British professional artists, lured by the prospect of fame and fortune, began arriving in India from 1760s onwards. While most of them applied their talents to landscape painting, the portraits of the ruling elite or pictures of historical events of imperial interest, there were some with a different bent of mind, who were inspired by the bewildering diversity of its exotic people, especially the native women, writes Pran Nevile.

KASHMIR, nature’s most spectacular work on earth, has for centuries lured seers and sages, emperors and scholars, adventurers and travellers, poets and artists — all of whom have glorified this picturesque paradise. Until the middle of the 18th century, there was no visual record of the majestic landscape and scenic beauty of Kashmir, and its people. The Kashmiris, who trace their origin to ancient Aryans, are handsome people with fair skins and chiselled features.

British professional artists, lured by the prospect of fame and fortune, began arriving in India from 1760s onwards. While most of them applied their talents to landscape painting, the portraits of the ruling elite or pictures of historical events of imperial interest, there were some with a different bent of mind, who were inspired by the bewildering diversity of its exotic people, especially the native women. Historian Robert Orme (1750) had already aroused their curiosity with his remarks like "Nature seems to have showered beauty on the fairer sex throughout Indostan (sic) with a more lavish hand than in most other countries".

The first European to visit Kashmir was French physician Francis Bernier, who accompanied the retinue of Aurangzeb in 1668. The Mughals admired the beauty of Kashmir and covered it with picturesque pleasure gardens which inspired the poets to hail it as a paradise on earth. Bernier describes Kashmir as "the terrestrial paradise of the Indies" and adds that "the women especially are very handsome; and it is from this country that nearly every individual, when first admitted to the court of the Great Mogol, selects wives or concubines, that his children may be whiter than the Indians and pass for genuine Mogols". Women of Kashmir figure in quite a few accounts of European travellers Bernier’s remarks about them are endorsed by John Henry Grose who wrote in his Voyage to the East Indies (1760) that for the Mughal rulers, who "spared no effort or cost to furnish their harems with the handsomest women, those of Kashmir were the most preferred, being much fairer than any other province of India and having beside the advantage of a delicacy in shape and make".

Moorcroft was the first Englishman to visit Kashmir in 1823. Until then, the British had generally viewed Kashmir through Lalla Rookh (1817), a popular work of poetic fiction which brought unprecedented literary fame to its author Thomas Moor. It is interesting to note that Moor never visited India, but his graphic description of the heavenly landscape of Kashmir with its majestic mountains and lakes, as culled from early accounts, is simply amazing. He wrote:

Then he weaves in his words an amorous and romantic aura around the lake in moonlight —

No wonder, the fair women of Kashmir have been extolled for their beauty by poets, scholars and other visitors. As performing artists also, Kashmiri damsels were greatly admired not only for their alluring grace and comeliness but also for their talent and accomplishment in the art of dance and music. They adorned the courts and salons from Delhi to Calcutta. Raj literature of the 18th and 19th centuries contains references about the Kashmiri nautch girls, and their superb performance which delighted the sahibs. An English official, who knew Persian, describes in Calcutta Gazette of June 9, 1808, how he was struck by the melody sung by a Kashmiri nautch girl which ran as follows:

Sleep sleep let me sing thee to sleep
Sleep while my tresses o’ver thee
Fall in fragrant caress.
Sleep, for to watch thee reposing
Is to me deep happiness.

Another English traveller, Lt. Col. Torrens (1860), captivated by the graceful form and face of some Kashmiri girls with braided tresses and dark bright eyes, gives an absorbing account of the enchanting performance of the nautch girls in the illuminated Shalimar Gardens. He was dazzled by these ‘queens of dance and song’ and wrote that "those songs neer so sweetly sound as from a young Kashmirian’s mouth". He considered them vastly superior’ to what he had seen elsewhere. Another witness to a similar event in Shalimar Gardens, reputed British artist William Simpson was so much charmed that he compared it to a scene from Lalla Rookh. "The sweet delusions of a never to be forgotten night" — "the Peris of Paradise", he said, "were not a matter of doubt; they were realities before us".

The Kashmiri women in general did not lead secluded lives in the zenana, but moved about freely in the open. The ladies of aristocracy, however, were not accessible to the artists. Women shared the daily chores with their men and could be seen rowing boats and working in the fields. The British artists have left behind a very rich visual record not only of the scenic splendours of Kashmir, but also of its people, including some true-to-life sketches of Kashmiri women. It should be noted that William Carpenter, a famous British artist who visited Kashmir in the 1850s, while selecting subjects for the Royal Academy Paintings of India chose the titles: "Cashmere women buying Vegetables on the banks of the City Lake", and "Girls gathering water lilies".

Top: Punditanis buying vegetables on the banks of the City Lake by William Carpenter, C-1850

(Courtesy V & A Museum, London).

Centre: Woman of Kashmir by William Carpenter (C 1850)

(Courtesy V & A Museum, London).

Bottom left: Kashmiri girl gathering water lilies by William Carpenter, C 1850

(Courtesy V & A Museum, London).

Bottom centre: Kashmiri nautch girls seated on a verandah overlooking the Lake and mountains by William Carpenter, C 1850

(Courtesy V & A Museum, London).

Bottom right: Pavilion in Shalimar Bagh by William Carpenter C 1850

(Courtesy V & A Museum, London).