The emir slays the snake after giving it shelter, from a Tuti-nama (Tales of a Parrot): Forty-fifth Night (c. 1560): Art, History and Details

The emir slays the snake after giving it shelter, from a Tuti-nama (Tales of a Parrot): Forty-fifth Night (c. 1560) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

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

In the upper register, the emir addresses the snake’s owner. The snake itself hides, barely visible beneath the edge of the emir’s orange robe. In the bottom scene, the emir dashes the snake on the ground having realized that the dangerous animal planned to kill him.

Object facts

• Title: The emir slays the snake after giving it shelter, from a Tuti-nama (Tales of a Parrot): Forty-fifth Night
• Date: c. 1560
• Culture: Mughal India, court of Akbar (reigned 1556–1605)
• Type: Painting
• Technique: gum tempera, ink, and gold on paper
• Dimensions: Overall: 20.3 x 14 cm (8 x 5 1/2 in.); Painting only: 9.9 x 10.5 cm (3 7/8 x 4 1/8 in.)
• Collection: Indian Art
• Department: Indian and Southeast Asian Art
• Accession number: 1962.279.287.b

A detail from the museum

The previous folio, showing Khujasta addressing Tuti the parrot, is currently in the collection of the National Museum of Asian Art-Freer Gallery of Art, Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC.

Collection credit

Gift of Mrs. A. Dean Perry

Further reading listed by the museum

• The previous folio, number 286, is currently in the collection of the National Museum of Asian Art-Freer Gallery of Art, Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC. It shows Khujasta addressing Tuti the parrot.
• Chandra, Pramod, and Daniel J. Ehnbom. The Cleveland Tuti-Nama Manuscript and the Origins of Mughal Painting. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1976.

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.