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Lot 110

A head and shoulders portrait of Raja Tulyaji Bhonsle of Tanjore (reg. 1765-87)
Company School, Tanjore, circa 1800

10 April 2008, 14:30 BST
London, New Bond Street

Sold for £3,120 inc. premium

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A head and shoulders portrait of Raja Tulyaji Bhonsle of Tanjore (reg. 1765-87)
Company School, Tanjore, circa 1800

watercolour on ivory, in brass mount and black wooden frame
miniature 60 mm. high; frame 135 x 120 mm.

Footnotes

Provenance:
Private collection, Sussex.

This portrait bears a close resemblance to one in the British Library, dated 1780 (though the date is thought to refer to that of the original by George Willison.) The Clives and their Italian governess, Anna Tonelli, visited Tanjore in 1798 and Tonelli painted both Raja Tulyaji and his son Raja Sarabhoji. It is possible that this miniature and the one in the British Library are by Tonelli, copying an original by Willison.

Raja Tulyaji (known as Tulsajee by the British) was removed as ruler of Tanjore in 1773 by Muhammad 'Ali Khan, Nawab of the Carnatic, with the assistance of the British, but was reinstated in 1776 by the new Governor of Madras, Lord Pigot. The following year, when Pigot died, Tulyaji commissioned a portrait of him by George Willison, who was in Madras from 1774 to 1780.

Additional information