Many of the paintings in the
Green collection illustrate the typically Indian literary theme of personified
and poeticized musical melodies (ragas). Grouped in sets known as a Ragamala
(Garland of melodies), India's musical modes are a polymorphic form of artistic
creativity unique in the history of world culture. They combine music, poetry,
and painting in specific emotional and aesthetic correlations. The melodies are
historically the oldest component of the triad. They consist of notes arranged
in a particular sequence or structure, around which melodies expressing a
particular sentiment or ambience are improvised. Following the melodies, poetic
verses were composed to describe the appearance, personalities, and,
especially, the interpersonal relationships of the personified melodies. In
contrast to the music, the poetry associated with ragas was much more limited
in its extent and range of expression, serving originally to emphasize various
emotions associated with the melodies and, subsequently, functioning as a basis
for the visual imagery.
Paintings depicting the melodies were the last
of the three associated arts to develop. They were originally mounted as sets
in albums containing either thirty-six or forty-two folios. The sets were
conceived and organized in a system of "families." Each family is
headed by a male (raga), who has five or six wives (raginis) and sometimes
several sons (ragaputras) and daughters (ragaputris). This system of raga
families was traditionally used to determine the genders of the painted
personifications and pronouns used in the verses of poetry but is today much
less rigidly followed in musical classifications.
The names of the ragas are
derived from a variety of sources (Gangoly i: 72-79; Kaufmann, pp. 18-20; and
Pal 1967, pp. 8-9). The earliest method of naming the melodies often depended
on the beginning or dominant note of the composition, as in the Madhyamadi
Ragini, which begins with the note Madhyama (corresponding to F in Western
musical notation). In addition to this musical basis there are numerous other
rationales for the derivations of the ragas' names. Different geographical
regions or cities lent their names to melodies, as in Khambhavati Ragini, which
is derived from the ancient name of the coastal city of Cambay in Gujarat.
Seasons contributed their names, as in Vasant (Spring) Ragini (no. 31). Flowers
and animals lent their names, as in Kamala (Lotus) Ragini or Mayuri (Peahen)
Ragini. Religious associations influenced the names, as in Bhairavi Ragini,
which is dedicated to Siva (no. 5A verso). Tribal ties determined the names of
several melodies, as in Malavi Ragini, named after the central Indian tribe of
the Malavas. Musicians and royal patrons also gave names to new musical
creations, as in jaimpuri Todi Ragini, named for the Shargi kings of Jaunpur in
Uttar Pradesh (r. 1394— 1479). Finally, new names even resulted from the
bungling of copyists, as in Patamanjari Ragini, which was originally called
Prathama-manjari Ragini.
There are a number of underlying inspirations
and cultural correlations inherent to Ragamalas. The most basic involves the
time of day or season with which each melody is affiliated. Although these
symbolic associations were often ignored by poets and painters, they are
considered so sacrosanct by musicians that performing Dipak (Lamp) Raga (no. 5B
verso) at any time other than its prescribed midday is believed to incite
flames and cause disaster. The most influential thematic corollary to
Ragamalas, however, was the extensive literary tradition of ideal loving
couples (see introduction to Themes of Romance section), which classifies
female lovers (nayikas) and male lovers (nayakas) into two basic emotional
stereotypes: ecstatic lovers in union and forlorn ones in separation. Megha
Raga, for example, expresses the former, while Todi Ragini symbolizes the
latter. The set imagery for Ragamalas was occasionally recast in more
devotional garb with the inclusion of Krishna as the hero and Radha or various
goddesses as the heroine (nos. 32B, 39).
An extensive literary tradition
developed in association with Ragamalas. Dating perhaps from the second century
of the common era, the Ragasagara (Ocean of melodies) by Dattila is the oldest
known text to personify and describe the melodies (Kaufmann 1968, p. 11). This
early example notwithstanding, most Ragamala texts date from the thir-teenth
century onward. The majority were written in Sanskrit or various dialects of
Hindi, with a few works or translations in Persian and Bengali also known
(Coomaraswamy 1923; Ebeling 1973, pp. 112-49; and Gangoly, I:I05—50). Among the
medieval Sanskrit texts, the most influential iconographic source for the
Ragamala paintings produced in the Rajasthani tradition were the Sangitadarpana
(Mirror of music) by Damodara Misra dating from about 1625 and the anonymous
Sangitamala (Garland of music) of about 1750. In the Pahari tradition, the
Ragamala of 570 by Kshemakarna (a court priest from Rewa, Madhya Pradesh;
popularly known also as Meshakarna) formed the basis for the radically
different pictorial imagery used.
Ragamala paintings exhibit a
complex and variable imagery throughout the different geocultural regions of
India. Among the earliest surviving examples are those painted at various
subimperial Mughal workshops in northern India (nos. 31, 32A). Their
iconography accords with the majority of representations from Rajasthan (nos.
32B, 35, 40), Madhya Pradesh (nos. 33, 39), and the Deccan, which together
constitute the "Rajasthani tradition" (Ebeling 1973, pp. 56-62).
Images produced within this tradition typically portray romantic or devotional
scenes involving royal couples in a palatial set-ting complete with attendants.
Depictions of ragas in the Rajasthani tradition follow an iconographic order of
classification known as the "painters system," a term coined by a
leading specialist on Ragamala painting, Klaus Ebeling. Although it was the
prevailing ordering system in numerous Rajasthani and related ateliers and
forms the conceptual basis of approximately half of all of the known inscribed
Ragamalas, its paradigmatic literary origin remains unknown. Within the
Rajasthani tradition, a variant ordering subsystem was used for Ragamalas
produced at Amber (no. 34) and Jaipur. In addition, a second iconographic
system, attributed to an early medieval musicologist named Hanuman, was also
utilized for some twenty-five additional Ragamalas (Ebeling 1973, p. 18).
Ragamala paintings and drawings
made for the courts of Himachal Pradesh (nos. 36-38, drawings on versos of 5A-B),
which comprise the "Pahari tradition" (Ebeling 1973, pp. 272-96),
typically show individual or paired deities, people, and/or animals. The
conceptual source for the Pahari illustrations was Kshemakarna's Ragamala, in
which verses 12-97 personify and describe each musical mode, and verses 98-109
compare each melody to either the call of an animal or to a manmade sound
(Ebeling 1973, p. 64-78).
Owing to their complex imagery,
diverse geographical traditions, and centuries of development, Ragamala
paintings frequently exhibit conflicting regional variations for the same
melodies. Complicating matters even further is the fact that painters also
relied on oral traditions for their compositions, and thus there is often a
lack of correspondence between image and text. Perhaps in consequence, the
paintings are generally identified by labels or poetic passages that function
as a visualization or meditation aid (dhyana-mantra). The lengthy verses of
text found on the top or the back of paintings customarily start with a
quatrain (caupayi) whose second and fourth lines rhyme and end with a rhyming
couplet (doha) that gives the essence of the initial quatrain. Unfortunately,
even contemporary, and especially later, inscriptions are occasionally
inaccurate.
Today Ragamalas have
disappeared from the repertoires of Indian painters and poets. Only the musical
modes still burn with the flame of creativity.
Writer - Pratapaditya Pal
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