Beschreibung:

Illustrated manuscript catalogue of tent designs, 3 volumes, circa 1880, approximately 155 tent designs in ink, watercolour and body colour, nearly all rectos and versos on 48 wove-paper leaves, some 50 designs full-page, the remainder 2 or 3 to a page (some depicting different aspects of the same tent), all with Persian manuscript specifications in red and black ink, nasta'liq script, illustrations and text within polychromatic frames, manuscript contents leaf to volume 1, tissue guards (many creased and torn), a few leaves apparently excised, some mild soiling (largely marginal), a few closed tears affecting frames, water-staining and concomitant abrasions or tears to endpapers, volume 1 front free endpaper and one illustrated leaf loose, contemporary red half morocco by Thacker of Bombay, titles gilt to front boards in Persian and English (the English portion slightly mistranscribed, and reading 'Farashkhama'), worn and marked, volume 1 rebacked with original spine laid down, volume 2 binding shaken and spine defective, folio (56 x 38 cm) Under the Mughals the farashkhana was 'a branch of the imperial textile workshops specializing in furnishings and carpets' (Kumar, Costumes and Textiles of Royal India, p. 43). During Crown rule they manufactured 'elaborate tents, rugs, furniture and other supplies for the camps which were an ordinary part of the life of the maharajas and their households when traveling' (Rudolph and others, eds, Reversing the Gaze: Amar Singh's Diary, A Colonial Subject's Narrative Of Imperial India, p. 581). (3)