At one haveli, for a small fee the owners allowed visitors into a particularly well preserved interior room.
It’s difficult to imagine being wealthy enough to afford to have the interior of your house hand painted like this.
Real gold leaf was used in much of the detail of these frescoes.
Some of the details in the room were reminiscent more of a church than a room in a private home.
I recognized several Hindu gods and goddesses in the frescoes. This is Krishna, always shown as blue, and Radha.
These are certainly beautiful — and familiar to me from the semester of Indian art history I took some years ago. If I were to go to India, I would very much want to see the amazing rock-cut temples like Ajanta and Ellora (mostly Buddhist as I hazily recall but some Hindu and Jain). Just the photographs in my text book took my breath away.
My eyes are twirling. These images are unreal!
I meant to ask you if you had been told the date of these paintings.
I didn’t even think to ask. I can tell you that the Mandawa Haveli Hotel was built in 1890 B.C., if that helps. I’d guess that that’s probably in the neighborhood.