1890
unspecified
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art
Leaf from a Kalighat album: Jatayu hinders Ravana’s chariot, trying to prevent the abduction of Sita (recto); Dushyanta watching his son Bharat playing with the tiger at the end of the Abhijnanashakuntalam (verso) is a 1890 unspecified by Unknown, a Patna School of Painting work, depicting Bengal, held at Cleveland Museum of Art.
You see a bright, flat picture of a giant bird grabbing a chariot in its beak while a woman inside screams. On the back, a prince watches his little son play with a tiger cub. These drawings were sold cheaply near a temple in Kolkata in the 1800s. Artists used bold lines and cheap paper so ordinary people could buy them. The same sheet tells two different Hindu stories—one on each side. Look up Kalighat to see more of these quick, colorful temple pictures.
This is an image of the ten-headed demon Ravana and Sita, wife of Rama, in a chariot held in the beak of the bird Jatayu, king of the vultures. When Ravana abducted Sita and carried her off in the flying chariot, Jatayu, a great devotee of Rama, engaged him in aerial battle to rescue her. Unsuccessful, he fell to earth, mortally wounded. It was from Jatayu that Rama found out about his wife. This story is from the epic Ramayana (The Journey of Rama). Here, in the Bengali version of this episode, Jatayu attempts to swallow the chariot in order to kill Ravana, but is forced to vomit it out once…
Read the full account in the museum source.
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