper: ‘yek shabih tasvir-i husn asp-i jadu savar’ (a picture of a beauty mounted on a magic horse).

Gouache with gold; undecorated paper border; gilt floral margin on three sides.

175 by 107 mm; page 356 by 196 mm.

A peri rides a composite horse across a field. She carries an orange banner, and her wings are striped in colours. The horse is composed of animals and a girl, and a dog running alongside is also composite. The sky is gold with coloured clouds at the top.

Note: The technique of composite painting reached Mughal India through Persian painting, and while seventeenth-century Indian examples are less common (eg. Binney (1973), no.31) the practice increased in the late eighteenth century. The original meaning of the art is obscure, but by the nineteenth century Delhi artists were producing composite subjects for the fascination of Europeans ( eg. those in the Skinner Album, Add.Or.1268 and 1270). ‘See also’ Hendley (1914).