A digital archive showcasing the extensive collection of jewellery and adornment images shared on the former Ethnic Jewels Ning site over the years. These images have significantly enriched discussions on cultural adornment and its global dispersion.
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Very nice of you to post these! Never seen them, I did not even know about shisha smoking in India.
Is the left one a elephant head?
My pleasure Harald. Hookahs were probably introduced by the Mughals who ruled large parts of present-day India for centuries. As far as I know, the usage remained restricted to the Muslim elite households where men and women both smoked. I have seen these in the homes of my school friends during my elementary years. Also as recently as 2006 I have seen this being prepared for the wife of Nawab in her inner quarters at their home in Lucknow. The legacy probably continues all over in the privacy of homes. And of course there are the new age shisha bars.
Yes - that is an elephant head. Am attaching detailed pictures of some of them (unfortunately Harald the single photo of the elephant head is missing from my image library - will put it up when I get a chance to retrieve the pieces and reshoot them).
Hello again Jaina. I think I lost my last comment so I'll try again. These pipe-ends are fascinating. There is so much going on here. I would love to be able to read them better. My guess would be that Number 3 and Number 7 are designed for female shisha users. They have much narrower pipes decorated with little bells. I wonder if this is correct. If so is there any reason why these two pipes are also in the form of right angles whereas the others are much straighter .... one is absolutely straight. Does it tell us anything about smoking etiquette? Or just personal preference?
This collection is amazing, Jaina. True marvels. Maybe at certain point they fit a hookak similar to this one (missing its own!).
Thank you Thelma and Berberia,
Thelma I will try and take additional pictures next week so that the details may be studied better. Your questions are intriguing but I have no answers! They are the kind of questions that launched many of my tribal travels - all aimed at solving the mysteries of form, motif and usage cultures contained within their traditional arts.
In this case, the answers to male-female variations, straight vs angled variations might be found in some old classic Bollywood films (like Pakeezah and Shatranj ke Khiladi). Will keep my eyes and ears open and hopefully we will have some answers someday.
Berberia, Yes - your hookah pot is ornate and pretty. Where is it from?
Old photographs are another research tool about old cultural traditions. Am posting some here. All seem to have straight pipe ends and although they make interesting pictures - they do not answer our questions!
What fabulous photographs! From each one a different kind of energy! I love the painting of the heavily armed man relaxing on the settle with his hookah....And there seems to an itinerant hookah man ... customer having a puff and the seller with pockets for his tools and cash. Is that right? And the three handsome tribesmen posing with a hookah. The photos are all fantastic and a great source of information. How exciting to be able to refer to these. I'm sure we are losing our memories these smoking cultures. About the shape of the hookah pipes.... maybe they can be compared with tobacco pipes. Some of these were straight and some carved at an angle so that they hung from the mouth. I think that was probably personal preference or the image the smoker wanted to create.... maybe to be like Sherlock Holmes! They could also be carved. I have seen pipes carved in the form of bears from Germany, for instance. So perhaps the image is related to the culture of the region. I wondered what some of the images on the 7 pipe ends were. In the photos, the pipe ends seem to be purely functional but maybe the more decorated ones are gifts to celebrate an occasion. And then there are opium pipes!!!
I agree with Thelma, Jaina. That set of pictures is superb and makes us dream of of another time and places. As to the antique hookah I got it years ago in Kashmir during one of my shopping trips in that area.
Vintage photos have a way of enticing us into their world don't they?
Thelma, do you have pictures or references of these German pipes? It would be interesting to see these!
There is so much information trapped in all things old!
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