Cleveland Museum of Art
The snake, hidden in a basket of flowers, reveals himself to the Raja who has just sent away his wife, from a Tuti-nama (Tales of a Parrot): Forty-third Night
- Date
- c. 1560
- Medium
- gum tempera, ink, and gold on paper
- Culture
- Mughal India, court of Akbar (reigned 1556–1605)
- Department
- Indian and Southeast Asian Art
- Institution
- Cleveland Museum of Art
- Object ID
- 137735
From the Cleveland Museum of Art record
A black cobra appears beside the raja’s bed, intending to poison him in revenge for his earlier cruelty. The raja, who had mutilated the snake’s wife, reveals that he did so only after watching her seduce another snake. Upon realizing his wife’s treachery, the grateful cobra grants the raja the ability to talk to animals. The raja has sent his wife away after realizing the treachery of women.
The authoritative record is held by Cleveland Museum of Art. LinkedCulture surfaces this object and its connections; it does not alter institutional metadata.
Get printable QR codesHide QR codes
Open QR codes for this object page and the museum record. They stay collapsed until needed.
Provenance & credit
As published by the source institution. Coverage varies — not every institution's open-data feed includes ownership history.
- Credit line
- Gift of Mrs. A. Dean Perry
- Provenance
- ?–1959: Estate of Breckinridge Long [1881–1958], Bowie, MD | 1959–1962?: (Harry Burke Antiques, Philadelphia, PA) | 1959?–1962: (Bernard Brown Agency, Milwaukee, WI, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art. Purchased with funds from Mrs. A. Dean [Helen Wade Greene] Perry) | 1962–: The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
Related across collections
Semantically similar works from Cleveland Museum of Art and other institutions.