Publication Date
1430-1440
Type
Document
Language
Persian
Digital
Yes
Manuscript
Yes
Physical Dimensions
157 mm x 106 mm x 28 mm (height x width x depth)
Library
Chester Beatty
Record ID
Per 294
Library Location
Persian collection
Date
1430-1440
Notes
Timurid Anthology of Six Persian Poets. This manuscript was made in Timurid Shiraz, in the 1430s. Although now in damaged and incomplete condition, this was a magnificent court production, shown by the complex illuminated medallions, the paintings and the paper itself. Five of the pages were made not in Iran but in Ming China: these heavily-sized olive green folios are block-printed with meandering gold designs. There are other known examples of the same heavy Chinese paper used in Timurid manuscripts, and Iranian papermakers soon imitated the fashion for gold-decorated coloured pages. The Timurid courts exchanged several embassies with Ming China at this period, including one 1419-22 mission with the artist Ghiyath al-Din Naqqash in the delegation. Codex, ink, colours and gold on coloured paper, 171 folios, Persian text in nasta`liq script, with seven illuminated shamsa medallions (fols. 1r, 27r, 40r, 54r, 73r, 170r, 171r), illuminated headings and borders throughout, and five paintings (fols. 88r, 120v, 141v, 149r, 161v), incomplete copy of an Anthology of poetry by Farīd al-Dīn ʿAṭṭār (d. 1230), Fakhr al-Dīn Ibrāhīm `Irāqī (d. 1289), Amīr Khusrau of Delhi (d. 1325), Awḥadī of Isfahan (d. 1338), `Imād al-Dīn Faqīh (d. 1372), `Iṣmat ibn Mas`ūd of Bukhara (d. 1426), unsigned (no colophon), Shiraz, Iran, c. 1430-1440. Folios 72, 133, 134, 167, 168 are tinted lead-white coated paper with block-printed gold designs, imported from Ming China into Iran throughout the fifteenth century. Folios 1-6, 143, 144, 178-184 are later replacements.
Materyal
Paper (material), Pigment (material), Ink (material), Gold
Nesne Adı
Codex
Yazı Tipi
Nasta`liq script
