Bernier, the first European to enter Kashmir, writing in 1665, said: ‘In truth, the Kingdom surpasses in beauty all that my warmest imagination had anticipated.’ The book is not about the entire Kashmir state, which includes many outlying provinces, but about Kashmir proper. The paintings are a vivid impression of this beauteous state of lakes, gardens and snow-clad mountains. It is a fascinating account of the old capital, the Dal Lake, the ‘meadow of ...
