WESTERN IRAN, SECOND HALF 15TH CENTURY

Two folios from the Khamsa of Nizami from which this painting comes are in the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery at the Smithsonian, previously in the collection of Henri Vever (S1986.140 and S86.0179; published Layla Diba (ed.), The Qajar Epoch 1785-1925, exhibition catalogue, New York, 1998, no. 2 and fig.1, pp.104-105). One is very similar in subject to ours - depicting Shirin examining Khusraw’s portrait (no.2). With reference to that Smithsonian painting, Layla Diba writes that it is in the style practised at the courts of the Turkoman rulers of western Iran (1380-1486), and that it is one of a number of episodes from Nizami’s text which concerns painting and sculpture, demonstrating the slow upsurge in acceptance of the art of painting in Iran.