Jacques-Charles Bar. France, 1740-1811.
Eleven hand-coloured mezzotint prints in modern frames.
There is little known about Jacques Bar except that he lived and worked in Paris until the French Revolution. He then left Paris and changed his name to Jacques Charles Rabelli-Bar.
This collection of prints is taken from the first edition of his six-volume publication, “Collection of all the costumes of the religious and military orders with a historical and chronological summary,” published by the author in Paris between 1778 and 1791.
This monumental work consisted of 610 plates of costumes engraved in mezzotint and hand coloured at the time by the author. It appears to be the only work he published.
Upon viewing the entire work, it is interesting to see that the majority of illustrations focus on the costumes and depict the subjects in simple standing poses. With the fakirs, there are many illustrations of the same “costume”; the focus is on the “exotic” religious practice.
Fakir is an Islamic term traditionally used to describe Sufi Muslim ascetics who renounce their worldly possessions and dedicate their lives to the worship of God. They do not necessarily renounce all relationships or take vows of poverty, but the adornments of the temporal worldly life are kept in perspective.
Sufi Muslim ascetics, fakirs and dervishes, were highly influential and greatly successful in spreading Islam between the 10th and 19th centuries.
Hindu or Muslim ascetics, usually called yogis and fakirs in India, piqued Europeans’ interest in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Generally regarded as holy men who possessed supernatural or miraculous powers, they tended to be regarded with wonder and suspicion.
Their otherworldly, naked appearance and their awesome practices of self-denial, known as austerities, to gain supernatural powers or merit with the gods, led Europeans to often interpret these acts as fanaticism or compare them to Christian penitential practices to atone for sins.
The European hostility was also in part due to their deserved reputation as warrior monks.
Between the 15th and 18th centuries, highly organised bands of ascetics controlled many of the trade routes in the north of the subcontinent. These ascetic militias often trained in martial arts, as well as yogic practices. They battled with each other and provided mercenary armies for moguls and rajahs.
In the 18th century, as The East India Company began to control and exploit more of India, they came increasingly into conflict with the British. They played an active role in some of the first armed resistance to British colonial rule, leading to the Fakir and Sannyasi rebellion that began in the 1770s.
In 1773, a ban was imposed on the wandering ascetics of Bengal. And it became an offence to wander naked or carry a weapon, the two defining characteristics of many ascetic groups.
As a result, many fakirs began to adopt a more sedentary religious practice, becoming the local holy man for villages and towns.
Throughout the 19th century, European attitudes towards fakirs became increasingly hostile and dismissive.
In the early 20th century, the “Mystical Fakir” became part of the vaudeville repertoire.
Acknowledgments. The Smithsonian National Museum of Asian Art, Wikipedia, Banglapedia, JSTOR, Cethis, The Welcome Collection, and Archives West.