1864.] Memorandum on the life-sized Statues at Delhi. 



101 



meant as likenesses of the two brothers, and merely shows that at the 

 time of his visit, they were popularly known by general repute as 

 representing the two Chittore princes, but leaves untouched the 

 assumption that they may have been in existence for centuries, may 

 have been known at Gwalior as memorials of the popular hero there, 

 — Raja Maun Sing — and on their removal to Delhi, may have been 

 re-named by Shah Jehan, in memory of some incident in his early 

 youth, connected with the fall of Chittore. 



5. In his memorandum, General Cunningham has shewn that 

 the art of sculpture had long nourished at Gwalior, and that more 

 than one statue of a life-size existed there. Of the most famous of 

 these, he has traced the history down to the reign of Shah Jehan, and 

 proves that it had disappeared from Gwalior in the next reign. 

 Its disappearance he connects with the iconoclasm of Aurungzebe, 

 but if that Emperor destroyed it at Gwalior, how came the fragments 

 to find their way to Delhi ? Their removal must have occurred 

 during the troubled reigns of the successors of Aurungzebe, who had 

 but little leisure or inclination for adorning their capital with 

 expensive restorations of ruined statues, brought from so great a 

 distance. 



6. The history of the Gwalior statues then, ends abruptly in the 

 latter part of Shah Jehan's reign ; that of the Delhi ones commences 

 as abruptly about the same time : what is more probable than that the 

 two groups are identical, and that they were removed from Gwalior 

 by Shah Jehan, who would gladly avail himself of this opportunity 

 of transferring to his new palace and capital, works of art so cele- 

 brated ? the only ones of their kind, apparently, that existed in his 

 domimons, and the removal of which, in their uninjured state, would 

 be a comparatively easy task ; how the change of nomenclature may 

 have arisen, I have already pointed out. 



M 



