The street cleaner, on his way to meet King Bhojaraja, sleeps under a tree where four thieves disguised as fellow travelers deprive him of a priceless pearl, from a Tuti-nama (Tales of a Parrot): Twelfth Night
Unknown Artist
c. 1560
Medium
gum tempera, ink, and gold on paper
Dimensions
20.3 × 14 cm · painting only: 10.5 × 10.4 cm
Classification
Painting
Department
Indian and Southeast Asian Art
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
Gift of Mrs. A. Dean Perry
Accession Number
1962.279.97.a
About this artwork
Many scholars consider the diminutive Tuti-nama to have been one of the first illustrated manuscripts made for Akbar, on which Indian artists worked with Persian masters to formulate a new style that their exacting emperor appreciated. The new Mughal style would be used to create the monumental Hamza-nama and hundreds of other Mughal manuscripts. There are many continuities between the Tuti-nama and the Hamza-nama, such as the image of a recumbent figure under a magnificent tree.