Cultural object
Khmer illustrated Ramayana and Jataka manuscript
The Khmer illustrated Ramayana and Jataka manuscript is a book of drawings with Khmer captions, made around 1880 to 1900 and now in the British Library.[1] Its 203 drawings show scenes from the Ramayana and from the Jataka stories of the Buddha's former lives.[2]
The object
The manuscript is written on European paper and bound as a European-style book, with a brown cloth hardcover.[2][3] It measures 23 by 35.5 centimeters (9 by 14 inches) and has 280 folios.[3] Its glossy endpapers carry a marbled "Spanish wave" pattern, a technique that grew popular in Europe in the second half of the 19th century.[4]
Pages 1 to 157 show scenes from the Ramayana in black ink shaded with gray watercolor. Pages 158 to 203 hold scenes in color from the Vessantara Jataka and other Jatakas.[2] Each folio has a short caption in Khmer script, written in pencil.[2][3] In one scene Rama reveals himself as an incarnation of Narayana.[4] The word "Couronne," perhaps a French name, is written in pencil on the first unnumbered page.[2]
Iconography
The drawings follow the style of Thailand's Rattanakosin period.[2] They resemble the reliefs of the Ramakien, the Thai Ramayana, at Wat Phra Chetuphon, also called Wat Pho, in Bangkok, made in the reign of King Rama III (1824 to 1851).[2] Similar scenes from the Reamker, the Khmer Ramayana, appear in the murals at Vat Po in Siem Reap and on the 12th-century bas-reliefs of Angkor Wat.[2][4]
The artist sketched each scene in pencil before drawing it in ink, and shaded the black-ink scenes with gray watercolor instead of leaving them as plain line drawings. This way of working is unusual in both Thai and Khmer painting.[2]
Date and origin
The British Library dates the drawings to about 1880 to 1900, from the acidity of the paper.[2] A handlist of the library's Khmer manuscripts gives about 1880, lists the title as "Ramakien / Vessantara Jataka," and classes the book under both Thai and Cambodian.[3]
Provenance
The British Library bought the manuscript from Sam Fogg in London in 1994. It is held under the shelfmark Or 14859.[1]