Images(2)

Folio from The Gulistan of Sa'di

Sultan Muhammad (borders)

1525–40

Object Placeprobably Tabriz, Iran

Medium/TechniqueInk, watercolor, gold and silver on paper

DimensionsHeight x width: 30.2 × 19 cm (11 7/8 × 7 1/2 in.)

Credit LineMuseum purchase with funds from the Francis Bartlett Donation of 1912 and by contribution

Accession number14.608

On View

Not on view

ClassificationsBooks and manuscripts

Collections

Description

This page is from a manuscript known for its magnificent borders featuring wilderness populated by wild animals. The text is the Gulistan (Rose Garden) of Sa'di, a Persian poet of the the 13th century. Exceptionally lively and rhythmic, the margins may have been created by the leading artist of his time, Sultan Muhammad (died about 1550), who headed the court painting studio of Persian Shah Tahmasp I (ruled 1524-76).

ProvenanceBy 1912, Victor Goloubew (b. 1879 - d. 1945), Paris [see note 1]; 1914, sold by Goloubew through M. Meyer-Riefstahl to the MFA for $76,999.81 (total price for 14.532-700). (Accession Date: June 4, 1914)

NOTES:
[1] Victor Goloubew was born in Russia but lived in Paris by the time of this acquisition. He formed this collection of Persian and Indian miniature paintings and exhibited it at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris from 1912 to 1914 (Paull, Florence Virginia. "The Goloubew Collection of Persian and Indian Paintings." Museum of Fine Arts Bulletin. Vol. XIII. No. 74. (February 1915) 1-16).