Bharani Thirunal Mahaprabha Amma Thampuran

Mavelikkara, some 80 kms north of Kilimanur, was the seat of important Kshatriya family and the home of Bharani Thirunal Mahaprabha Amma Thampuram, mother of Ravi Varma's wife. For a man who helped popularize a new notion of Indian beauty—with fair skin, aquiline features, and implied docility—the picture of his wife’s mother is a mirror that reflects the actual reality of matrilineal Kerala - the lady is dark and full of power, authority and her eyes in this portrait flash fire.