A Medieval Tribal

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This portrait truly represents the image of a medieval tribesman, though he has been painted with somewhat finer and more delicate features and fairer complexion for anyone of his class. His beautiful round face, fine receding chin, expressive eyes, elegantly dressed and pleasantly fashioned hair, well set moustaches, shapely neck, beautifully cast arms and legs, proportionate figure and neat and comely dress, suggest as if someone of a high birth is enacting a tribesman in some dramatic production.

His identity as a tribesman is, however, evident from his bare feet and from his costume consisting of unstitched chadar-type pieces of plain long cloth, one wrapped around his waist, other around his shoulders and a third knotting around his hair suggesting that he belongs to a world where cloth or leather stitching has not yet made its way. A tribesman is essentially a part of nature, raw, plain, unassuming and uncast, as are various other creatures populating forests. For defining this kinship between the two, the man and the animal world, the artist has used a deer affectionately looking at him, as if something inseparable, some unseen ties bind them together.

This description by Prof. P.C. Jain and Dr Daljeet. Prof. Jain specializes on the aesthetics of ancient Indian literature. Dr Daljeet is the chief curator of the Visual Arts Gallery at the National Museum of India, New Delhi. They have both collaborated on numerous books on Indian art and culture.