Lovers Parting, Page from a Book of Fables, c. 1590-95. Northern India, Mughal court, 16th century. Opaque watercolor with gold on paper, mounted on an album leaf with inner borders of gold-sprinkled blue paper and outer plain cream borders (recto); page: 36.1 x 24.8 cm (14 3/16 x 9 3/4 in.). The lovers have met in a remote wilderness location, away from the city shown in the distance. However, their affair has run its course, and they decide to part ways, each walking in opposite directions through an ominous landscape, where strange rock formations and an oversized serpent-slain by foxes gnawing on its innards-lend a sense of foreboding. As Mughal court painting developed into the last decades of the 16th century, artists began using increasingly muted colors and gentler shading techniques than they did in the more robust Adventures of Hamza at the left. The omission of a light source and shadows adds to a timeless, otherworldly impression to the landscape.