File:Two illustrated folios from a copy of Bijan's Tarikh-i Jahangusha-yi Khaqan Sahibqiran, attributable to Mu'in Musavvir, Isfahan, Safavid Iran, circa 1680.jpg

English: TWO ILLUSTRATED FOLIOS FROM A COPY OF BIJAN'S TARIKH-I JAHANGUSHA-YI KHAQAN SAHIBQIRAN

ATTRIBUTABLE TO MU'IN MUSAVVIR, ISFAHAN, SAFAVID IRAN, CIRCA 1680

From a History of Shah Isma'il, the first illustration depicting the Shah Isma'il taking Yazd and capturing the rebel Ra'is Muhammad Kara, the second Shah Isma'il in battle, opaque pigments heightened with gold on paper, with lines of black nasta'liq reserved in clouds against a gold ground above and below, set within blue floral borders and gold and polychrome rules, the orange margins illuminated with large gold scrolling flowers, folios numbered bottom left corner, verso of each plain, one with red and blue stickers, both with pencil notations, the battle scene mounted, framed and glazed Text panel 9 ½ x 6 1⁄8in. (24 x 15.5cm.); folio 14 1⁄8 x 9 1⁄8in. (36 x 23.3cm.)

These paintings come from a dispersed copy of Bijan's text Tarikh-i Jahangusha-yi Khaqan Sahibqiran, the known illustrations of which, Eleanor Sims writes, present the first Safavid Shah of Iran as a divinely inspired ruler and a princely hero following the mode of Firdawsi's Shahnama (Eleanor Sims, 'A Dispersed Late-Safavid copy of the Tarikh-i Jahangusha-yi Khaqan Sahibqiran, published in Sheila R. Canby (ed.) Safavid Art and Architecture, Cambridge, 2002, p. 54). The text was compiled in the 1680s by a 'minor late-Safavid historian, almost certainly a Georgian, who signs himself as qissa-yi safavi-khwan’ (Sims, op.cit., p.54). For a note on Mu'in Musavvir, see lot 13 in this sale.

Other folios from the same manuscript are in the Nasser D. Khalili collection and the Art and History Trust Collection. One sold at Sotheby's London, 30 June 1980, lot 243, four others (Property of the Baltimore Museum of Art), on 22nd/23rd March, 1986, lots 151-4, and another on 20 June, 1980, lot 243. Others have sold more recently in these Rooms, 17 April 2007, lots 246 and 247 and another on 6 October 2009, lot 122 and 13 April 2010, lot 98.