Akbar and Jahangir Examine a Ghir Falcon while Prince Khusrau Stands Behind (c. 1602–4): Art, History and Details

Akbar and Jahangir Examine a Ghir Falcon while Prince Khusrau Stands Behind (c. 1602–4) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

Emperor Akbar sits against a purple bolster under a canopy looking aged and careworn, probably not long before his death. He examines a trained falcon of the type that the Mughals used in hunting. This falcon appears to be from Akbar’s son, Prince Salim, who stands before him in a gesture of gift-giving. A stately black antelope, a wild animal now a pet, harnessed and wearing a bell, crouches at the foot of the steps leading up to the canopied platform.

Object facts

• Title: Akbar and Jahangir Examine a Ghir Falcon while Prince Khusrau Stands Behind
• Date: c. 1602–4
• Culture: Mughal India
• Type: Painting
• Technique: gum tempera and gold on paper
• Dimensions: Page: 35.8 x 23.4 cm (14 1/8 x 9 3/16 in.)
• Collection: Indian Art - Mughal
• Department: Indian and Southeast Asian Art
• Accession number: 2013.317

A detail from the museum

Salim rests his hand on a sharply pointed dagger in a red velvet sheath.

Collection credit

Gift in honor of Madeline Neves Clapp; Gift of Mrs. Henry White Cannon by exchange; Bequest of Louise T. Cooper; Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund; From the Catherine and Ralph Benkaim Collection

Further reading listed by the museum

• Mace, Sonya Rhie, Mohsen Ashtiany, Catherine Glynn, Pedro Moura Carvalho, Marcus Fraser, and Ruby Lal. Mughal Paintings: Art and Stories: the Cleveland Museum of Art. London: D Giles Limited, 2016.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.