Gita Govinda #19

BY: SUN STAFF

Gita-Govinda, Kangra School

Nov 29, USA (SUN) — This month-long series explores text and manuscript illustrations from Gita-Govinda

In the Gita-Govinda series up to this point, we have explored numerous text and illustration folios from the Jaur Gita-Govinda along with a few paintings that exemplify other more formal styles. This limited number of examples hardly uncovers the great number of painting styles in which Gita-Govinda has been rendered over many hundreds of years.

Gita-Govinda, Saraswati Bhandar, Udaipur, Rajasthan, c. 1654 A.D.

For those interested in making an ongoing study of the large body of Gita-Govindaworks, following is a general chronology of some of the most prominent examples:

1. The Gita-Govinda, Gujurati, published by Sri M.R. Mazmudar, 15th century.
2. The Gita-Govinda in the B.J. Institute, Ahmedabad, in a folk idiom, also published by M.R. Mazmudar. He places it in the 15th century and Sri Karl Khandalavala places it in the early 17th century.
3. The Caurapancasika style Gita-Govinda, dated 1525-1570 by karl Khandalavala, considered to be from Jaunpur.
4. The Gita-Govinda folios in the National Museum, also dated late 16th century by Moti Chandra and Karl Khandalavala, c. 1575 A.D.
5. The Gita-Govinda of the N.C. Mehta collection which Mehta placed in the 15th century and Moti Chandra and Khandalavala placed in the early 17th century (1610 A.D.)

   
   

   

   Gita-Govinda, Mewar, c. 1530 A.D.

6. A few folios (eighteen) of the Gita-Govinda acquired by the City Palace3 Museum of Kaipure in 1977. Stylistically, it is close to the Dasamaskandha of the Jodphur Library or the Dasamaskandha of the jagdish Mittal collection.
7. The Gita-Govinda set in the collection of the Maharaja of Kankorali, some of its folios being in the same style as some folios of the N.C . Mehta collection. This set would also have to be placed latest at the end of the 16th or early 17th centuries.

   
   

   

   Gita-Govinda, Punjab Museum, Patiala

8. A Gita-Govinda set in the collection of the Maharaja of Jaipur. Stylistically it is closer to the Malwa idiom and cannot perhaps be dated later than mid-17th century.
9. the Gita-Govinda set in the Saraswati Bhandara, Udaipur, judging from a colophon which appears in a manuscript of the Kavipriya, which precedes the Gita-Govinda manuscript. This belongs to the mid-seventeenth century.
10. Some paintings from the set mentioned above are close to the Gita-Govinda in the collection of the Raja of Navalagarh, dated 1650 A.D. by Motichandra in the Lalit Kala Akademi publication on Mewar paintings.

Following these manuscripts of particular note are many other sets of Gita-Govinda done in the various sub-schools of Bundi, Kishangarh and Jaipur, and those of Basohli and Kangra in the 18th and 19th centuries.

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