Amorous Delight: The Amarushataka Palm-leaf Manuscript

Around 1800, an anonymous engraver in Sharanakula, a small temple place on the southern coast of Orissa, illustrated a palm-leaf anthology of love poems. The one hundred Sanskrit quatrains, which are said to be the work of the 7th-century poet Amaru, describe the behaviour of enamoured couples, their longing for each other, the lovers’ anxieties, their ecstatic joy as well as their doubts and sorrows.In India, these quatrains have at all times been cherished for their elegant language. Then, two hundred years ago, a great master-engraver visualised these verses in many small but meticulously executed and richly detailed illustrations. The erotic scenes in particular are of remarkable quality. While the verses are, without doubt, some of the greatest in the annals of Sanskrit literature, it is the illustrations of the work that have absorbed the authors here. The first part of the book is given to the poet and the poems, but then attention is turned to the intentions and acheivements of the painter. The authors attempt to follow his perception of the verses to comprehend how this Master visualised and rendered the refined Sanskrit verses into line drawings with such creative bearing and wit.