Jain Journal 1970 04

Author(s): Jain Bhawan Publication
Publisher: Jain Bhawan Publication

Page 24

Pigments used in Jaina Miniatures
MOTI CHANDRA
The majority of colours in the palette of Western Indian painting. came from minerals or natural salts. Some minerals were obtained in fine powders, while others were found in stones which had to be pulverised in fine dust to obtain colours.
To separate the colours from two undesirable elements, the sand and humus, the earth is dissolved in water. Naturally, the sand is deposited at the bottom, and the peat and mould tend to float and are skimmed off. But before the coloured earth also sets at the bottom, the water is quickly drained into another vessel. This process is repeated several times, till the colour is cleansed of all impurities. After being dried in the sun, the colour is ready to be used.
White
The nature of white used in Western Indian book illustrations specially in the palm-leaf period, has not yet been ascertained by scientific analysis. It could not have been white lead or zinc-white, as these pigments are not mentioned in the medieval Sanskrit texts on painting. The Mānasollāsa, a work composed in 1131 A.D. by Somesvara, mentions burnt conch-shell as pure white employed by the artists. In the list of formulas for mixing colours in two stray paper-folios, obtained by Muni Punyavijayji, the use of zinc-white is ordained. The possibility is that this colour was introduced in India in the 16th century or even a little earlier, by the Muslims as the word safeda for zinc-white is of Persian origin. But the use of zinc-white by the Mughal painters raises an important question whether the safedā used in Mughal paintings of the 16th and 17th centuries was in reality zinc-white or was it white lead, as the process of making zinc-white was discovered in the 18th century.
White lead was extensively used in medieval European paintings though it has two drawbacks. Firstly, it is poisonous and thus injurious for the worker and secondly, as water-colour pigment, it may be blackened by sulphur gases in the air. But this darkening of colour is uncommon in medieval manuscript paintings of India. From the medieval painter's point of view it was a further fault of white lead that it was incompatible with verdigris and orpiment in mixtures. As orpiment was frequently used in the Western Indian miniatures with white,