The mendicant’s wife deceives him with a soldier, from a Tuti-nama (Tales of a Parrot): Fourth Night
Unknown Artist
c. 1560
Medium
gum tempera, ink, and gold on paper
Dimensions
20 × 13.5 cm · painting only: 9.1 × 10.6 cm
Classification
Painting
Department
Indian and Southeast Asian Art
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
Gift of Mrs. A. Dean Perry
Accession Number
1962.279.26.b
About this artwork
According to this story, written in Persian, a skilled yogi in India reached such a high level of practice that he was able to perform acts of transformation. Anxious to prevent his wife from committing adultery, he transformed himself into an elephant and carried her hidden in a howdah on his back and stayed only in the deep forest, away from men. One day, when the elephant was out foraging for food, a lone soldier came upon the wife, and they made love. The moral of the story is that no matter...