Everyday Life in Kashmir Through Photographs, 1880s–1939

This post brings together early photographs from Kashmir, spanning the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and documenting everyday life across rivers, villages, institutions, and sacred spaces. The images include the Hazratbal Shrine, royal river processions on the Jhelum, children at a hospital school, rural family life, canal-side Srinagar near Barbarshah Bridge, houseboat culture below Takht-i-Suleiman, public health vaccination work, rice processing by children, women spinning thread in Sopore, and river scenes near Baramulla. Together, these photographs show how work, worship, education, health, and movement were closely woven into the landscape and daily rhythms of Kashmir before modern transformation.

 This early 20th-century photograph from the 1920s, originally captioned "Hasrat Bal. The Mosque.", shows the historic Hazratbal Shrine (Dargah Sharif) in Srinagar, Kashmir, in its original wooden form before the modern marble reconstruction. Considered the holiest Muslim shrine in Kashmir, Hazratbal houses the sacred Moi-e-Muqqadas, a relic believed to be a hair from the beard of Prophet Muhammad (saw), which was brought to Kashmir around 1699-1700 by Khwaja Nur-ud-Din Eshai after a turbulent journey from Bijapur. The site began as Ishrat Mahal, a beautiful garden and pleasure palace commissioned in 1623 by Mughal subedar Sadiq Khan during Emperor Shah Jahan's reign, and was later converted into a prayer hall in 1634. The architecture in the photograph reflects traditional Kashmiri style with distinctive multi-tiered slanting roofs made of wood, surrounded by a spacious open courtyard near the shores of Dal Lake, offering a rare glimpse into the shrine's appearance before its transformation began in 1968 under Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah and was completed in 1979 with a prominent white marble structure, dome, and minaret.

This photograph shows the Maharaja’s ceremonial boat moving along the Jhelum River in Srinagar during 1911–1912, accompanied by long rowing boats arranged in formal formation. The large, covered vessel at the centre reflects royal river travel traditions of the period, while the coordinated rowers highlight the importance of the river as a ceremonial and administrative route. At the time, the Jhelum served as Srinagar’s primary artery for movement, governance, and public display, with royal processions reinforcing authority and visibility within the city’s dense riverfront neighbourhoods and wooden housing that line the banks in the background.

This photograph shows a group of Kashmiri schoolchildren standing together at a hospital compound in Srinagar in 1912, holding books and dressed in simple traditional clothing. The image reflects the early stages of organised education in Kashmir, when schooling was limited and often connected to missionary institutions, hospitals, or state-supported facilities rather than dedicated school buildings. During this period, access to formal education was slowly expanding, particularly in urban centres like Srinagar, where hospitals and associated institutions played an important role in introducing literacy, basic learning, and social reform alongside medical care in the early twentieth century.

This photograph shows a Kashmiri family group gathered outside timber-built houses in a village setting in 1906, with adults and children arranged around everyday domestic tools and simple structures. The scene reflects rural life in Kashmir at the beginning of the twentieth century, when most families lived in small agrarian or craft-based communities and relied on manual labour, seasonal work, and household production. During this period, village architecture was largely constructed from wood and earth, and extended families commonly lived together, sharing work, childcare, and resources in an economy shaped by agriculture, weaving, and local trade long before modern infrastructure reached much of the region.

This photograph shows the Jhelum River near Baramulla in the 1880s, with wooden boats moored along the bank and simple riverside structures set against the surrounding hills. The calm waterway reflects the river’s central role in everyday life, serving as the primary route for transport, trade, and communication in northern Kashmir before the arrival of modern roads. During the late nineteenth century, Baramulla functioned as an important river port linking Srinagar with areas further downstream, and scenes like this illustrate how settlements, commerce, and daily movement were closely shaped by the rhythm and utility of the Jhelum.

This photograph shows two Kashmiri children engaged in pounding rice using traditional wooden tools, a common household task in rural Kashmir during the early twentieth century. Rice processing was largely done by hand at home, with mortars, pestles, and woven baskets forming part of everyday domestic equipment, and children often assisted adults in routine work. At this time, agriculture and household food preparation were closely linked, especially in village life, where rice was the staple grain and its processing reflected a self-sustaining economy shaped by manual labour, seasonal cycles, and family participation long before mechanised milling became widespread in the region.

This photograph shows a view from Barbarshah Bridge in Srinagar, looking over the Chunt Kul canal with dunga boats moored along the water and densely built riverside houses lining both banks. Chunt Kul was one of the important canals branching from the Jhelum River, forming part of Srinagar’s intricate water network that supported transport, housing, and daily commerce. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, areas around Barbarshah were shaped by canal-side living, where wooden houses, houseboats, and small craft reflected a city organised around waterways long before modern roads and embankments altered the riverfront landscape.

This photograph shows the houseboat Diana moored on the Jhelum River at the foot of the Takht-i-Suleiman hill in Srinagar in the early twentieth century, with the wooded hillside rising behind the riverbank. Large houseboats like Diana were among the earliest floating residences built for European visitors and officials, combining local boat-building traditions with colonial residential needs. During this period, the Jhelum served not only as a transport route but also as a setting for river-based living, and areas beneath prominent landmarks such as Takht-i-Suleiman became established mooring points that linked Srinagar’s natural landscape with its emerging houseboat culture.

This photograph shows a health worker administering a cholera inoculation to a child in Kashmir in 1939, with other children and adults gathered closely around. Cholera outbreaks were a recurring and deadly threat in Kashmir during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, often spreading rapidly due to limited sanitation and contaminated water sources. By the late 1930s, organised vaccination and inoculation campaigns had become an important part of public health efforts in the region, reflecting a gradual shift toward preventive medicine and state-supported disease control aimed at reducing the heavy toll epidemics had long taken on Kashmiri communities.

This photograph shows women spinning thread in the village of Sopore in 1915, with children seated nearby and simple village houses in the background. Spinning yarn by hand was a routine domestic activity in rural Kashmir, closely linked to household needs and the wider tradition of textile and weaving work for which the region was long known. In the early twentieth century, Sopore and surrounding villages formed part of an agrarian economy where women’s labour played a central role, and practices such as spinning reflected a slow, skill-based way of life shaped by seasonal rhythms, self-sufficiency, and family-based production long before industrial methods became common.