Details

Subjects:

Erotic art.
Pachisi.
India.
Hindu legends.
Pachisi -- Pictorial works.
Rites and ceremonies -- India.
Rites and ceremonies.
Erotic art -- India.
Siva (Hindu deity).
Gaṇeśa (Hindu deity).

Form/Genre:

Pictorial works.
Paintings (visual works)
Manuscripts, Sanskrit -- 18th century.
Manuscripts, Sanskrit -- 19th century.
Illustrated works.

Language:

In Marwari (Devanāgarī)

Summary:

Manuscript is written in Marwari (old Gujarati) tells the story of the love, life, happiness, trials, and despair of Nāgajī and Nāgavantī, a royal couple living in the north-central Rajasthan (Bikaner). Contains numerous colorful illustrations of the couple, court scenes, religious ceremonies, bedroom scenes, as well as one depicting the couple playing the game of chaupar, referred to as copaḍa in the manuscript (f. 15r), the Indian precedent for the well known game Parcheesi, as well as illustrations of well known gods such as Gaṇeśa and Śiva. Some text follows the main text in a second scribal hand (f. 54v, i-iii).

Notes:

Title from colophon (f. 54r).
Written in 2-9 lines per leaf.
93 leaves foliated [i-ii], 1-53, [54], [i-xxxvii], upper left and lower right verso.
Colophon: iti śrīnāgajī nai nāgavaṃtī rī bāta saṃpūrna // subhabhavatuḥ kalpāṇam astu // (f. 54r).
Mistakes covered over in yellow or blacked out; some corrections and additions in margins; significant syllables, words, or phrases highlighted in red throughout; vertical margins marked with double red line and filled in with yellow. Illustrations occur on the bottom or bottom left of the text and are bordered with red.
Bound as a codex with heavy paper wrapped in cloth.
Formerly housed as Ms. Coll. 390, Item 3023.

Penn Provenance:

Formerly owned by W. Norman Brown given by his estate to the University of Pennsylania Libraries after 1975.

Publications about:

Levitt, Stephan Hillyer. "New manuscripts from the collection of W. Norman Brown added to the Indic manuscript collection of the Library of the University of Pennsylvania." Manuscripta orientalia 7, no. 3 (Sept. 2001).

Cited as:

UPenn Ms. Indic 34

Contributor:

Brown, W. Norman (William Norman), 1892-1975, former owner.

OCLC:

867650104