Indian Painting under the Mughals, A.D. 1550 to A.D. 1750 c18.2.2

c18.2.2

21 b) by Muhammad Khan in the album of Dara Shikoh in the India Office Library. Plate XXIX is a picture by a Hindu artist, and an inscription in Hindi characters, also not discernible in the reproduction, which contains the name of Hunhar, may be in the handwriting of the painter. But it is clear that all the illustrations in the Akbari books were originally issued by the artists, the majority of whom were Hindus, unsigned, and the names which they now bear were written later by Muhammadan and very often by Persian clerks. Unfortunately the reliability of all these inscriptions is open to question, especially when they are subjected to a close scrutiny. In the case of a number of pictures, notably in the British Museum *Dārābnāma*, frequent corrections in the artists’ names are visible, and it is evident that the work of labelling was not carefully done. On many of the paintings the artists’ names have been wrongly written, and afterwards others substituted when the mistake was discovered. The clerk concerned thought that his faults might be mitigated by deleting his first incorrect inscription with a smear of gold paint, and then writing across it another name. There was evidently considerable uncertainty in the office responsible for this work as to which artist painted which picture.