Tiger Attacking a Youth

Mu'in Musavvir (Persian, 1617–1701)

8 February 1672

Object PlaceIsfahan, Iran

Medium/TechniqueInk and watercolor on paper

DimensionsOverall: 14.1 x 21.1 cm (5 9/16 x 8 5/16 in.)

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

Accession number14.634

On View

Not on view

ClassificationsBooks and manuscripts

Collections

InscriptionsIt was Monday, the day of the Feast of the blessed Ramadan, of the year 1082, when the ambassador of Bukhara had brought a tiger with a rhinoceros as gifts for His most exalted Majesty, Shah Sulayman. At the Darvaza-Dawlat, the above-mentioned tiger jumped up suddenly and tore off half the face of a grocer's assistant, 15 or 16 years of age. And he died within the hour. We heard about the grocer but did not see him. [This] was drawn in memory of it. And in that year, from the beginning of the second half of the honorable month of Sha'ban until the 8th day of Shawwal until now, there have been 18 heavy snowfalls of such magnitude that the trouble of shoveling snow had exasperated people. And the price of most goods went up, and firewood, one "man" at four "bisti," and kindling, one "man" at six "bisti," were still unobtainable. And the cold was such that there were no glass bottles or rosewater bottles, etc., left. May God end it well. [It is] Monday the 8th of the month of Shawwal, the year 1081; heavy snow is falling; we stayed at home because of the cold. It was drawn, the work of Mu'in Musavvir.

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).