THE VIRGIN MARY AND CHILD

A closely related composition depicting the Holy Family with an attendant is in the St Petersburg Muraqqa'. Painted in Lucknow, it is also copied from the engraving of Aegidius Sadeler. There was a vigorous revival of European-style pictures with Christian subjects at the court of the Nawabs of Awadh. One of the most popular subjects was another print by Sadeler, The Holy Family with Saint Anne and Two Angels, after a painting by Johann von Aachen. Unlike many others the present painting, as the painting in the St Petersburg Muraqqa', is not an overpainting, but an adaptation of the European model in which Saint Joseph is replaced by a female attendant. The same composition appears to have been repeated in Lucknow and in other provincial centers until the 19th century (Toby Falk, et al, The St. Petersburg Muraqqa', 1996, pl.57, pp.68-69).