Goddess of Dance, Indrani 7th Century, Kashmir Sri Pratap Museum This Goddess of Dance, Indrani 7th Century, Kashmir Sri Pratap Museum
This one was came from Badamibagh in 1926. About 20 other were found in Pandrethan between 1923 and 1933 while digging of military barracks were going on in the area. More than 500 relics were found. Now not much remains.
Kashmiri Dancing Girl at Shalimar
photograph by Herford Tynes Cowling,
for National Geographic Magazine, October 1929.
Vyjayanthimala in Amrapali inserted into a comic panel based on story of Hamsavali from Somadeva’s Kathasaritsagara. Somadeva, son of Brahman Rama, composed the Kathasaritasagara (between 1063 and 1081) for Queen Suryavati, daughter of Indu, the king of Trigarta (Jalandhar). She was the wife of King Anantadeva, who ruled Kashmir in the eleventh century. The story of Suryavati, Ananta, Kalsa and Harsha is perhaps the gruesomest tale from Rajatarangini that ends with Anata killing himself by sitting on a dagger and Suryavati going ablaze.
Although Edward Powys Mathers is more famous for ‘Bilhana: Black Marigolds’ (1919), which was later used by John Steinbeck for dramatic purposes in his American novel ‘Cannery Row’ (1945), Edward Powys Mathers was also one of the first translators of Kshemendra’s Smayamatrika.
His english version came out as ‘Harlot’s Breviary’ in volume 2 of book ‘Easter Love’ (1927).
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The book was available at Digital library of India but the reading method provided there is not too easy. So I have recompiled and uploaded the book to archive.org
Pratap Singh died on 25th September, 1925 and the throne passed on to his nephew Hari Singh. The coronation ceremony, the ‘Raj Tilak’ was held in February 1926. It was a long elaborate affair. Starting on February 14 and ending on 24th. After the main function was held in Jammu, the processions moved to the Akhnoor where the final ceremony of power transfer was performed.
The world media was obviously interested in the obscenely lavish pageantry held in honor of “Mr. A”.
“Jammu, Kashmir, India – New and rare photographs of the religious ceremonies within the palace gates and the dancing girls who took part in the coronation of the Maharaja of Kashmir have just been recieved. Reigning prices from all parts of the empire were present at the coronation of Sir Hari Singh, better known as the “Mr. A” of the sensational Robinson Case, in ceremonies which rivalled in splendor those of the Arabian Night. The celebration lasted over a week, preceded by mystic religious rites by the Hindu priests. The Prince’s favourite dancing girls also took part in the coronation, dancing for the new Maharaja before and after the religious ceremonies. Gifts amounting to two million pounds sterling were received by the new Indian potentate.” Dated: 19th April 1926.
Here are two rare photographs from the ceremony. A closer look at the dancing girls.
The child dancer.
The Dancer and the Wailer. Here the woman in the foreground is the dancing girl while in the background can be seen the woman hired for wailing. The coronation ceremony was essentially a mix of both a happy and a sad occasion. Traditionally the death of the previous king was to be mourned and the new king celebrated. This photograph captures it perfectly.
By 1920s, Kashmir in Summers was buzzing with tourists, year after year. And with the coming of tourists and therefore money into an impoverished region. And with that came a new set of issues. The travelogues on Kashmir written during this time often allude to this problem but when coming close to it, clearly avoid going into the details. The dubious happening in the ‘Bachelor’ side of Chinar Bagh were only whispered with a disapproving nod. The Kashmiris on their part were to permanently cast doubt on the character of Haez bai, the women of boat people, by insulations and that too without ever directly going into the details.
Following is the only graphic description I could about the nature of the issue:
Two Kashmiri Women with their Dog on a houseboat
[late 19th century, probably by Bourne]
Leached from ebay
The rain had stopped by the time we got back, and the night sky was like a cloth of blue velvet on which had been spilled a stupendous collection of fire-filled gems. A scent of flowers filled the rain-washed air, and over the tops of the gossiping chenar-trees the full moon was rising, a huge globe of soft orange light.
For one brief moment I wondered why the boat was lighted up. My bearer had asked for leave until the next morning . . “to see my uncle, sahib.”
“Garm pani lao! Khana lao!” (“A hot bath! Food!”)
Entering the living-room, I might have blundered into a tale from the Arabian Nights. Sitting cross- legged under the biggest of the Chinese lanterns, on a chintz cushion set in the middle of the floor, was a young Kashmiri girl in a trousered costume of green.
Despite the wide gravity of a pair of brown eyes darkened with antimony, she was evidently little more than a child.
We stared at each other. She was trembling. Apparently moveless, the silver bracelets on her arms were chinking faintly, and a little metal ‘bugle’ suspended between her eyes was tremulous.
“Who are you?” I am ashamed to say the question was not politely put.
“I am called Ameena. This is my mother’s sister.’ With a sideways movement she indicated a sheeted crone whose wrinkled and sunken lips were ceaselessly moving. I had not noticed her.
The sheeted lady salaamed several times in rapid succession, and muttered something unintelligible. Senile decay! It would be useless to talk to her.
Again I addressed the girl. “Why have you come?” (I heard her whisper under her breath the word “Allah!”)
“My father sent me. The manji said that the Presence wanted me. . . .”
The truth that rang in her voice and shone in her eyes roused a savage fury against the manji.
“I did not send him for you! I know nothing about it!” Mistaking the cause of my anger, before I could prevent her she had thrown herself at my feet.
“Do not beat me, Lord-sahib! Be pleased to let me stay! If I go before sunrise he will beat me!” The hands clasped about my ankles shook.
“Who will beat you?” (‘To beat/ ‘to abuse’how common those verbs are in India!)
“Your manji, sahib! . . . Shall I dance for you, sahib?”
Phaeton in the swaying chariot of the sun never wrestled more fiercely with his maddened steeds than I with runaway thoughts at that moment. … I had heard of these things, of course.
Something had got to be done! But what? . . .
(“What would the sahib like to do?” . . . “I will do anything!” … So that was it!)
I fetched a box of chocolate-almonds from the sideboard.
Her story was pitiable enough, but I knew that every word of it was true. Her father embroidered small articles with iridescent beetles’ wings. He had eye-sickness. Her mother was dead. They had no food. They owed a hundred rupees to a Marwari money- lender who had threatened to turn them out of their ‘house/ So the father had agreed to sell his daughter temporarily. (“What else could he do, sahib?”)
The beldame, when appealed to, moved forward on her hams, Indian-fashion, and, stroking the vic- tim’s hair, expatiated on her gentleness and general desirability. I could have slapped her.
Yes, it was true. He had fetched the girl, thinking to please me. Other sahibs did such things. He hitched contemptuously the dirty padded quilt about his shoulders she was a virgin, and for three hundred rupees –
Huge as he was, I would have thrashed him not so much for the way he spoke, but because of that profit of 200 rupees. But she was staying at Kashmir and I was returning to India. Also, I might easily be asked to send in my resignation as the result of a fracas in a native state.
~ Indian Mosaic (1936) by Mark Channing, an officer of Indian Army who wrote this book about his search for a real ‘Spiritual Pilgrimage’ in India. The book ends with Kashmir and the section begin with a chapter titled ‘The Girl I Bought’. And of course, he finds a ‘Guru’ in Kashmir, a man whose one of the duties is to read the dreams of Maharaja.
Although by 1936, George Orwell was already a published author but that year he didn’t even have money to pay his rent. In that year, he started writing reviews of plays, films and books for various publication. His first work for The Listener magazine was an unsigned review of the book ‘Indian Mosaic’ (1936) by Mark Channing, for which he was paid one pound. But even back then, he writing was sharp, astute and to the point. About this book and its author he wrote:
“Mr. Channing is, or was, an officer of the Indian Army. Probably it was fortunate for him that he was in the Supply and Transport Corps and not in an ordinary regiment, for it allowed him to travel widely and to get away from the atmosphere of the barracks and the European clubs. It is interesting to watch his development from a thoughtless youngster contemptuous of ‘natives’ and chiefly interested in shooting, into a humble student of Persian literature and Hindu philosophy.
And then he makes an observation that shouldn’t be hard to notice for a present day reader too but is seldom pointed out:
One of the paradoxes of India is that the Englishman usually get on better with the Moslem than the Hindu and yet never entirely escapes the appeal of Hinduism as a creed. But as a rule his response to it is unconscious – a mere pantheistic tinge in his thought – whereas Mr. Channing has studied Yoga at the feet of a guru and believes that we have far more to learn from India than she from us. He does not, however, believe India to be capable of self-government, and his book ends with a queerly naive mixture of mystical reverence and Kiplingesque imperialism. ” [quoted from ‘Orwell and Politics’, Penguin Classics]
A lovely little girl, she became a thief quite soon:
Honored by the townsfolk during the changes of the moon,
She was invited to their homes where the little dear
Made all their sacred vessels completely disappear.
When she was only seven, her voice already bold,
Her mother started teaching her how she could be sold;
Out of greed mom tutored her to play the harlot’s game,
And at the market gate, Deathtrap soon became her name.
She wore a pair of falsies and shells upon a string;
Hugs and kisses pleased her lovers – she’d do most anything.
One day a merchant’s son, Master Fullofit Esquire,
Shopping for some saffron, just happened to pass by her;
He was young and handsome – he wore fourteen carat gold.
Later in a gambling joint, where drinks were also sold,
She winked her eye, raised her brow, did all that she could do
To rouse his eagerness for a nighttime rendezvous.
While clinging to his neck that night as he lay fast asleep,
(since he had had a lot t drink his snooze was very deep),
She stole his golden earrings – he still did not awaken –
And the rings from off his fingers quietly were taken.
“Help! Help!” the girl then shouted, “Oh! Oh! I have been robbed!”
As if to stop a thief, “Help! Help!” she loudly sobbed.
Robbed and awakened, to avoid a family disgrace,
The salesman ran away, using his clothes to hide his face.
All decked out in dazzling duds, looking young and pretty,
She changed her name and moved along to another city.
~ ‘Samayamatrika’ of Kshemendra written during the reign of King Ananta, around A.D. 1050. Starting with a hymn in praise of Goddess Kali, it narrates the comic exploits of a harlot named Kankali (Skeleton) as her narration travels around Kashmir, from childhood to old age, from one heroine to another, from one adventure to another. The (improvised) translation given above is from Lee Siegel in his book ‘Laughing Matters: Comic Tradition in India’ (1987 ). These particular lines are about a girl named Arghagharghatika (Gurgling Little Pot).
An extract from Imperial India; an artist’s journals’ (1879) by V. C. Prinsep, who visited Kashmir around 1877.
One evening I went to a wedding. I was not allowed to join in the ceremony, but viewed the proceedings from an upper window. Seven days the tomasha had lasted, and day and night were women howling congratulatory verses to the bridegroom who sat feasting with his intimates the while. On a certain day rings are put into the bride’s ears and nose; on another her hands are marked with henna, and so on. She lived in a house hard by, where the happy man was allowed to see her for a short time each day, being conducted to and fro with mush ceremony and many torches stinking and reeking, as I found to my cost. I have taken down many of the distiches sung on the occasion, and am trying to get them translated, when, if they are worth it, I will add them to my diary. The continued howling of the women becomes very irksome after a time, and although the sight was curious, I was glad to get away after a couple of hours. The bride was nine years old.
The following is a translation of the songs sung at a Kashmirree wedding [by Major Henderson, C.S.I., the political officer in Kashmir]: –
Mother of the Bridegroom to the Bridegroom.
Urge on thy steed in every direction.
I will prepare thy seat in the garden pavilion:
On thy right the Koran, on thy left the necklace.
Thou art worthy to be called Lalla Gopal!
The Lalla Gopal in the verse needed some explanation. A note in the book adds, ‘Lalla Gopal, one of the names of Krishna, who was supposed to have been the type of loveliness. Curious, this, when sung by a Mohammedan!’
Prinsep further explains:
The song is a good picture of the manners of the country, and the way that the Moslem and hindoo customs have acted on each other. Whilst at Sreenugger I have painted two or three nautch girls, and it was through them that I got to this wedding, as they were amongst the singers. now these girls, like most nautch girls in India, were all Moslemehs, yet had they all the caste feeling of Hindoo. Of moral sentiment they were entirely innocent, but they would never permit any one to drink out of their cup or smoke from their hookah, and they always went about these two utensils, for smoke and tea are the two things necessary to a Kashmiree. So in this song a Kashmiree Moslem is made to say “beautiful as Krishna.”
There is another interesting line given in that song:
Singing women to the Bride and Bridegroom.
The parrot of Lahore and the Mainah of Kashmir!
How did you both become mutually acquainted?
The year must have been 1835. Godfrey Thomas Vigne, an English traveler in Kashmir,one of the first, was visiting a decaying old village called Changus( Shangus, as it is now called), a miles from Achibul (or Yech-i-bul, as he called it) in Anantnag district. He had heard that in the old glory days of Kashmir, this village was renowned for its colony of dancing girls. The singing, dancing and the beauty of the nautch women from this village was renowned all over the valley. The most famous among these danseuses was a women named Lyli. Englishman’s local host, a nobleman named Samud Shah, spoke of her with signs of regret, and expressions of admiration. But Lyli was long dead and so it seemed was the village. There were still some dancing women in the village but none refined like the days of yore. Like most places in Kashmir, this village too had lost its muse. The dancing muse – Terpsichore, no longer lived in that village. Or so it seemed. While he was walking around in the village, he heard a woman sing a song whose opening notes reminded him of a certain old comic song “Kitty Clover” by one Mister Liston and yet to him the song’s import seemed rather amorous. He was fascinated enough by the melody to have copied it into a sheet and then have it published in his book ‘Travels in Kashmir, Ladak, Iskardo ‘ (1844) under the title ‘Kashmirian Dancing Girl’s Song’.
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When I first saw that small sheet of music given in G.T. Vigne’s ‘Travels in Kashmir, Ladak, Iskardo ‘( see my post about nautch girls of Kashmir ), a strange thoughts occurred to me, ‘What song had G.T. Vigne heard that day? Wouldn’y it be nice to some how recreate that tune! Would it sound familiar?’.
With no knowledge of sheet music, I set about doing something about it.
(Sheet for Kashmirian Dancing Girl’s Song given in Travels in Kashmir, Ladak, Iskardo)
After experimenting with a number of software, I settled with a software called SharpEye2 that reads sheets from images and converts them to Midi format. The music sheet generated by the software isn’t perfect. Facility for editing the notes is provided but it isn’t very flexible. After tweaking the sheet, the end result looked something like this:
It isn’t pefect but still good enough.
And here is the sound generated (MP3 converted from Midi format):
Don’t know about ‘Kitty Clover’ (couldn’t find anything on it) but the opening notes are certainly wonderful and it indeed sounds Kashmiri.
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Enjoy a variation on the song with images of Shalimar Bagh:
In 1863, Samuel Bourne, a British photographer during his work trip to Kashmir was having trouble trying to get a troupe of Kashmiri dancing girls to pose for a photograph. After successfully taking a satisfactory photograph, much later, in his Narrative of a photographic trip to Kashmir (Cashmere) and adjacent territories (British Journal of Photography, 25 January 1867), he recounted:
“By no amount of talking and acting could I get them to stand or sit in an easy, natural attitude . . . The English Commissioner resident at Srinnugur (Srinagar). . . gave an order to have a number of the best-looking girls collected, of whom I was to take a group. They were very shy at making their appearance in daylight, as, like the owl, they are birds of night. They came decked out in all their rings and jewelery. and all their silk holiday attire; but, on taking a cursory glance at them when they were all assembled, with the exception of two or three, one could not help coming to the conclusion that if these were the prettiest, the rest must be miserably ugly. Much to my annoyance, a number of gentlemen had assembled ‘to see the fun’, and their presence by no means added to the composure of my fair sitters. They squatted themselves down on the carpet which had been provided for them, and absolutely refused to move an inch for any purpose of posing; so, after trying in vain to get them into something like order, was obliged to take them as they were, the picture, of course, being far from a good one . . . (13) (plate 22).”
He also explains why the ‘fair’ Kashmiris appeared dark in photographs:
“A photograph hardly does justice to native beauty; the fair olive complexion comes out much darker than it appears to the eye, on account of its being a partially non-actinic colour.”
A couple of years later, these dancing girls seem to have posed happily for a photographer named John Burke. Azeezie, probably a popular dancing girl at time in Kashmir, posed no less than four times for him. Burke, in notes to these photographs mentions some other dancing girls named Sabie and Mokhtarjan. In fact, all three of them had earlier been photographed by Bourne. Around the same time, another visitor to Kashmir, Captain William Henry Knight in his Diary of a Pedestrian in Cashmere and Thibet (1863) mentions a Kashmiri dancing girl named Gulabie. These dancing girls had already been made famous by the western travelers through their travel writings and were given the misnomer of nach/nauch/nautch girls.
As opposed to the first euphoric description of Kashmiri Beauty by Bernier, the new western travelers to the valley were trying to write a more reasonable and realistic account of Kashmiri beauty. Naturally, not all the nautch girls came out looking pretty in these accounts. In their accounts, these travelers noted that most of these dancing girls worked at Shalimar Bagh that was built by the Mughals. Here, lamps were lit at night and camps were set in the garden. And the tourists often used to visit these camps. Pran Nevile, a man who knows much about the history of nautch girls of India and author of the book Stories from the Raj: Sahibs, Memsahibs and Others,writes:
“There is a fascinating description by Lieutenant Colonel Tarrens (1860) of a nautch by Kashmiri girls in the Shalimar Gardens at Srinagar. The author was enchanted by the beauty of Shalimar, the queen of gardens, which he felt should be visited at night by the pale of moonlight when it is properly bedecked with torches, and crowned with lamps. Then “the proper thing to do is to give orders for a nautch at Shalimar.” Apart from the beauty of the place, Torrens was enchanted with the dancing and singing of the charming Kashmiri nautch girls whom he considered “vastly superior” to what he had seen elsewhere. Another witness to a similar performance in Shalimar Gardens was a reputed professional artist, William Simpson, who was so much enthralled by the sight of nautch girls dancing by torchlight that he describes it as “the sweet delusion of a never to be forgotten night.”
Often, in these accounts, they also noticed that Kashmir must once have been a great country but with years of cruel Pathan rule – it was in a state of slow decay.
“The village of Changus,** but a few miles from Achibul, was celebrated in times gone by as containing a colony of dancing girls, whose singing and dancing were more celebrated than those of any other part of the valley. I have heard Samud Shah and other old men breathe forth signs of regret, and expressions of admiration, when speaking of days that were past; and the grace and beauty of one of the Changus’ danseuses, whose name was, I think, Lyli, and long since dead, seemed to be quite fresh in their recollection. The village itself, like every thing else in Kashmir, has fallen to decay. A few of the votaries of Terpsichore still remain, but are inferior in beauty and accomplishments to those in the city, and continue to get a living by what would technically called provincial engagements. From one of them, whom I heard singing, I picked up the following air, which I believe to be original, although the first line bears, it cannot be denied, a striking resemblance to that of Liston’s “Kitty Clover.” Of word I know nothing, excepting that they were, as usual, of amorous import.”
“Unoppressed by any rigid code of etiquette, and naturally addicted to pleasure, the people of Kashmir find much of their enjoyment in female society, and from the earliest times have been noted for their love of singers and dancers. In former days the capital city was the scene of constant revels, in which morality was but but a secondary consideration, and now the inhabitants relieve the continual struggle against misfortune and despotism by indulging in gross vices, and drown the sense of hopeless poverty in the gratification of animal passions. The women of this delightful valley have long been celebrated for their beauty, and are still called the flower of the Oriental race. The face is of a dark complexion, richly flushed with pink; the eyes large, almond-shaped, and overflowing with a peculiar liquid brilliance; the features regular, harmonious, and fine; the limbs and bodies are models of grace. But all writers agree that art does nothing to aid nature, and it is not unusual to see eyes unsurpassed for brightness and expression flashing from a very dirty face. Among the poorer classes filth and degradation render many women actually repulsive, notwithstanding their resplendent beauty.
Travelers always remark the dancing girls who have acquired much renown in Kashmir. The village of Changus was at one time celebrated for a colony of these women, who excelled all others in the valley; but now its famous beauties have disappeared, and live only in the traditions of the place. The dancing girls may be divided into several classes. Among the higher may be found those who are virtuous and modest, probably to about the same extent as among actresses, opera singers, and ballet girls in civilized communities. Others frequent entertainments that the house of rich men, or public festivals, and estimate their favors at a very high price, while the remainder are avowed harlots, prostituting themselves indiscriminately to any who desire their company. Many of these are devoted to service of some god, whose temple is enriched from the gains of their calling.
The Watul, or Gipsy tribe of Kashmir is remarkable for many lovely women, who are taught to please the taste of the voluptuary. They sing licentious songs in an amorous tone, dance in a lascivious measure, dress in a peculiarly fascinating manner, and seduce by the very expression of their countenances. When they join a company of dancing girls, they are uniformly successful in their vocation, and have been known to amass large sums of money. Now that the valley is in its decadence, their charms find a more profitable market in other places. The bands of dancing girls are usually accompanied by sundry hideous duennas, whose conspicuous ugliness forms a striking contrast to their charge.
The Nach girls are under the surveillance of the government, which licenses their prostitution. They are actual slaves, and cannot sing or dance without permission from their overseer, to whom they must resign a large portion of their earnings.
In addition to these, who may be styled poetical courtesans, there exists a swarm of prostitutes frequenting low houses in the cities or boats on the lake; but of them we have no distinct account. It is certain that they are largely visited by the more immoral of the population, and an accurate idea of their status may be formed from a knowledge of the fact that the traveler Moorcroft, who gave gratuitous medical advice to the poor of Serinaghur, had at one time nearly seven thousand patients on his lists, a very large number of whom were suffering from loathsome diseases induced by the grossest and most persevering profligacy. In short, there can be but little doubt that the manners of the inhabitants of this interesting and beautiful valley are corrupt to the last degree.”
Around this time, stories of young Kashmiri girls being sold in the plains of Punjab were also doing the rounds in writings on Kashmir. These stories were first recorded by a French botanist named Victor Jacquemont who visited Kashmir in around 1831.
On his arrival in the Lahore court of Maharaja Ranjit Singh – the ruler of Punjab and of Kashmir, Jacquemont was treated to “a most splendid fěte” – a performance by “Cashmerian danseuses” who had “their eyes daubed round with black and white”. In a letter he told a friend of his: “my taste is depraved enough to have thought them only the more beautiful for it.” And in a letter to his father he wrote: ” the slow-cadenced and voluptuous dance of Delhi and Cashmere is one of the most agreeable that can be executed.” However, his experience with dancing girls in Kashmir was only of disappointed. In his supreme disappointment, he calls Kashmiri women “hideous witches” and even calls Irish poet Thomas Moore “a perfumer, and a liar to the boot” for essentially writing too beautifully about Kashmir in his famous poem Lalla Rookh. About the dancing girls at Shalimar Bagh her wrote: “They were browner, that is to say blacker, than the choruses and corps de ballet of Lahore, Umbritsir, Loodheeana, and Delhi.” Jacquemont had made up his mind when he wrote: “It is true that all little girls who promise to turn out pretty, are sold at eight years of age, and carried off into the Punjab and India.”
George Forster, who visited Kashmir in 1783, thought that Kashmiri dancers had disappointingly “broad features” and even more disappointingly often “thick legs” too. He was probably the first European to write about Kashmiri nautch girls. In spite of his disappointment he wrote: “the courtesans and female dancers of Punjab and Kashmire, or rather a mixed breed of both these countries, are beautiful women, and are held in great estimation all through Norther parts of India: the merchants established at Jumbo, often become so fondly attached to a dancing girl, that, neglecting their occupation, they have been known to dissipate, at her will, the whole of their property; and I have seen some of them reduced to a subsistence on charity; for these girls, in the manner of their profession, are profuse and rapacious.”
Surprisingly, Jammu can be claimed to have continued this tradition right until the time of legendary singer Malika Pukhraj (1927-2004). She started her illustrious career at the royal court of Maharaja Hari Singh and went on to captivate the entire divided sub-Continent with her beautiful singing.
There is another Jammu angle to the story of Kashmiri Dancing girls.
What these early western visitors probably witnessed in Kashmir was a form of Kashmiri singing and dancing known as Hafiz Nagma. The songs are usually set to Sufi lyrics or Sufiana Kalam and the dancer who performs these songs, always female, is known as – Hafiza. These dancers were much celebrated at weddings and festivals.In a Victorian twist, Hafiz Nagma was banned Kashmir in 1920s by the ruling Dogra Maharaja. He felt that this dance form was losing its sufi touch and was becoming too sensual, and hence amoral for the civil society. Now, old traditional songs being the same, in an odd parody, female dancers were replaced by young boys dressed like women to perform on them. It came to be known as bacha nagmaand is still popular at Kashmiri weddings. Hafiz Nagma is now almost lost.
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*This particular book first published in 1842 is my personal favorite. The only obvious error I could find in the book is that it got the date of George Foster’s visit to Kashmir wrong. Foster visited Kashmir in 1783-84 and not 1833 as claimed in Chapter titled Beautiful Country that quotes Foster’s visit to Vernag (Verinag). The same was noted in a footnote to C.Knight’s Penny cyclopaedia of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge (1851) while dealing with an article on the life of Francois de Bernier.
** Changus: Village Shangus of Anantnag district.
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Photograph of Shalimar Garden taken by me in June 2008
