Historical Feature

History Of Ajrakh

Twenty Five Centuries Ago, Before The Time Of Buddha, Trade Is Known To Have Existed Between Babylon And The Sub-Continents; Traders Carrying Silk And Gold Cloth Were Known As ‘Merchants In Blue Cloth And Broidered Work’. This Cloth Was Evidently Made In Large Quantities And Exported From The Indus Valley To The Persian Gulf By The Sea Route, And Was Taken To Egypt And Babylon. Lassen Declares That The Egyptian Mummies Wore The Muslim From India.

2500bc-1500bc

Excavations At Moenjodaro.

Steatite Statue Fragment; Mohenjodaro (Sd 767); Trefoil-Decorated Bull; Traces Of Red Pigment Remain Inside The Trefoils.	Statue, Uruk (W.16017), C. 3000 B.C.; Bull With Trefoil Inlays.

Tre-Foil Inlay Decorated Base: National Museum Of Pakistan, Karachi; After Mackay 1938	Trefoils Painted On Steatite Beads, Harappa

The Discovery Of The King Priest Acclaimed By Sir John Marshall As “The Finest Piece Of Statuary That Has Been Found At Moenjodaro…. Draped In An Elaborate Shawl With Corded Or Rolled Over Edge, Worn Over The Left Shoulder And Under The Right Arm. This Shawl Is Decorated All Over With A Design Of Trefoils In Relief Interspersed Occasionally With Small Circles, The Interiors Of Which Are Filled With A Red Pigment”.

-Exactly The Same Trefoil Pattern Is Found On The Bodies Of Sumerians Bulls In Mesopotamia, Where The Concept Of Trinity Was Evolved.

-Trefoil Also Occurs On The Couch Of Tutankh-Amen And On The Hathor Cow.

-It Is Interesting To Note That The National Museum Of Karachi Had A Small Faience Bead From Moenjodaro With The Same Trefoil Patter Around It.

The ‘Trefoil’ Is A Symbolical Motif Of The Three Sun-Disks Fused Together To Represent The Inseparable Unity Of Power Of Gods Of Suns, Water And Earth.

The Ustos Of Ajrakh Printing Firmly Believe That The Shawl Draped On The Figure Of The King Priest Is Ajrakh And The Trefoil Motif Is Actually Kakar (Cloud) Pattern. This Theory Is Debatable As No Printing Evidence Has Been Discovered Yet, Although Knowledge Of Spinning, Weaving And The Magical Process Of ‘Manjitha’, Madder Dyeing Of Cotton Cloth, Was Established; However, Needles Were Unearthed And The Possibility That The Patter Was Embroidered And Printed Cannot Be Ruled Out.

Panini Wrote In The First Millennium B.C, About Cloths Known By Their Colors: ‘Nila’ Was The Cloth Dyed With Indigo, ‘Lohitaka’ Was Red; Madder-Dyed Cloth- ‘Laksa’, The Red From Lac, And ‘Kalaka’, The Black Cloth.

R.Pfitser In His Monograph ‘Les Toiles Impremees De Fostat Et ‘Hindustan’, States That Some Of The Fragments Were Printed On The Western Coast Of The Sub-Continent As Late As The Fourteenth Centuary, While Lamm Believes That Some Of The Fabrics Can Be As Early As The Abbasid Dynasty (8th-9th Centuary A.D)

There Are Long Lapses Of Time Where There Is No Evidence Of Textile Specimen Or Any Reference In The Documented History Of Manufactured Cloth Till The Seventeenth Century A.D.

There Was A Great Demand In England For Cotton Goods.

A Factory Was Set Up, And On Viewing Of The Consignment From Sindh, The Directors Wrote “The Synda Factory For Aught We Yet Perceive, Hath Most Cause To Be Cherished And Pursued Than Any Of Your Calico Factories. For The Goods Received From Thence, This Shipping Are The Flower Of The Whole Parcel And Are Preferred Here Before All Others…”

The East India Company Maintained A Factory In Sindh From 1636-1662; And Then After A Lapse Of 96years, Reopened The Factory For The Second Time In 1758, And Continued Till 1775. This Time The Company Did Not Purchase Cloth And Indigo, But Instead Sold Broad-Cloth And Woolens, And Bought Sindhi Cattle, Batty Or Unhusked Rice And Saltpeter.

An Exhibition And Fair Was Held In Karachi In 1869 And According To The Records, Prizes Were Awarded To Items Termed ‘Ujrak Or Coloured Sheets”.

Patterned And Printed Fabrics Of Sindh Had Become A National Industry In The Seventeenth Century. Weavers By Then Were World Famous And This Art Form Was Part Of Their Everyday Existence.

When The Britishers Traders Left, There Was A Change Of Government In Sindh; But Still The Weaving Activity Continued. In The Nineteenth Century, The Imposition Of Foreign Rule, Following The Conquest And Annexation Of Sindh To The British Raaj, Brought An Upheaval In The Life Of Sindh And The History Of Its Arts.

Partition Proved To Be A Very Crucial Time For Ajrakh Prints. It Divided The Artisians And Broke The Flow Of This Crafts. ‘Khatri’ Being The Main Caste Came To India And Settled In Gujrat And Rajasthan.

Barmer Became The Main Residence Of Ajrakh Printing In Rajasthan.

The Change Brought In New Concepts, New Commerce And Economy, New Symbols In Tastes And Fashion; The Clarity Of Form Disappeared, The Vision Of The Craftsmen Became

lurred, That Was The Decline Of The Indigenous Textile Industry; The Old Centers Gradually Withered And Perished.