…but they are crafty

– A Snake Charmer in the New Bazaar, Srinagar, Kashmir, 1892
from Illustrated London News. [found it here at Columbia.edu]
[Update: It was the work of J. E. Goodall]

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‘[They] are good-looking…but they are crafty’.

wrote Buddhist pilgrim from China, Huen Tsang who arrived in Kashmir in A.D. 631 as a state guest and stayed for two years. The exact words,”light and frivolous, and of a weak, pusillanimous disposition. The people are handsome in appearance, but they are given to cunning. ‘They love learning and are well-instructed.”

Kashmir in 1920s

Some more vintage photographs from ‘Kashmir in Sunlight & Shade: a Description of the Beauties of the Country, the Life, Habits and Humour of its Inhabitants, and an Account of the Gradual but Steady Rebuilding of a Once Down-trodden People’ by Cecil Earle Tyndale-Biscoe (1922).

A Winter scene by Pandit Vishwanath.
Back waters of Dal

Floating Gardens of Dal.
Diving from the old school.
Dussehra sequence from Salman Rushdie’s Shalimar The Clown wasn’t mere magic realism.
Tiny dots are the pilgrims.

Kashmiri in 1922

Some more old photographs of Kashmir from ‘Kashmir in Sunlight & Shade: a Description of the Beauties of the Country, the Life, Habits and Humour of its Inhabitants, and an Account of the Gradual but Steady Rebuilding of a Once Down-trodden People’ by Cecil Earle Tyndale-Biscoe (1922).

Pounding Rice: The mortars are block of wood hollowed out: the pestles are heavy pieces of timber which makes this daily round in women’s work very arduous.It is the women’s duty to convey water for domestic use. The constant practice of balancing the pots on their heads gives them an erect and graceful poise.

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