Akbar (whose reign extended from 1556 to 1605) was not only the founder of an extraordinary empire but also a monarch besotted by art and passionate about music; he was incidentally an excellent naqqara (kettledrums) player himself.

Abul Fazl Allami, his historian and biographer, describes the pomp and splendours of a ceremonial court where multitudes of musicians stayed and intermingled: Indians, those originally from Iran and Central Asia. It was in this context that the vocal art form, dhrupad, flourished: composed with lyrics in regional languages, it was accompanied by the rabab or the vina.

But it was also played in private, as exemplified in this painting by Manohar, who depicts here a favourite pastime of princes within the closed doors of the zenana (women’s quarters). A young woman stands deferentially, playing a bin whose tailpiece is made of ivory as are the three pegs and the cover adorning the upper end of the tube. Two other musicans accompany her: one woman beating time with her hands, while the other plays the dholak. The tradition of the vina had been firmly ingrained in the South Indian musical culture since very long. Innumerable texts and musical treatises describe the instrument and explain playing techniques.

Prince in the seclusion of the zenana, by Manohar,
Mughal school, towards 1605-1610

The term rudra vina appeared for the first time in 1550 in a South Indian tome written by the musicologist Ramamatya.
The instrument comprised four melodic strings and three supplementary strings that acted both as drone and rhythmical strings. Quite like the kinnari vina, the rudra vina was an instrument that featured largely in contemporary iconography – in its wide variety of forms.