The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of December 18, 2025

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

c. 1560

Mughal India, court of Akbar

(reigned 1556–1605)
gum tempera, ink, and gold on paper
Overall: 20.3 x 14 cm (8 x 5 1/2 in.); Painting only: 11.2 x 9.9 cm (4 7/16 x 3 7/8 in.)
Gift of Mrs. A. Dean Perry 1962.279.119.b
Location: Not on view

Did You Know?

The whereabouts of the previous folio, probably depicting the parrot addressing Khujasta on the sixteenth night, are unknown.

Description

A ladder connects the daughter-in-law’s chambers to the courtyard below, where the vagabond kneels beneath a tree, a stringed instrument called a rebab in hand, mouth open in song. Because her husband is unpleasant and ill-tempered, the woman falls in love with the musician. The damage to the right side of this page was probably repaired in the early 1800s.
  • ?–1959
    Estate of Breckinridge Long [1881–1958], Bowie, MD
    1959–1962?
    (Harry Burke Antiques, Philadelphia, PA)
    1959?–1962
    (Bernard Brown Agency, Milwaukee, WI, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art. Purchased with funds from Mrs. A. Dean [Helen Wade Greene] Perry)
    1962–
    The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
    Provenance Footnotes
    1 Samuel Miller Breckinridge Long (May 16, 1881–September 26, 1958) was an American diplomat and politician, who served in the administrations of Presidents Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Long is largely remembered for his obstructionist role as the Assistant Secretary of State responsible for granting refugee visas during World War II. His interests included the collection of antiques, paintings and American ship models. He maintained a stable of Thoroughbred race horses and was a director of the Laurel Park Racecourse in Laurel, Maryland, and he enjoyed fox hunting, fishing, and sailing.
  • Chandra, Pramod, and Daniel J. Ehnbom. The Cleveland Tuti-Nama Manuscript and the Origins of Mughal Painting. [Cleveland]: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1976. p. 116
    Seyller, John. “Overpainting in the Cleveland T̤ūtīnāma.” Artibus Asiae 52, no. 3/4 (1992): 283-318. p. 314 www.jstor.org
  • {{cite web|title=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|url=false|author=|year=c. 1560|access-date=18 December 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1962.279.119.b