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拍品專文
Samuel Davis trained as a professional artist in London, where he befriended Thomas Daniell, before travelling to India in 1780 to join the East India Company (he was made a director in 1806). He entertained the Daniells for a year from 1790-91, whilst posted in Bhagalpore (Bihar). Davis accompanied the uncle and nephew on various sketching trips. In May 1790 the three journeyed to Rajmahal and almost certainly crossed the river to Gaur, where they sat down to sketch this scene.
The Kotwali gate is on the south side of Gaur. The Kotwal was the chief officer of the police. A watercolour of the subject by Thomas and William Daniell was included in the P. & O. Collection; Christie's, London, 24 September 1996, lot 1 (£24,000), and one Daniell oil painting of the site is known (see M.Shellim, 1979, TD23; Bayly 1990, no. 248). Davis depicts the gate from a greater distance, unobscured by foliage, and incorporates the figure of an Englishman sketching nearer the gate. This is almost certainly Thomas, and he is accompanied by two attendants. A Bengal sepoy - an Indian soldier who served the British - is seated in the foreground.
Gaur was an ancient Hindu capital of Bengal. It was adopted as a centre of Muslim rule in around 1200, and flourished as the capital of an independent sultanate in the 15th century, when most of the surviving monuments were built. The city was devastated by plague in 1575 and never recovered; much of the area of the former city is now under cultivation. Like most of Gaur's buildings, the Kotwali Gate was constructed substantially of brick.
The aforementioned Daniells' watercolour served as a basis for an engraving in the Oriental Annual of 1835. The accompanying description illuminates both the majesty of the remains and the living presences which provided fascination of a different kind:
The arch is upwards of fifty feet high, and the wall of immense thickness. The ravages of time are indeed fearfully visible upon it, but nevertheless appears likely to stand for centuries. The neighbourhood swarms with vermin and reptiles of all kinds, and only two days before our arrival, a boa snake, two-and-twenty feet long, had been killed close by the old gateway'.
(The Oriental Annual, 1835, p. 244)
The gate still stands, slightly more ruinous; situated at the southern extremity of the site, it functions as a checkpost on the modern border with Bangladesh.
The Kotwali gate is on the south side of Gaur. The Kotwal was the chief officer of the police. A watercolour of the subject by Thomas and William Daniell was included in the P. & O. Collection; Christie's, London, 24 September 1996, lot 1 (£24,000), and one Daniell oil painting of the site is known (see M.Shellim, 1979, TD23; Bayly 1990, no. 248). Davis depicts the gate from a greater distance, unobscured by foliage, and incorporates the figure of an Englishman sketching nearer the gate. This is almost certainly Thomas, and he is accompanied by two attendants. A Bengal sepoy - an Indian soldier who served the British - is seated in the foreground.
Gaur was an ancient Hindu capital of Bengal. It was adopted as a centre of Muslim rule in around 1200, and flourished as the capital of an independent sultanate in the 15
The aforementioned Daniells' watercolour served as a basis for an engraving in the Oriental Annual of 1835. The accompanying description illuminates both the majesty of the remains and the living presences which provided fascination of a different kind:
The arch is upwards of fifty feet high, and the wall of immense thickness. The ravages of time are indeed fearfully visible upon it, but nevertheless appears likely to stand for centuries. The neighbourhood swarms with vermin and reptiles of all kinds, and only two days before our arrival, a boa snake, two-and-twenty feet long, had been killed close by the old gateway'.
(The Oriental Annual, 1835, p. 244)
The gate still stands, slightly more ruinous; situated at the southern extremity of the site, it functions as a checkpost on the modern border with Bangladesh.