This collection consists of three photographs on 2 disaggregated album pages and 1 loose print: 1. Album page with two mounted salt prints showing Elliot marbles from Amaravati. Album page: 45 x 33 cm.; print 1: 16.7 x 19 cm; print 2: 19.7 x 19 cm. 2. Album page with one mounted albumenized salt print showing Elliot marble stupa relief from Amaravati. Album page: 45 x 33cm.; print: 25.5 x 24 cm. 3. Unmounted albumenized salt print, Facade of the West Side of the Nayakar Durbar Hall, Tanjore. 28 x 37.7 cm.
Arrangement:
One flat box.
Biographical / Historical:
Linnaeus Tripe (1822-1902) was an official photographer for the British Government, employed to document Southern Indian archaeological remains before they further decayed. He photographed widely in southern India, including Rayakottai (Ryakotta), which was then a British stronghold. Around 1858 Tripe took this image of sculptures from the ruined Buddhist stupa at Amaravati, which was a large monument built approximately 2000 years ago in what is now Andhra Pradesh. The stupa was a mound-like structure made of brick, adorned with bas-relief medallions, paneled friezes made of limestone and freestanding sculpture. As time passed, the stupa fell into disrepair and was eventually buried under rubble. Eventually, the structure was excavated and some of the decorative elements were shipped to the British Museum, London. These pieces were referred to as the 'Elliot marbles' after Walter Elliot, the antiquarian, linguist and member of the Madras Council who recovered them.
Local Numbers:
FSA A2017.06
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Rights:
Permission to publish, quote, or reproduce must be secured from the repository.
151 commercial stereographs depicting scenes of South Asia. Sources include Underwood and Underwood Publishers; Ricalton; H.C. White Co.; American Stereoscopic Co. and Keystone View Co. Collectively this is a nearly complete complement of photographs of India taken by James Ricalton.
Local Numbers:
E591
FSA A2014.06 2.S
Collection Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Genre/Form:
Stereoscopic photographs
Stereographs
Collection Citation:
Robert J. Del Bonta Collection, FSA A2014.06. National Museum of Asian Art Archives. Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.
3 Prints (albumenized salt paper, images 25 x 37 cm. or smaller, mounted 44 x 57 or smaller.)
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Prints
Photographs
Salted paper prints
Place:
India
India -- Andhra Pradesh -- Amaravati
Date:
circa 1856-1858
Scope and Contents:
This collection consists of three photographs: I. Albumenized salt print from wet collodion negative, 22 x 28 cm., circa 1858, on original mount, 33 x 45 cm. Depicts a piece of sculpture from the Great Stupa at Amaravati; these sculptures were then known as the Elliot marbles. II. Albumenized salt print from wet collodion negative, 18 x 29 cm., circa 1858, on original mount, 34 x 46 cm. Depicts an Indian sculpture with a measuring device. III. Albumenized salt print from wet collodion negative, 25 x 37 cm., circa 1856, on original mount, 44 x 57 cm. Depicts the idgah and tomb at Ryakotta (Rayakottai).
Arrangement:
One flat box.
Biographical / Historical:
Linnaeus Tripe (1822-1902) was an official photographer for the British Government, employed to document Southern Indian archaeological remains before they further decayed. He photographed widely in southern India, including Rayakottai (Ryakotta), which was then a British stronghold. Around 1858 Tripe took this image of sculptures from the ruined Buddhist stupa at Amaravati, which was a large monument built approximately 2000 years ago in what is now Andhra Pradesh. The stupa was a mound-like structure made of brick, adorned with bas-relief medallions, paneled friezes made of limestone and freestanding sculpture. As time passed, the stupa fell into disrepair and was eventually buried under rubble. Eventually, the structure was excavated and some of the decorative elements were shipped to the British Museum, London. These pieces were referred to as the 'Elliot marbles' after Walter Elliot, the antiquarian, linguist and member of the Madras Council who recovered them.
Local Numbers:
FSA A2001.10
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Rights:
Permission to publish, quote, or reproduce must be secured from the repository.
