A Somewhat Ominous Gift

It is well known (among scholars and historians at least), that tigers were an especially fascinating animal to the European colonial imagination, and were widely seen as a visual signifier for India.

But the European imagination did not come up with this allegory on their own of course. Many royal houses in India used the tiger in their insignia, and their mythology; the most famous among whom was Tipu Sultan, also known to the world as the Tiger of Mysore. In the late 18th century, Tipu famously commissioned a life-size semi-automaton of a tiger devouring a European soldier, complete with sound effects (the dying moans of the soldier). It was of course carted off to Britain after Tipu was killed in 1799, and now sits as one of the most popular objects in the collection of the Victoria & Albert Museum in London.

In a curious inversion of Tipu’s version, in this wall hanging, made about a century later, it is the tiger who is slain, fatally stabbed in its heart by a dagger that has gone clean through it. And somehow, It feels like too neat of a trajectory – from victor to victim, over a century of colonial conquest.

Who Made This?

And why did they make it? All I know is that it is a wall hanging, that it came from the United Kingdom, and that it was made sometime in the late 19th century.

I think I can safely infer that this textile piece was not manufactured in the UK, given its beautifully embroidered text, which reads ‘Present From India’, Then it likely made two journeys – one as a present from India, and one as an acquisition (possibly?) back from the UK.

The piece measures 116cm x 120cm, so it is certainly not small. It’s journey back and forth could not have been easy; I imagine.

Forget Me Not

It is a strange gift, to both give and receive. Forget Me Not, it declares while depicting a man engaged in a battle to the death with a tiger. The embroidered words are large enough that if displayed on a wall, it would have been possible to read it from over 50 feet away.

I wonder how the recipient of this present would have reacted on opening it.

Present from India

I read the word ‘India’ here as though it is the name of a person. Forget me not, says India. Here, I give you this present. The man and the tiger could almost be mistaken to be in a gentle embrace, were it not for the delicately embroidered red dagger.

From victor to victim, from slayer to slain, taken, and brought back, gifted, then returned. Once hung, now stored.

But, maybe I am reading too much into this.

The wall hanging doesn’t really say forget me not. It says Forget Menot. Begone Menot, whoever you are, you certainly have been forgotten.