Types of India. A Chat with a Friend
[Original caption] A Chat with a Friend. This picture gives good opportunity to study the Indian dress.
Divided back
A Lazy Father
A humourous postcard showing a sleeping father, who is supposed to be pulling the punkah [fan] string to cool the off-framed European, but instead has delegated the task to his son. The punkahwallah not doing his duty was a common postcard theme.
A Kandyan Lady
A refreshing portrait of a woman looking straight back at the viewer, not contained by the frame. Most probably from a portrait by Charles Scowen in the 1870s, who photographed the same woman in slightly different poses.
H.H. The Maharaja's Palace at Srinagar (Kashmir)
In her Tourist's India (1907), Eustace Alfred-Reynolds Ball writes: "Colonel Durand in his "Making of a Frontier" gives in few words a picturesque yet accurate description of Srinagar from the river : "The town, a huddled mass of lightly-built
Greetings from India
This early postcard was published by the "Bazaar for the Suffering Child," a missionary group in Germany for domestic consumption and draws our attention to two features of early European postcards.
Asking for Alms
The photographic original of one-half of the lithograph A Fair Exchange by W. Cooper.
Savoy Hotel, Mussoorie
Postcards were an important advertising tool for hotels from the mid-1890s, when Alpine hotels in Austria, Germany and Switzerland helped to popularize the medium.
Canal Scene, Narsapur Taluq
An unusual embossed scene, likely in Andhra Pradesh, where the frame contrasts nicely with the blue canal. Produced by a missionary organization, probably to raise money or advertise their activities in India.
Group of Mogul Empresses
Although the women do look somewhat similar in this set of a dozen Mughal Empresses, they can be identified individually thanks to the Urdu captions beneath each: [From Top Left to Top Right, First Row] Jamila Khatoon W/o [Wife of] Muhammad Mirza,
Confectioner's Stall - Jaipur
Some of the most interesting postcards are bazaar and storefront scenes, which can be staged or candid, but always seem to contain a wealth of information about life a century or more ago.
