A Mankot-style Pahari school of painting now at the Ashmolean Museum.
<ul><li>The Mankot style of Pahari school developed in the Mankot court of the Pahari Hills, now western part of Himachal Pradesh, close to the Jammu region. The ruling family of Mankot belonged to the Jammu Riasi family. The arts they patronized in the 17th and 18th-century reflect the Himalayan and northern Kashmiri traditions. Items from this collection are now found in many major museums around the world.</li></ul><ul><li>Approximate GPS location of where this art was created c. 1720 CE: <table style="width:100%"><tbody><tr><td style="border:none;"><span class="plainlinks"><span class="plainlinksneverexpand"><a class="external text" href="https://geohack.toolforge.org/geohack.php?pagename=File:1720_CE_Brahma_on_hamsa,_Pahari_school_of_chitra,_Mankot_Himachal_Pradesh.jpg&amp;params=032.497194_N_0076.072250_E_globe:Earth_type:camera__&amp;language=en">32° 29′ 49.9″ N, 76° 04′ 20.1″ E</a></span></span> <a class="mw-kartographer-maplink no-icon" data-mw-kartographer="" data-style="osm-intl" href="//commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:Map/13/32.497194/76.07225/en" data-zoom="13" data-lat="32.497194" data-lon="76.07225" data-overlays='["_43ec90ca97cde928f6b71dad19dbb7e88b074ba9"]'><img alt="Kartographer map based on OpenStreetMap." src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b0/Openstreetmap_logo.svg/20px-Openstreetmap_logo.svg.png" decoding="async" title="Kartographer map based on OpenStreetMap." width="20" height="20" srcset="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b0/Openstreetmap_logo.svg/30px-Openstreetmap_logo.svg.png 1.5x, https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b0/Openstreetmap_logo.svg/40px-Openstreetmap_logo.svg.png 2x" data-file-width="256" data-file-height="256"></a></td><td style="border:none;">View this and other nearby images on: <a class="external text" href="https://wikimap.toolforge.org/?wp=false&amp;cluster=false&amp;zoom=16&amp;lat=032.497194&amp;lon=0076.072250">OpenStreetMap</a></td><td style="border:none;"><a href="//commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Geocoding" title="Commons:Geocoding"><img alt="info" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/69/OOjs_UI_icon_help.svg/18px-OOjs_UI_icon_help.svg.png" decoding="async" width="18" height="18" srcset="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/69/OOjs_UI_icon_help.svg/27px-OOjs_UI_icon_help.svg.png 1.5x, https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/69/OOjs_UI_icon_help.svg/36px-OOjs_UI_icon_help.svg.png 2x" data-file-width="24" data-file-height="24"></a><span class="geo" style="display:none"> 32.497194;   76.072250</span></td></tr></tbody></table></li></ul><ul><li>The above gouache on paper painting is now at the Ashmolean Museum, as <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://jameelcentre.ashmolean.org/object/LI118.6">item LI118.6</a>. It is about 17 cm by 13 cm.</li></ul><ul><li>The painting shows 4-headed deity of Hinduism Brahma riding on his vahana. He holds a manuscript in rear right hand (Vedas), kusa grass in rear left hand (yajna rituals), a meditation beads (<i>mala</i>) in front right hand and a <i>kamandalu</i> (water pot) in front left – all standard, historic iconography. He sits on his vahana called <i>hamsa</i>.</li></ul><ul><li>This early 18th-century painting is notable for showing <i>hamsa</i> as a white swan with a long neck, unlike the goose-like bird iconography commonly found in Deccan region and south India where swans are rare. In the northern Himalayan regions, Punjab and parts of south Pakistan, the mute swan is known to migrate for the winter.</li></ul><ul><li>This is not an isolated painting. Many early Pahari school paintings and surviving Jammu &amp; Kashmir-region, Punjabi and Himachal Pradesh area artwork show Brahma sitting on a bird that looks more swan-like, rather than a gray duck or gray goose found in lower tropical climates such as those in South India. In contrast, <i>hamsa</i> in historic south Indian iconography is depicted closer to a goose or duck, sometimes with mythical flowery tail or beak. In southeast Asia, such as parts of Myanmar, the <i>hinta</i> or <i>hong</i> or <i>hongsa</i> icon is the religious equivalent of <i>hamsa</i>, and in places it is neither swan-like, nor goose-like, it is closer to a hen-shaped bird. The historic artists in different regions mapped the ideas and their interpretations to the fauna they had more intimate experience with.</li></ul><ul><li>This is a photograph of a 2D artwork created over 300 years ago, and therefore wikimedia commons' PD-Art guidelines apply. Any rights I have as a photographer, I herewith donate to public domain (CC0 1,0 license) through wikimedia commons.</li></ul>
1720 <a href="https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q50812768#P571" title="Edit this at Wikidata"><img alt="Edit this at Wikidata" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/8a/OOjs_UI_icon_edit-ltr-progressive.svg/10px-OOjs_UI_icon_edit-ltr-progressive.svg.png" decoding="async" width="10" height="10" style="vertical-align: text-top" srcset="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/8a/OOjs_UI_icon_edit-ltr-progressive.svg/15px-OOjs_UI_icon_edit-ltr-progressive.svg.png 1.5x, https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/8a/OOjs_UI_icon_edit-ltr-progressive.svg/20px-OOjs_UI_icon_edit-ltr-progressive.svg.png 2x" data-file-width="20" data-file-height="20"></a>
<span class="int-own-work" lang="en">Own work</span>