Only Her Face Survived

The historical 19th-century photograph appears to be a portrait of a woman from the royal zenana (harem) of Jaipur, captured by Maharaja Sawai Ram Singh II between 1857-1865. Portraits from this series capture women of the inner court or performers of the royal household, offering a rare glimpse into 19th-century royal Indian life outside strict purdah conventions... 

She lived in a part of the palace outsiders were rarely permitted to see.

Then the Maharaja pointed a camera at her.

Her face survived.

Her name did not.

In 19th-century Jaipur, the women of the royal household lived largely within the zenana, the secluded women's quarters of the palace. Purdah restricted their visibility to unrelated men, making the private world behind palace screens almost inaccessible to outsiders.

But Maharaja Sawai Ram Singh II had developed an unusual obsession: photography.

By the 1860s, he was experimenting seriously with the new technology, maintaining photographic equipment and producing portraits himself. Eventually, his camera entered the zenana.

The resulting photographs are extraordinary.

Women stare directly into the lens. Some appear richly dressed and covered in jewelry. Others are attendants or women whose exact positions within the household remain uncertain. They were photographed inside a world that contemporary visitors ordinarily could not enter.

Yet there is something unsettling about the surviving images.

We know who held the camera.

We know his name, his title, his reign and his fascination with photography.

But many of the women standing before him were never identified.

Older descriptions sometimes casually called them women of the Maharaja's “harem.” Modern historians are more cautious. They may have included attendants, servants, performers and other women associated with the zenana, not simply royal wives or concubines.

And we cannot know how each woman felt about being photographed.

The camera had crossed the boundary of purdah, but it had not necessarily given the woman before it control over how she would be remembered.

More than 150 years later, that creates a strange intimacy.

We can study her clothes.

We can examine her jewelry.

We can look directly into her eyes.

We can even identify the man standing behind the camera.

But for many of these women, the archive preserved almost everything except the one thing that belonged entirely to them.