[CT]introduction

580 A painting published in B. W. Robinson, Persian Paintings from the India Office Library (London: Sotheby Parke Bernet, 1976) (no. 222) and another one in R. Hillenbrand, Imperial Persian Painting (Edinburgh: Scottish Arts Council, 1977) (no. 163) seem to be by the same hand.

581 A similar bowman is in the collection of the Los Angeles County Museum (M.73.5.480); see P. Pal, ed., Islamic Art (Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 1973), no. 261. Another in the Murad III Album in the ™sterreichische Nationalbibliothek, Vienna (Cod. Mixt. 313, fol. 47a), bears an attribution to Vali-Jân; see D. Duda, Islamische Handschriften I, Persische Handschriften (Vienna: Verlag der ™sterreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1983), no. 387.

582 State Public Library, St. Petersburg; see F. R. Martin, The Miniature Painting and Painters of Persia and India and Turkey from the 8th to the 18th Century (reprint; London: Holland Press, 1968), pl. 102.

583 Qâzi, Golestân, pp. 151-52.

584 Robinson, Persian Drawings, nos. 57, 59.

585 The only one of the Twelve Imams buried in Iran is `Ali b. Musâ, the eighth imam of the Sh'ia, who is interred in Mashhad, thus the importance of Mashhad as a pilgrimage site in Safavid times, when access to the rest of the Sh'ia shrines, all situated in Ottoman territory, was difficult.

586 See Sotheby's, Dec. 17, 1969, lot 284, fol. 1v. For a complete discussion, see Schmitz, "Miniature Painting in Harat," pp. 161-69. Schmitz is cautious in acknowledging that Habib(ollâh), painter of the three paintings, is the same individual who signed the manuscripts, as no definite similarity is visible. Perceptible similarities are seen, however, in the handwriting and the style of the signature, râqemaho Habibollâh.

587 Eskandar Beyg, vol. 1, p. 222.

588 Mahd-e `Oliâ's constant interference in the government prompted the Qezelbâsh amirs to strangle her a few years later; ibid., p. 25.

589 Bayâni (vol. 3, p. 910) stated that the scribe Mozaffar-Hosayn was one of the most "solid" nasta`liq calligraphers of the sixteenth century. In some calligraphy specimens Mozaffar-Hosayn stated his father's name as Mohammad Amin.

590 Eskandar Beyg, vol. 1, p. 164.

591 The Qezelbâsh involved in the uprising were mostly affiliated with the Shâmlu and Ostâjlu clans, ibid., p. 278.

592 Ibid., p. 280.

593 Ibid., p. 286.

594 Ibid., p. 286. Bayâni ([vol. ?], p. 287) also noted that the Qezelbâsh argued that "since Mirzâ Salmân was a Tâjik, he should confine his activity to the administrative tasks and not interfere in military affairs."

595 Eskandar Beyg, vol. 1[?], pp. 280-82.

596 Dickson, "Shah Tahmasb and the Uzbeks," p. 160.

597 Qâzi, Golestân, pp. 106-11, 143-44.

598 See S. C. Welch, Royal Persian Manuscripts (London: Thames and Hudson, 1976), pp. 98-127.

599 Qâzi, Golestân, p. 190.

600 The two are A Seated Youth Playing a Musical Instrument, formerly in the collection of W. Schulz, Berlin (Martin, Miniature Painting and Painters, pl. 101), and fol. 23a of a Divân of Ebrâhim Mirzâ in the Sadruddin Aga Khan collection (T. Falk, ed., Treasures of Islam [London: Sotheby's Publications, 1985], cat. no. 77). A painting I have not yet seen, dated A.H. 972/1564 and signed by `Abdollâh-e Mozahheb (from a Sobhatol-abrâr manuscript in the Gulbenkian collection), is mentioned in Schmitz, "Miniature Painting in Harat," p. 121.

601 Ex-Gholâm-`Ali Seif-e Nasseri collection, see Sotheby's, Dec. 1, 1969, lot 192.

602 See M. S. Simpson, "Production and Patronage of the Haft Aurang," Ars Orientalis 13 (1982), p. 98; for a reproduction, see also P. P. Soucek, "`Abdallâh SŒrâzŒ," in Encyclopaedia Iranica (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1975-), vol. 1, p. 206.

603 S. C. Welch has suggested that two other paintings from the same manuscript--The Ascent of the Prophet to Heaven (fol. 275a) and Why Is the Sufi in the Hamam? (fol. 59a)--are by the same hand, but he attributes them to Ghadimi (painter A); see Welch, Royal Persian Manuscripts, nos. K, W, and pl. 38. Although I agree that all three are by the same hand (the attribution of a fourth, The Arrival of Zolaykhâ in Egypt, fol. 100b, is not clear to me), the sudden reappearance of Ghadimi after thirty years of eclipse seems odd; attribution to `Abdollâh-e Mozahheb is more likely on stylistic grounds. A close associate of Ebrâhim Mirzâ such as `Abdollâh-e Mozahheb would have been likely to participate as a painter in the project.

604 B. Âtâbây, Fehrest-e divânhâ-ye khati-ye ketâbkhâné-ye saltanati(Catalogue of literary manuscripts in the imperial library) (Tehrân: Zibâ Press, 2535), vol. 1, pp. 337-40.

605 V. Minorsky, trans., Calligraphers and Painters: A Treatise by Qadi Ahmad, Son of Mir Munshi (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution, Freer Gallery Publications, 1959), p. 190.

606 Mohammadi resided in Herât most of his life, and cat. no. 90b was likely completed there. This supposition is further confirmed by an inscription on a portrait of `Ali-Qoli Khân-e Shâmlu by Mohammadi dated 1583 (Topkapi Sarây Library, Istanbul, H.2155, fol. 20v), which states that it was painted in Herât; see Schmitz, "Miniature Painting in Harat," pl. 236.

607 Ibid.

608 Eskandar Beyg, vol. 1, p. 176.

609 See M. M. Ashrafi, Persian-Tajik Poetry in XIV-XVIII Centuries Miniatures (Dushanbe: Irfon, 1974), nos. 48-50.

610 Ibid., no. 37; see also S. C. Welch, Wonders of the Age, exh. cat. (Cambridge: Harvard University, Fogg Art Museum, 1979), p. 24.

611 See Dickson and Welch, vol. 1, pp. 165-77, 251-53.

612 Eskandar Beyg, vol. 1, p. 176. Eskandar Beyg further wrote that "no one was better than him in depicting faces and accurate portraiture (guné-sâzi)."

613 Budâq-e Monshi-e Qazvini, Javâherol-akhbâr (Jewel of the chronicles), photocopy of a manuscript (Dorn 288) from the State Public Library, St. Petersburg, courtesy of the Center for Middle Eastern Studies, University of Chicago, p. 113b. The study of Shaykh-Mohammad's career by Dickson and Welch, vol. 1, pp. 165-77, left a gap between 1545 and 1555 which is now bridged with the information provided by Budâq-e Qazvini. Budâq's accounts on this period should be judged as accurate, for according to a detailed chronology of his own life (p. 315), he was a firsthand witness to many events reported in his chronicle. Particularly interesting are the fourteen years (circa 1536-50) that Budâq was personal secretary to Bahrâm Mirzâ: "I remained there day and night, serving and entertaining [the prince] in daytime and sleeping at his feet at nighttime, sometimes not seeing my wife and children for up to forty days."

This information might shed light on the identity of the two artists: painter Dust[-Mohammad]-e Divâné and the calligrapher Dust-Mohammad. Budâq (pp. 110a, 111b) considers them separately, but Dickson and Welch (p. 119) considered them as one. Dickson and Welch's arguments are essentially based on the similarity of the names, an overlapping period of activity, and a certain calligraphy piece signed "Dust-Mohammad the Painter," similar to the signature on his paintings (Dickson and Welch, p. 118). The name Dust-Mohammad was not unknown among artists; at least one other contemporary artist (a découpeur, qâte`) named Dust-Mohammad son of `Abdollâh is known (see C. Adle, "Autopsia, in Absentia," Studia Iranica 19 [1990], pl. 13).

The long list of works signed by the calligrapher Dust-Mohammad (Bayâni, vol. 1, pp. 191-92) represents the works of a full-time calligrapher who would scarcely have time for painting. In 1545 the calligrapher Dust-Mohammad completed the introduction to the famous Bahrâm Mirzâ Album while Budâq was in the services of the prince. Budâq himself was an accomplished calligrapher, and he undoubtedly had met Dust-Mohammad during this period, since he relates a personal observation: "He [Dust-Mohammad] pronounced `li' instead of `ri'" (Budâq, p. 110a). It is therefore inconceivable that he would consistently distinguish the calligrapher from the painter by calling the former Dust-Mohammad and the latter Dust-e Divâné (Dust the Mad) unless they were two different people. Budâq's account includes the information that Dust-Mohammad the painter died in India, while the calligrapher remained in the services of the shâh. Confirming the two-artist hypothesis are the descriptive captions of the works of Dust-Mohammad the painter in the Bahrâm Mirzâ Album, for example, "an excellent work by master Dust-Mohammad," a description not likely to have been written by the painter. It is more likely that the calligrapher Dust-Mohammad was the author of these captions.

614 Another drawing in the Freer Gallery of Art, Imperial Hunt (54.32; see E. Atil, The Brush of the Masters: Drawings from Iran and India [Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution, 1978], no. 14) is also attributed here to Shaykh-Mohammad and this period. In it he used the same coloration: a touch of white-blue on a bonnet, red for the strings, and some minor gold highlighting.

615 Published in B. W. Robinson, A Descriptive Catalogue of the Persian Paintings in the Bodleian Library (London: Oxford University Press, 1958), pl. 21; the attribution is by S. C. Welch, see Dickson and Welch, vol. 1, p. 252. For the drawings of Ozbak princes attributed to Shaykh-Mohammad, see Welch, Wonders of the Age, nos. 77, 80, and Martin, Miniature Painting and Painters, pl. 83.

616 A. B. Sakisian, La miniature persane du XII au XVII siŠcle (Paris: Les Editions G. Van Oest, 1929), figs. 96-97, and Welch, Wonders of the Age, no. 77.

617 Hillenbrand, Imperial Persian Painting, no. 72.

618 For instance, several versions of the yoked prisoner are known; see Dickson and Welch, vol. 1, p. 252.

619 Eskandar Beyg, [vol. ?], p. 177.

620 For further discussion of the Mashhad style, see Welch, Royal Persian Manuscripts, pp. 24-27.

621 See Welch, Wonders of the Age, no. 70, or Robinson, Persian Drawings, pl. 44.

622 The double-page frontispiece seems to be a later addition; see F. Cagman and Z. Tanindi, Topkapi Palace Museum: Islamic Miniature Painting (Istanbul: A. R. Baskan Guzel Sanatlar Matbaasi, 1979), no. 104 and pls. 34-35.

623 The damage sustained by this painting, especially on the upper right, did not leave enough clues for the restoration of the birds.

624 Another page from the same manuscript is at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts (43.31.2); see E. J. Grube, The Classical Style in Islamic Painting: The Early School of Herat and Its Impact on Islamic Painting of the Later 15th, 16th, and 17th Centuries (Lugano: Edizioni Oriens, 1968), pl. 80.

625 See E. Blochet, Musulman Painting XIIth-XVIIth Century, trans. M. Binyon (New York: Hacker Art Books, 1975), pl. 137; Robinson, Persian Drawings, pl. 40; and Kevorkian and Sicre, Jardins, p. 227.

626 Kevorkian and Sicre, Jardins, p. 229, and Martin, Miniature Painting and Painters, pl. 103a.

627 See Gray, Peinture persane, p. 157.

628 This page originally was part of the same album as cat. no. 209.

629 The inscriptions attributing drawings to Mohammadi, written by the same hand in an awkward calligraphy style, all refer to him as ostâd, master (in painting), while his own signature is in an elegant nasta`liq without any epithets.

630 Gray, Arts of the Book, p. 50.

631 Another page from the same manuscript, sold at Sotheby's on April 21, 1980, lot 59, is presently in the Rezâ-e `Abbâsi Museum, Tehrân.

632 See Robinson (Colnaghi), no. 34.

633 See E. J. Grube, Islamic Paintings from the 11th to the 18th Century in the Collection of H. P. Kraus (New York: H. P. Kraus, n.d.), pp. 128-43.

634 Without seeing the actual ex-Kraus manuscript (present location unknown), it is difficult to ascertain whether the Rothschild paintings belonged to it or not.

635 For an earlier funerary procession (circa 1330-35), see G. D. Lowry with S. Nemazee, A Jeweler's Eye (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1988), no. 7.

636 The manuscript has lacunae at fols. 38/39, 61/62, 62/63, 90/91, 94/95, 365/366, and 367/368.

637 A detailed analysis of the painters is provided in Sotheby's, Dec. 9, 1975, lot 352.

638 See G. D. Guest, Shiraz Painting in the Sixteenth Century (Washington, D.C.: Freer Gallery of Art, Smithsonian Institution, 1949), where painter A is referred to as painter B.

639 . See Robinson, Persian Paintings from the India Office Library, pp. 96-96.

640 See Robinson, Descriptive Catalogue of Persian Paintings in the Bodleian Library, pp. 97-102.

641 See Robinson, Persian Paintings from the India Office Library, nos. 297-301.

642 Budâq, Javâherol-akhbâr, p. 134. (This section of the original manuscript is misbound; its correct location would have been p. 336.) Budâq states that the manuscripts were copied by "Mowlânâ Soltâ-`Ali and Mowlânâ Mir `Ali and Khâjé Mahmud-e Siyâvoshâni who is still alive, and who was a pupil of Mollâ Mir `Ali but reputed to have surpassed him."

643 B. W. Robinson, "Ismâ`il II's Copy of the Shahnama," Iran 14 (1976), p. 1.

644 For other paintings by Mir Zaynol-`Âbedin, see Robinson, "Ismâ`il II's Copy of the Shahnama," p. 6. A double-page painting of a Shâhnâmé dated 1546 is also attributed here to him; see Blochet, Musulman Painting, pls. 134-35.

645 R. Ghirshman, L'Iran et la migration des indo-aryens et des iraniens (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1977), p. 12.

646 Ibid.

647 B. W. Robinson, "Ali Asghar, Court Painter," Iran 26 (1988), pp. 125-28.

648 For example, all attributions to the painter Siyâvosh on pages from this manuscript are by the same hand; see A. Welch, Artists for the Shah (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1976), pp. 17-40.

649 Rezâ's illustration in the Qesasol-anbiyâ is published in Gray, Peinture persane, p. 162; Woman with a Fan is reproduced in Atil, Brush of the Masters, no. 19a. The same treatment of the flowers and stones suggests a similar date for both.

650 See F. Cagman and Z. Tanindi, The Topkapi Saray Museum: The Albums and Illustrated Manuscripts, ed. and trans. J. M. Rogers (London: Thames and Hudson, 1986), no. 119.

651 Four paintings of that Shâhnâmé have been attributed to Rezâ, see Welch, Artists for the Shah, pp. 108-17. `Ali-Asghar's influence is visible in all four, and three of them (pls. 9-10, fig. 36) include faces that suggest `Ali-Asghar's hand.

652 Four paintings of that Shâhnâmé have been attributed to Rezâ, see Welch, Artists for the Shah, pp. 108-17. `Ali-Asghar's influence is visible in all four, and three of them (pls. 9-10, fig. 36) include faces that suggest `Ali-Asghar's hand.

653 Falk, Treasures of Islam, no. 111.

654 See, for instance, a work by Mohammadi at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (no. 14.588), reproduced in Robinson, Persian Drawings, pl. 46. The trousers were still worn in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries; see cat. nos. 160 and 171a.

655 T. Sugimura, "The Chinese Impact on Certain Fifteenth Century Persian Miniature Paintings from the Albums (Hazine 2153, 2154, 2160) in the Topkapi Sarayi Museum, Istanbul," Ph.D. diss., University of Michigan, 1981, pp. 84-119.

656 See Martin, Miniature Painting and Painters, pl. 154.

657 See Sotheby's, London, May 3, 1977, lot 45.

658 Rezâ's style was even appreciated at the Mughal court of Jahângir where the woman painter Roqié Bânu produced a tinted drawing of a seated youth in the style of Rezâ; see B. Âtâbây, Fehrest-e moraqqa`ât-e ketâbkhâné-ye saltanati (Catalogue of the albums in the Imperial Library) (Tehrân: Zibâ Press, 1353), p. 338.

659 A case in point is the so-called Rezâ-e `Abbâsi Album now in the Freer Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. (53.12-58). All the writing and signatures of Rezâ contained in this collection of scraps and practice sheets appear to be outright forgeries. For instance, folios 53.12, 53.25, 53.27, 53.28, and 53.34, bearing Rezâ signatures, are by the same hand as fig. 48 and obvious forgeries. Folios 53.26, 53.30, 53.33, 53.44-46, and 53.48 are also by the same hand but have no signatures. Folio 53.22 is a copy of a work by Sâdeqi Beyg, reproduced in I. Stchoukine, Les peintures des manuscrits de Shah Abbas I … la fin des Safavis (Paris: Librairie Orientaliste Paul Geuthner, 1964), pl. 29. All these drawings are reproduced in E. Atil, The Brush of the Masters: Drawings from Iran and India (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution, 1978), pp. 64-95.

660 Hakim Shefâ'i died in 1628; see Eskandar Beyg, vol. 2, p. 1083. Either Mo`in misdated the painting, or Rezâ created the portrait posthumously, some six years after the physician's death.

661 The album (Suppl. Persan 1572) is a curious collection of Indian paintings, some copies, and a mixture of poor and good quality Persian works. Rezâ's signature has been added (and subsequently erased) on several paintings, including Lady Counting on Her Fingers (fol. 5); see B. W. Robinson, Persian Drawings from the 14th through the 19th Century (Boston: Little, Brown, 1965), pl. 61.

662 The major exception is a group of four unsigned illustrations from the Chester Beatty Shâhnâmé (no. 277).

663 Rezâ-e Mosavver's works are included in a Shâhnâmé at the State Public Library, St. Petersburg (circa 1642-54, Dorn 333); see M. M. Ashrafi, Persian-Tajik Poetry in XIV-XVIII Centuries Miniatures (Dushanbe: Irfon, 1974), pp. 110-11.

664 Ibid., p. 111, and Stchoukine, Peintures des manuscrits de Shah Abbas I, p. 44.

665 See Stchoukine, Peintures des manuscrits de Shah Abbas I, pp. 85-133. Although Stchoukine's arguments are well reasoned and the information valuable, not all his attributions or rejections are accurate, perhaps due to the poor-quality reproductions by which he formed some of his judgments.

666 Two modern Persian scholars, A. Soheyli (see Qâzi Ahmad-e Qomi, Golestân-e honar [Garden of talents], ed. A. Soheyli [Tehrân: Bonyâd-e Farhang-e Iran, 1352], p. 150) and M. Karimzadeh (The Lives and Art of Old Painters of Iran [London: Interlink Monograph, 1985], p. 186) have perpetuated the confusion by identifying Rezâ-e `Abbâsi with Âqâ Rezâ Jahângiri. N. M. Titley (Miniatures from Persian Manuscripts [London: British Museum Publications, 1977], p. 188, pl. 41), A. Kevorkian and J. P. Sicre (Les jardins du désir [Paris: Phebus, 1983], pp. 232-44), and numerous others make a distinction between Âqâ Rezâ and Rezâ-e `Abbâsi. On the other hand, major studies undertaken by A. Welch and S. Canby recognize the identity of Âqâ Rezâ with Rezâ-e `Abbâsi; see A. Welch, Artists for the Shah (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1976), p. 100, and S. Canby, ed., "Age and Time in the Work of Riza" in Persian Masters, Five Centuries of Painting (Bombay: Marg Publications, 1990), p. 41.

667 Qâzi, Golestân, pp. 149-50.

668 Ibid., p. 34.

669 V. Minorsky, trans., Calligraphers and Painters: A Treatise by Qadi Ahmad, Son of Mir Munshi (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution, Freer Gallery Publications, 1959), p. 192.

670 Ibid.

671 Eskandar Beyg, vol. 1, p. 176.

672 Although the honorific Âqâ would not typically be used in a signature (see p. 000), in this context it is a sign of respect invoking an imam's name. To this day in Iran, people named Rezâ or Sâdeq after one of the Twelve Imams are commonly referred to as Âqâ Sâdeq and Âqâ Rezâ.