Tipu's Tiger

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Tipu's Tiger in the V&A Museum, London.

Tipu's TIger, detail.

Tipu's Tiger (a.k.a. Tippoo's Tiger) is an automaton, representing a tiger savaging a European soldier, or employee of the British East India Company. It was originally built for Tipu Sultan (the tiger was Tipu's emblem) in Mysore, ca. 1795. The operation of a crank handle powers several different mechanisms inside Tipu's Tiger. A set of bellows expels air through a pipe inside the man's throat. This produces a wailing sound, simulating the cries of distress of the victim. A mechanical link causes the man's left arm to rise and fall. This action alters the pitch of the 'wail pipe'. Another mechanism inside the tiger's head expels air through two pipes. This produces a sound simulating the roar of the tiger. Concealed behind a flap in the tiger's flank is a small ivory keyboard. Depressing these keys expels air through a series of organ pipes of local Indian manufacture. The design may have been inspired by the death of Hugh Munro, son of General Sir Hector Munro, who had defeated Tipu in battle during the Anglo-Mysore Wars.

It was captured from the Sultan in 1799 and shipped to England. The Governor General of the East India Company, Richard Wellesley, 1st Marquess Wellesley, wrote a memorandum describing the strange object he had seized from the vanquished Tipu Sultan: “This piece of mechanism represents a royal Tyger in the act of devouring a prostrate European. There are some barrels in imitation of an Organ, within the body of the Tyger. The sounds produced by the Organ are intended to resemble the cries of a person in distress intermixed with the roar of a Tyger. The machinery is so contrived that while the Organ is playing, the hand of the European is often lifted up, to express his helpless and deplorable condition. The whole of this design was executed by Order of Tippoo Sultaun”.

This tiger was initially displayed in the East India Company Museum in Leadenhall Street, London in 1808. The poet John Keats saw it there and wove it into his satirical verse, “The Cap and Bells”. In the poem, a Soothsayer visits the court of the Emperor Elfinan. He hears a strange noise and thinks the Emperor is in a rage or snoring.

Replied the page: “that little buzzing noise….

Comes from a play-thing of the Emperor’s choice,

From a Man-Tiger-Organ, prettiest of his toys''

Today it is exhibited in the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. Visitors can no longer operate the mechanism since the device is now kept in a glass case.