Hyderabad by Walk - Salar Jung Museum

I have been meaning to visit Salar Jung Museum for a while now - a more leisurely exploration of the place with my new knowledge about the history of Hyderabad etc. So when Deccan Archives announced a heritage tour to look at some interesting aspects of the museum I went. 

The museum

Old relic

Old fire engine

I reached there early, waited for them to come and somehow conjured missing out on the whole group for quite a while and managed to miss out a whole section of the experience. Anyway, i caught up on the part where we examined Miniature Paintings, Manuscripts and a bit about the Weapons.

Asaf Jah 1 - The first Nizam

Shah Jahan shooting deer - he cannot miss from there

The Miniature Paintings were perhaps influenced by artists from the Deccan Sultanates who were inspired by Persian, Arabic and Middle Eastern cultures and artists from Vijayanagara after its fall in 1565. The paintings have characteristics of the temples of the Vijayanagara period. 

Death of Shahjahan with Princess Jahanara - Taj Mahal in the background

Abdullah Qutb Shah - 7th Qutb Shah Sultan

Tana Shah - the last Qutb Shah Sultan  

These paintings have backgrounds with mango trees, parrots, squirrel, palm trees etc which indicate the Deccan area. Paintings of Asaf Jah 1, Shah Jehan, Patamanjari Ragini paintings from the 17th century, Krishna and Radha, Ragamala paintings.

Minister Madanna who served Abdullah Qutb Shah 

Madanna brother of Akkanna

Scene from the Gita

How did Laila fall for Majnu?

Sibgat explained about the clothes, the halo behind the head of the king to signify that he is the ruler, the general scenery, how only people of standing had their paintings made. There were paintings of Asah Jah 1, Shah Jahan, Akkanna, Madanna and others.

Manuscripts

From there we proceeded to the manuscripts section which according to the information provided there had a copy of the Holy Quran written by Yaqut-al-Mutassim (1298 AD) a famous calligrapher of the Abbasid era. 

The Gita

The Mahabharata 

Apparently the decorations were enriched with colours of various kinds. Calligraphy was made into an art form as there were restrictions on producing figural art. Text was shaped into the form of minarets, arches, scripts etc. Most of it was on parchment, textiles, palm leaf, paper, glass, wood, stone and the inscription was in Persian, Arabic, Urdu, Telugu, Sanskrit. I saw some copies of Bhagavad Gita and the Mahabharata in these scripts.

Quran in different shapes and styles 

Ghalib's manuscript

Apparently the Arabic script is known as Kufic. Other scripts that followed are Jazm, Takshil, Harakat and then Nashk, Thulth, Muhaqqaq, Tauqi, Riqa, Rihan, Taleeq, Nastaliq, Shikasta, Shafia, Bahar (from India), Gulzar, Mahi, Thugra, Zulf-e-Uroor and Makas.

Weapons

We popped into the weapons section and checked out a fruit knife used by Noor Jehan and an archer's thumb ring of Shah Jahan.

Top left - Noorjahan's fruit knife

 

Then we saw the clock do its 12 O clock and went down to see the veiled Rebecca of which Sibgat said there were only three copies and only this one had a blemish with a black mark someplace. 

Veiled Rebecca

Masjid-e-Salarjung

The rooms were hot with no air conditioning and only some fans working. The lighting was not good enough nor was the information provided with each item on display. Clearly I need a longer visit to the museum at my own pace which I will do some other day.