Angma Jhala and Jayasinhji Jhala (Eds.) Genealogy, Archive, Image: Interpreting Dynastic History in Western India, c.1090-2016 Angma Jhala and Jayasinhji Jhala (Eds.) Genealogy, Archive, Image Interpreting Dynastic History in Western India, c.1090-2016 Managing Editor: Katarzyna Michalak Associate Editors: Sam Pack and Łukasz Połczyński Language Editor: Adam Tod Leverton ISBN: 978-3-11-053944-8 e-ISBN: 978-3-11-053945-5 ISBN EPUB: 978-3-11-053963-9 This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 License. For details go to http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/. © 2017 Angma Jhala, Jayasinhji Jhala and chapter`s contriburors. Published by De Gruyter Open Ltd, Warsaw/Berlin Part of Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston The book is published with open access at www.degruyter.com. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A CIP catalog record for this book has been applied for at the Library of Congress. Managing Editor: Katarzyna Michalak Associate Editors: Sam Pack and Łukasz Połczyński Language Editor: Adam Tod Leverton www.degruyteropen.com Cover illustration: © Molly Zenobia Matrisciano, Rani JijiBa amongst her beloved spirited horses. Contents Acknowledgements X List of Contributors XII Angma D. Jhala 1 Introduction: Genealogy, Archive, Image 1 1.1 The Periphery/Centre Debate: Framing a Region Through Dynastic History 3 1.2 Colonial and Postcolonial Reverberations 4 1.3 Scholarly Ruminations: Studies of Princely India and Ethnohistory 6 1.4 The Role of the Archive: Meaning, Preservation and Revitalization 8 1.5 Archivist as Ethnohistorian: H. H. Maharaja Meghrajji III of Dhrangadhra 10 1.6 Painting the Jhallesvaras 13 1.7 Painting Methodology 14 1.8 Marginal Voices and Diverse Sources 15 1.9 Chapter Outline 15 Bibliography 17 John McLeod 2 The Making of Jhallesvar Genealogy 21 Bibliography 80 Kevin McGrath 3 Landscape, Poetry and the Hero 83 Bibliography 118 Tony McClenaghan 4 Jhallesvaras in War and Peace 121 4.1 Era of Eclipse and the New Dawn 122 4.2 Era of New Alliances 131 4.3 Era of Reassertion and the End of Warfare 149 4.4 Concluding Thoughts 164 Bibliography 165 Angma D. Jhala 5 Rani Jijima, Soldier, Statesman, Financier: A Rajput Queen in Mid- Eighteenth Century Western India 167 5.1 A Word on Interpretation and Sources 172 5.2 Goddess, Patron, Warrior and Regent: The Many Faces of Jhala Women 174 5.3 Woman as Goddess: On Saktima 174 5.4 Women as Patrons 179 5.5 Women as Servants 181 5.6 Rani Jijima: Queen Extraordinaire 183 5.7 The Siege 187 5.8 Her Influence Post Siege 189 5.9 Concluding Thoughts 190 Bibliography 192 Michael Oppenheim 6 Patronage Networks and Musical Traditions in Jhalavad 194 6.1 Visual Sources 195 6.2 The Paintings 197 6.3 Historical Events 197 6.4 The Queen and Her Women at the Temple 199 6.5 Religious Events 201 6.6 Rasada of Haq Padi Viner Jagajo Re 201 6.7 Holi 203 6.8 Court Life 204 6.8.1 Harem Scenes 204 6.8.2 Military Procession 205 6.9 Special Events of the Court 206 6.9.1 Weighing the King 206 6.10 Plowing the First Furrow 209 6.11 Music in the Paintings 210 6.11.1 Performers 210 6.11.2 Audiences 212 6.11.3 Types of Instruments 213 6.11.4 Membranophones 213 6.11.5 Idiophones 215 6.11.6 Chordophones 215 6.11.7 Aerophones 216 6.12 Instruments in the Paintings 216 6.12.1 Historical Events 216 6.12.2 Religious Festivals 217 6.12.3 Court Life 217 6.12.4 Special Events 217 6.13 Reading the Paintings 218 6.14 Contemporary Traditions in Jhalavad 219 6.15 Hindu Devotional and Religious Music 219 6.15.1 Bhajan Singers 219 6.15.2 Bhajans in Dhrangadhra 220 6.15.3 Audience Interactions 222 6.15.4 Ramayana Singer 222 6.15.5 Puja 222 6.16 Muslim Devotional and Religious Music 223 6.16.1 Siddhi Culture 223 6.16.2 Siddhi in Dhrangadhra 223 6.16.3 Muslim Prayer and Recitation 224 6.17 Secular Performances 224 6.17.1 Madari Show 224 6.17.2 Langha Praise Songs 225 6.17.3 Wedding Music 226 6.17.4 Street Theater 226 6.17.5 Bhavai Theater 227 6.18 Genealogical Ceremony 230 6.19 Stratifications of Performance 231 6.20 Agency in Contemporary Traditions 232 6.21 Classifying Interactions in Dhrangadhra, Jhalavad 233 6.22 Tradition in Transition 234 6.23 Conclusion 234 Bibliography 235 Jayasinji Jhala 7 Village Archives: Reinventing Fifteenth Century Memories in Twenty-first Century Jhalavad 237 7.1 The Sensitivities of the Archive 241 7.2 The Sources 242 7.3 History as Story: Comparative Interpretations of Kuva-no-Ker 243 7.4 Vernacular Readings: A Miraculous Encounter 246 7.5 Village Voices: Local Mythologies 249 7.6 Jhalavad’s Guerilla War (Nanu Khet Yudhha) 255 7.7 Interpretations of the Village Archive 256 Bibliography 262 List of Figures 264 Index 269 For Bava H. H. Maharaja Meghrajji III of Dhrangadhra Writer, Anthropologist, Artist, Politician, Historian Acknowledgements This book could not have been made possible without access to Jhallesvar Meghrajji III’s invaluable textual archive. His life long collection of genealogical and historical materials enabled this exploration into Jhala dynastic history. Without it, we could not have imagined either the paintings or the essays, which compose this volume. We also thank our fellow contributors whose diversity of approaches and subjects of inquiry have enriched our understanding of the genealogy, music, history, poetry and paintings of Jhalavad. Many of them have visited the region and know firsthand the generous spirit of its people through lived encounter. We are grateful to the many residents of Jhalavad who have given much of themselves in the making of this work. Thanks go to Kalu Amra and Amrit Kalu Bhavaiya, theater players of the village of Kankavati, poets Bhachu Gadhvi and Charan Kirtidan, painters Vijay Chauhan and Hemendra Bhai Valera, the Bharvad pastoralists of Jesada village, Mera Bhai Gamara and Arjan Bhai Gamara, musicians and singers, Bhagavati Shankar Prasad Bhat, Mehul Bhai Seth, Alarakhi Bai Langha and Hemu Bai Mir, the priest Nana Lal Dave, lineage historians Raj Rana Harisinhji of Tana, Mangalsinhji of Bavali, Udesinhji and his wife BharatiBa of Bhrigupur and Rajendrasinhji of Ganad. Several filmmakers and artists have also been involved in earlier visual interpretations of Jhalavad. Anthropologist and ethnographic filmmaker Roger Sandall documented the visual and performance traditions of Jhalavad during his first visit in 1979. Aspiring filmmakers, Sam Pack, Lindsey Powell, Paul Osorio, Philip Rached, Rhett Grumbkow, Brendan Muzinski, Keith Machiafava, Hanah Angle and Travis Doyle have made contribution up to 2016. John Infante and Premji Rudatala, have recorded dynamic expressions of village and town life, celebrating memory and its historical legacy in the several decades since. Katey Mangels and Vijay Raol were most helpful in the early stages of developing this digital archive of paintings, while Molly Zenobia Matrisciano has refined the images seamlessly in the final stages, merging image and text. Anthropologists and ethnographic filmmakers have shaped our inquiry into the present and past of Jhalavad and we are grateful for the support of Asen Balikci, John Bornaman, Richard Chalfen, Robert Gardner, Carol Henderson, Charles Lindholm, John Lord, Norbert Peabody, Harold Prins, Clair Ritchie, Jean Rouch, Christopher Steiner, Paul Stoller, Stanley J. Tambiah, Elizabeth Marshall Thomas, Maxine Weisgrau and Nur Yalman. In particular, Richard Leacock inspired Jayasinhji Jhala’s first foray into documentary film and Sally Falk Moore has been a generous guide and support throughout the years. We are also indebted to various institutions, which enabled this decades-long project. The National Center for the Performing Arts, Mumbai showed early interest in the musical documentation of Jhalavad court singers in the 1970s. Temple University allowed us to bring students, faculty and interested researchers to this remote region, Acknowledgements XI as well as support the study and understanding of Jhalavad through research grants and sabbatical leaves. Temple’s Center for the Humanities hosted the first exhibition of paintings referred to in this collection during 2013. In 2014, the paintings were also shown at Mehrangarh Fort Museum in Jodhpur, India, and we thank H. H. Maharaja Gajsinh II of Jodhpur, Rajkumar Martand Singh of Kapurthala and Director Karni Singh Jasol, for exhibiting these works. We are grateful to Harvard University’s Library of World Music for their interest in the preservation and collection of Jhalavadi music and Tozzer Library for their acquisition of the documentary film, Halo of Heroes. In particular, we thank the late John Marshall and Documentary Education Resources for their decades of interest in the ethnographic films of Jhalavad. To Liluye Jhala, we owe a particular debt for her innovative vision in creating this wholly new and hybrid form of Jhalavadi miniature painting. We especially thank Rajkumari Rajasree Jhala, a steadfast partner in this endeavor of exploration and interpretation of discovery, for her many insights. List of Contributors Angma D. Jhala is an Associate Professor of History at Bentley University and was a visiting scholar at Harvard (2015-16). She received her doctoral degree in modern history from Oxford University and her Masters in Divinity and A.B. from Harvard. Her work focuses on modern South Asian history and religion, with a particular emphasis on politics, gender and material culture in nineteenth and twentieth century India. She has published Courtly Indian Women in Late Imperial India (2008) and Royal Patronage, Power and Aesthetics in Princely India (2011). Her newest book, An Endangered History: Religion, Politics and Indigeneity at the Crossroads of India, Bangladesh and Burma, forthcoming with Oxford University Press, examines histories of indigeneity and colonial systems of knowledge (botany, gender, enumerative statistics and ethnography) in constructing the India/Burma border.