Lot 126
Darogah Haji Abbas Ali
An Illustrated Historical Album of the Rajas and Taaluqdars of Oudh
Auction: India in Ink: The Library of Dr Raj Krishna | 01 October 2026 from 10am | Lots 79 to 208
Description
Allahabad: North-Western Provinces and Oudh Government Press, 1880. First edition, large 8vo (24 x 16cm), modern green half leatherette, with English letterpress at front ([6] xxiii 8 102 pp.) and lithographic Urdu text at rear (with imprint of Nawal Kishore, Lucknow, 1880, [4] 8 96 pp.), illustrated with one full-page albumen-print portrait photograph of Sir George Cooper (lieutenant-governor of the North-Western Provinces and chief commissioner of Oudh (14.3 x 10.5cm), 260 albumen-print carte-de-visite photographic portraits (9 x 5cm), and 83 similar carte-de-visites with the sitter replaced by text within the photograph (either 'unavoidably absent', 'pardanashin' i.e. a woman in purdah, 'sold', or ‘deceased prior to commencement of present work’ as issued), pasted to rectos and versos of 43 card mounts with printed captions in English (paginated 1-86 pp., with 4 prints to pp. 1-85 and 3 prints to p. 86), outer text-leaves silked, Urdu text pp. 69-96 with repairs (chiefly to margins), first 2 card mounts detached, inner of remaining mounts margins reinforced with linen, variable fading, corners of portraits affected by glue, small worm-track to lower-right portrait of each page, a few others appearing from about halfway through the portraits, ramifying towards rear (with resulting repairs and tears to mounts)
Provenance
INDIA IN INK: THE LIBRARY OF DR RAJ KRISHNA
Footnote
A rare photographic work in the Mughal tradition of the muraqqa', or album of portraits. The photographer Abbas Ali describes himself on the title-page as a ‘government pensioner, late municipal engineer, Lucknow'; 'darogah’ was an official position akin to a police officer.