Alexander Lowered into the Sea — Folio from the Khamsa of Amir Khusrau Dihlavi

Alexander the Great — Iskandar to the Persian poets — descending into the deeps of the ocean in a glass diving bell, painted as a Mughal vision of the most celebrated episode in the Eastern Alexander romance. His ships ride above; beneath the waves an angel will appear, foretelling the conqueror's death.

The painting is by Mukunda, one of the court artists in Emperor Akbar's atelier, dated to around 1597–98. It comes from an illustrated copy of the Khamsa — the Quintet — of Amir Khusrau Dihlavi, the fourteenth-century Persian poet of Delhi whose verses were among the most prized in the Mughal libraries. The manuscript was prepared for Akbar's imperial library, in the years when the workshop was at its peak.

The Khamsa's Alexander tradition treats the conqueror not as a Greek hero but as a seeker — a king who descends into the sea to learn the limits of his own power. The angel he meets there closes the question. Mukunda renders the scene with the colour and momentum that defined the late Akbari workshops.

Restored from the museum archives by aurahliving.com.