Page from a Bhagavata Purana Manuscript: Krishna Distributes Butter to the Monkeys (Primary Title)
Illuminated page (Object Name)
Unknown (Artist)
To hide him from his evil uncle, the baby Krishna was spirited away in the night and delivered to a foster family in the pastoral community of Vrindavan. This page depicts one of Krishna’s most famous boyish pranks. In the upper register, the young blue-skinned god distributes butter he has stolen from his foster mother, Yashoda, to a group of monkeys. In the panel below, Krishna’s brother Balarama (miraculously saved from Kansa’s program of infanticide) and two of his friends converse among themselves and with the threatening Yashoda, who stands before them with a stick. A second woman points to the overturned butter churn that Krishna has raided. An example of an important early Indian painting style, this page features flat pictorial space, a vibrant palette, and rhythmically arranged figural groups set against solid-color grounds.
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