Daswanth
Legendary Artist
Painting
Artworks
In Collections
Daswanth (also spelled Dasvant and Dasavanta) was a sixteenth century painter of Akbar’s imperial workshop, conjectured to have been Hindu and probably of humble origin. As the son of a palanquin-bearer who drew on workshop walls he was noticed by the emperor and placed under the Persian master Khwaja Abd as-Samad. He contributed to the Tutinama and the Hamzanama before designing the greater part of his surviving work for the Razmnama begun in 1582. Contemporary chroniclers praised his talent and the Akbarnama dates his death by suicide to 1584.