Cross-Material Cultures in Mughal Weighing Ceremonies

Kings across South Asia have participated in the royal weighing ceremony, sitting in large scales to weigh their bodies against precious materials to be donated as alms. Hindu rulers in the Rastrakutas dynasty constructed temporary structures of cow dung and grass within which they were weighed against gold, perfume, and food to be donated to Brahmin temples. Mughal emperors, in their adaptation of the practice, weighed themselves against precious metals, textiles, and spices in the innermost courts of their residential forts. The manuscript painting, Jahangir Weighing his son Prince Khurram, the future Shah Jahan, in 1607 (c.1615), presents the heir apparent within his princely estate in Kabul. The garden setting is ornamented with finely woven Persian rugs and lined with chini khana (China house) niches, while multi-colored silks, strings of pearls, and metalwork fill the foreground. The décor of the setting and the prepared fineries are brought together from local and distant manufacturers to present an image of cosmopolitan dynasty. Across cultural contexts, the weighing ceremony transformed the royal body into tangible and precious goods. I argue that the Mughal weighing ceremony adopted and reframed the religious aspects of a ritual used in Hindu, Jain, and Buddhist courts by maintaining the material and sensorial aspects of the ceremony while altering the architectural backdrop. In comparing the sensorial, architectural, and material elements of Mughal and pre-Mughal weighing ceremonies, I demonstrate how global and local materials wove together disparate elite cultures to give potency to the rituals in Mughal imperial theater.