A powder horn, Itawa, Kota, Rajasthan, India, late 19th century

Philippe Missillier Collection no.159C

The present powder horn is part of a group characterised by the form, resembling a nautilus shell, and by the decoration of inlaid mother of pearl and ivory in small lozenges and floral patterns. These powder horns were made at Itawa, a small town in Kota district, Rajasthan. An example made by Sita Ram was exhibited at the Calcutta International Exhibition in 1882-83 (Journal of Indian Art and Industry April 1884, I, no.2, p.11 and pl.XVIII) and another example at the Jaipur exhibition in 1883 (Hendley, Memorials of the Jeypore Exhibition, 1883, vol.I, pl.XVI). The catalogue of the Colonial and Indian Exhibition of April 1886 (Colonial and India Exhibition 1886, p.201) states that this work was done by two or three families of the Khatri caste.

The group is discussed by George Watt in 1903 (Watt 1903, pp.157-8, 207, pl.43a) and, more recently, Itawa work was discussed by Amin Jaffer (Jaffer 2001, p.283), and Kjeld von Folsach (Folsach et al. 2021, p.156, no.51). Another example from this group is in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (inv. no.1976.176.2), and two further examples are in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London (inv. nos.IM.13-1912 and IM.97-1927; Skelton et al. 1982, p.136, no.444), presented to the museum by Queen Mary and Lord Curzon in 1912 and 1927, respectively. Although dated by some to the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, it seems probable that most surviving examples were made in the nineteenth century.

Another comparable powder horn was made on the order of Maharaja Bhim Singh of Bharatpur and was sold in these rooms, 19 October 2016, lot 275.