Miniature pasted on an album leaf. ‘A Group of Women Visiting a Hindu Shrine’

There is a great deal of humor in this painting of five wide-hipped Hindu women on their way to sacrifice at the local Shiva temple. The god’s symbol, a lingam, can be glimpsed next to the well-fed priest. The women’s gaily-patterned saris stand out against the temple’s violet sandstone and the lush green hills. Between the women and a thin monk behind them are traces of a woman that was painted over, making the bottom of her body part of the terrace and the top a light-green bush.

Aurangabad was conquered by the Mughals as early as around 1600, which is why the painting style there was influenced more by northern Indian painting than other art from the Deccan.