Bullock with water-skins & Bhisti. Jaipur
Bullocks and bhistees served an important role in transporting fresh water to city residents.
Ensuring fresh water supply to the residents in a desert region was always difficult.
Bhistee
Water Carrier
The Pakistani poet Daud Kamal (1935-1987) has a poem entitled Water-Carrier:
More patches on his clothes
than on the empty goatskin
slung across his shoulder.
Like the others
he waits his turn
at the Municipal tap.
Twice a day
he delivers water
free
The Water Carrier (Bhistee)
Bhistees supplied water to households and regiments
In the past, water carriers used cured hides of animals to carry water. Today animal hides have been replaced by bottles and jars of plastic.
Bhistee (Water Carrier)
One could argue that the bhistee was the most common male postcard type at the turn of the 20th century.
Water Bullock
Bullocks that ferried water were called "water bullocks." This colored image by Clifton & Company, one of the earliest mass publishers of postcards in Mumbai (Bombay) was fairly popular, perhaps because of its rich colors.
Water Carrier, Chumba
The Princely State of Chamba appeared on few postcards during the Raj even though its rulers seemed to have good relationships with a number of Punjab-based photographers, including Fred Bremner and John Burke.
A Water Carrier, Central Provinces India.
[Original caption] Woman Water Carrier. It is no unusual sight in India to see women performing manual labour, and in some cases they perform harder tasks than the men.
A Water Carrier, Madras
Today goatskins, pigskins and earthen pitchers have given way to plastic jars and bottles and huge, lumbering dripping water tankers that supplement inadequate piped water supplies in towns and cities throughout South Asia.
A Bhistee [Watercarrier]
![A Bhistee [Watercarrier]](https://www.paperjewels.org/sites/default/files/styles/square_thumbnail/public/slides/a-bhistee_0.jpg?itok=DCLgU_Ef "A Bhistee [Watercarrier]")
One of the most popular subjects of early postcards was the water-carrier, shown here together with a buffalo. Perhaps Hobson Jobson's definition for what it spells as "Bheesty" helps to explain why (1903, p.
Water bearer. Bombay.
A very early India-printed postcard signed by the chief lithographer at the Ravi Varma Press, Paul Gerhardt. Gerhardt was probably aware of Ravi Varma's prize-winning painting that year, Water Bearer, and we know from Raja Varma's diaries - the great
