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GOVARDHAN
The Day of Judgement is discussed in a bathhouse
1540 - 1605RCIN 1005032.i
This is the earliest painting in the Khamsa manuscript, dating to 1540 (written on the end of the rooftop inscription). Areas of paint in the foreground were scraped off and painted over by the Mughal artist Govardhan in the early seventeenth century.
The painting depicts the passage in Nava’i’s text describing an imaginary meeting in a bathhouse between the twelfth-century Muslim theologian and philosopher from Herat, Fakhr al-Din al-Razi, and his contemporary, Shah Muhammad of Khwarazm. Shah Muhammad asks al-Razi to describe the Day of Judgement. He replies that on that day too, rich and poor will be alike in their nakedness.
In the top and right panels, we see the building from its exterior: the geometric forms of the dome and doorway against a gold sky. A date of 947 AH (AD 1540–1) written at the very end of the rooftop epigraphic inscription confirms that these areas of the painting belong to a sixteenth-century phase in the manuscript’s history. The upper half of the interior view also dates to this period: the dome’s pendentives are ornamented with a typically Bukharan pair of angels sharing a cup of wine. The Mughal artist Govardhan removed then repainted the original figures in the Mughal style.
The painting depicts the passage in Nava’i’s text describing an imaginary meeting in a bathhouse between the twelfth-century Muslim theologian and philosopher from Herat, Fakhr al-Din al-Razi, and his contemporary, Shah Muhammad of Khwarazm. Shah Muhammad asks al-Razi to describe the Day of Judgement. He replies that on that day too, rich and poor will be alike in their nakedness.
In the top and right panels, we see the building from its exterior: the geometric forms of the dome and doorway against a gold sky. A date of 947 AH (AD 1540–1) written at the very end of the rooftop epigraphic inscription confirms that these areas of the painting belong to a sixteenth-century phase in the manuscript’s history. The upper half of the interior view also dates to this period: the dome’s pendentives are ornamented with a typically Bukharan pair of angels sharing a cup of wine. The Mughal artist Govardhan removed then repainted the original figures in the Mughal style.
