The origin of music from a fabulous bird of India which had seven holes in its beak, from a Tuti-nama (Tales of a Parrot): Fourteenth Night (c. 1560): Art, History and Details

The origin of music from a fabulous bird of India which had seven holes in its beak, from a Tuti-nama (Tales of a Parrot): Fourteenth 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:

This story tells of a fantastical bird called a qaqnos who emitted sonorous tones from its beak when joyful. From these sounds, the science of music was developed. In the image, a man holding a book in one hand and an instrument called a vina in the other crouches beneath a tasseled canopy. His weapons, a quiver, sword, and shield hang in the tree nearby.

Object facts

• Title: The origin of music from a fabulous bird of India which had seven holes in its beak, from a Tuti-nama (Tales of a Parrot): Fourteenth 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: 20.2 x 14 cm (7 15/16 x 5 1/2 in.); Painting only: 10 x 10 cm (3 15/16 x 3 15/16 in.)
• Collection: Indian Art
• Department: Indian and Southeast Asian Art
• Accession number: 1962.279.110.b

A detail from the museum

The illegible writing on the musician’s book seems derived from an Indian script, rather than Arabic or Persian.

Collection credit

Gift of Mrs. A. Dean Perry

Further reading listed by the museum

• The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1966. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1966.
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1969. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1969.
• Chandra, Pramod, and Daniel J. Ehnbom. The Cleveland Tuti-Nama Manuscript and the Origins of Mughal Painting. [Cleveland]: 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.