1955.167: Iskandar's Iron Cavalry Battles King Fur of Hind (text, recto; painting, verso), illustrated folio from the Great Ilkhanid Shahnama (Book of Kings)

Identification and Creation

Object Number

1955.167

Title

Iskandar's Iron Cavalry Battles King Fur of Hind (text, recto; painting, verso), illustrated folio from the Great Ilkhanid Shahnama (Book of Kings)

Classification

Manuscripts

Work Type

manuscript folio

Date

c. 1335

Places

Creation Place: Middle East, Iran, Tabriz

Period

Ilkhanid period

Culture

Persian

Persistent Link

https://hvrd.art/o/216944

Physical Descriptions

Medium

Ink, colors, gold, and silver on paper

Dimensions

folio: 50.2 x 39.5 cm (19 3/4 x 15 9/16 in.)

Acquisition and Rights

Credit Line

Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Gift of Edward W. Forbes

Accession Year

1955

Object Number

1955.167

Division

Asian and Mediterranean Art

Contact

am_asianmediterranean@harvard.edu

Permissions

The Harvard Art Museums encourage the use of images found on this website for personal, noncommercial use, including educational and scholarly purposes. To request a higher resolution file of this image, please submit an online request.

Publication History

• C.F. Kelley, "Persian and Indian Miniature Painting", Bulletin of the Art Institute of Chicago, The Art Institute of Chicago (Chicago, IL, 1933), vol. XXVII, fig. pp. 46
• Laurence Binyon and J. V. S. Wilkinson, Persian Miniature Painting: Including a Critical and Descriptive Catalogue of the Miniatures Exhibited at Burlington House, January-March, 1931, exh. cat., Oxford University Press (NY) and Oxford University Press (UK) (London, England, 1933), fig. plate XXVI
• M.H. de Young Memorial Museum, Exhibition of Islamic Art, exh. cat. (San Francisco, 1937), p. 28, no. 42e
• Doris Brian, "A Reconstruction of the Miniature Cycle in the Demotte 'Shah-Nameh'", Ars Islamica, Freer Gallery of Art / Smithsonian Institution and University of Michigan (1 January 1939), vol. 6(2), pp. 97-112, no. 30
• Eric Schroeder, Persian Miniatures in the Fogg Museum of Art, Harvard University Press (Cambridge, MA, 1942), pp. 46-48, fig. 6
• Ivan Stchoukine, Les peintures du Shan-nameh Demotte, Arts Asiatiques (1958), vol. V, pp. 83-96, pp. 91, 95, group III
• Basil Gray, La Peinture Persane, Skira (Geneve, 1961)
• Basil Gray, Persian Painting, Skira (New York, NY, 1977), pp. 29, 33-34
• "The Rise of Islam", Harvard Magazine (May-June 1979), 99, 5, pp. 22-28, Pg. 25
• Maurice Daumas, A History of Technology and Invention: Progress through the Ages, Crown Publishers Inc. (New York, 1979), P. 367, Plate 54
• Marianna Shreve Simpson, Arab and Persian Painting in the Fogg Art Museum, Fogg Art Museum (Cambridge, MA, 1980), pp. 23, 26-27, no. 5, ill.
• Oleg Grabar and Sheila Blair, Epic Images and Contemporary History, University of Chicago Press (Chicago, IL, 1980), page 30, 116-117/figure 30
• Johann Christoph Burgel, The Feather of Simurgh: The "Licity Magic" of the Arts in Medieval Islam, New York University Press (New York, NY, 1988), page 175/figure 17
• Leila Avrin, Scribes, Script, and Books: The Book Arts from Antiquity to the Renaissance (Chicago, 1991), pp. 277-279, pl. 239
• Abolala Soudavar, "The Saga of Abu-Sa'id Bahador Khan: The Abu-Sa'idname", Oxford Studies In Islamic Art XII: The Court of the Il-Khans 1290-1340, Oxford University Press (NY) (Oxford, UK, 1996), page 134/figure 29
• Al-Qafilah, Al-Qafilah, Altraiki Printing Press (Dammam, 1997), page 30
• Markus Hattstein and Peter Delius, Islam Kunst und Architektur, Könemann Verlagsgesellschaft (France, 2000), Page 387 & 403
• Linda Komaroff, ed., The Legacy of Genghis Khan: Courtly Art and Culture in Western Asia, 1256-1353, exh. cat., Yale University Press (New Haven, CT, 2002), pp135, fig. 160; pp256, num.48
• Stephan Wolohojian and Alvin L. Clark, Jr., Harvard Art Museum/ Handbook, ed. Stephan Wolohojian, Harvard Art Museum (Cambridge, 2008), p. 50
• Christoph Baumer, The History of Central Asia: The Age of Islam and the Mongols, I. B. Tauris (London, 2016), p. 195, fig. 127
• Penley Knipe, Katherine Eremin, Marc Walton, Agnese Babini, and Georgina Rayner, Materials and Techniques of Islamic Manuscripts, Heritage Science, Heritage Science (https://doi.org/10.1186/s40494-018-0217-y, 2018), 6, 55, Figure 22, Page 31; Figure 23, Page 32

Exhibition History

• Arab and Persian Painting, Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, 02/10/1981 - 03/09/1981
• The Heavenly Court: Persian Poetry and Painting, Harvard University Art Museums, Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, 02/09/1985 - 03/31/1985
• Paintings for Princes: The Art of the Book in Islam, Harvard University Art Museums, Cambridge, 01/27/1990 - 03/25/1990
• Eyes to the East: Indian, Persian, and Turkish Art Given by Harvard Graduates, Harvard University Art Museums, Cambridge, 09/22/1990 - 11/25/1990
• In Detail: Looking at Persian, Turkish and Indian Pictures, Harvard University Art Museums, Cambridge, 11/11/1995 - 01/21/1996
• Legacy of Genghis Khan: Courtly Art and Culture 1256-1353 (The), The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 10/28/2002 - 02/16/2003; Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, 04/13/2003 - 07/27/2003
• Re-View: S231 (Islamic rotation: 5) Heroic Gestes: Epic Tales from Firdawsi's Shahnama, Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Cambridge, 06/18/2010 - 11/27/2010
• Word and Image in Persian Painting, Harvard Art Museums, Cambridge, 01/31/2013 - 03/30/2013
• A New Light on Bernard Berenson: Persian Paintings from Villa I Tatti, Harvard Art Museums, Cambridge, 05/20/2017 - 08/13/2017
• An Epic of Kings: The Great Mongol Shahnama, Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Washington, 08/31/2024 - 01/05/2025

Subjects and Contexts

• Google Art Project
• Collection Highlights

Verification Level