The daughter-in-law of the king of Banaras, charmed by the music of a vagabond, comes down to meet him, from a Tuti-nama (Tales of a Parrot): Sixteenth Night

The painting from the Sixteenth Night of the Tuti-nama, depicting the daughter-in-law of the king of Banaras drawn to a wandering minstrel by music, entered a Cleveland Museum of Art collection in 1962. Attributed to an unknown artist and created in the Mughal Empire circa 1560, it remains a cited example of Mughal book illustration in scholarly surveys of Indian painting. Its visual narrative of courtly fascination with itinerant music has been referenced in studies of cross-cultural motifs in South Asian art, though no major subsequent exhibitions or market records are documented.

The work depicts a bifurcated scene from a narrative in the Tuti‑nama, a collection of Persian tales. In the upper register a palace bedroom is shown, where two women in vivid, patterned garments stand beside a gilded canopy bed; one holds a fan, the other a letter. The lower register presents an outdoor garden where a woman in red leans against a tree while a man in orange plays a stringed instrument, all set against red‑brick flooring and a pink, diamond‑patterned wall.

The painting illustrates a moment from the sixteenth night of the story, in which the king’s daughter‑in‑law is enchanted by the music of a wandering minstrel and descends from her royal quarters to meet him. The juxtaposition of interior and exterior spaces underscores the transition from courtly confinement to the freedom of the garden, highlighting the allure of music and love across social boundaries.