Picture Details
Two women grinding grain to make flour
Partner:
British LibraryImage reference:
BL.Add.Or.957Origin:
North, IndiaArtist / Date:
Unknown, c.1880Description:
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In this Company drawing (in the style produced by Indian artists for European collectors in the 18th and 19th century), two women are engaged in producing flour by either grinding wheat or dals for gram flour. The grains are not distinct enough to enable us to know for certain what it is that they are grinding, but the scene is of the sort that is still repeated all over India particularly in rural households, part of the domestic life of women. Here village women sit on the ground in front of their thatched hut; one cleans the grain using a characteristic reed or split-bamboo tray and heaps it into a basket; another rotates a grindstone to powder the cleaned grain. Wheat flour is made into various types of unleavened breads and gram flour is usually used to make thin coating batters. It is painted in the north Indian Patna style.
