Enrica Medugno
Senior Sale Coordinator
Lot 212
A rare 'Ganga-jamuna' mail shirt Lahore, 19th Century
12 November 2024, 11:00 GMT
London, New Bond StreetSold for £3,200 inc. premium
Looking for a similar item?
Our Islamic and Indian Art specialists can help you find a similar item at an auction or via a private sale.
Find your local specialistAsk about this lot
Oliver White
Head of Department
A rare 'Ganga-jamuna' mail shirt
Lahore, 19th Century
Lahore, 19th Century
of typical form with open front, long sleeves and single vent to back, formed of small iron, copper and brass rings creating a quatrefoil lattice, the border with lozenge bands, lozenge band running up one side of back
81 cm. long
81 cm. long
Footnotes
This fine mail shirt was produced from thousands of unusually small and unwelded rings resulting in an extremely flexible and light piece of armour. The use of contrasting metal rings is a technique known as 'Ganga-Jamuna' - the contrasting colours representing the churning waters at the confluence of two of India's most sacred rivers, the Ganges and the Yamuna. A Sikh turban helmet produced in Lahore with a camail bearing a lozenge design is published in Lord Egerton, Indian and Oriental Arms and Armour, London 1896, p. 134, fig. 33. Another set of armour with lozenged mail is also mentioned as having been "worn at the court of Ranjit Singh" (p. 134, no. 703). A helmet with a camail of iron and brass rings in the Royal Armouries in Leeds is believed to have been worn personally by Ranjit Sing (acc. no. XXVIA.36). A Lahore mail coif armour using the same technique acquired by Lord Dalhousie following the annexation of the Punjab is now in the Toor Collection and is dated to circa 1840 (see Davinder Toor, In Pursuit of Empire, Treasures from the Toor Collection of Sikh Art, London, 2018, pp. 232-3.) Two further examples of mail shirts are in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (Acc. Nos. 36.25.57 and 36.25.22a).