.jpg?w=1)
.jpg?w=1)
.jpg?w=1)
.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
There can be little doubt that the 13th and 14th centuries were, as Stefano Carboni termed it, ‘the great era of enamelled and gilded glass’ in the Islamic world (Glass from Islamic Lands, London, 2001, p.323). As well as adding to the beauty of objects, applying enamel to glass was an impressive technical feat - it required glass makers to heat the vessels sufficiently to vitrify the enamel, but not enough to melt the glass body of the object. These rarities were greatly prized in the Middle Ages - many were given to European potentates in the age of the Crusades, but Mamluk ambassadors also took glass objects as far afield as Ming China.
The Form
The form of this particular example, though rarely encountered, is iconic. Many surviving Mamluk objects bear the symbol of the saqi, or cup-bearer - a silhouette of a footed bowl with a distinctive raised boss in the middle of the stem. These court functionaries enjoyed unusual influence, due to their constant intimacy with the sultan. They might be asked to lead military campaigns, or even accompany the Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca. In 1327 a saqi named Qawsun married a daughter of al-Nasir Muhammad in a ceremony that lasted several days (Nader Masarwah, The Significance of the Cupbearer during the Mamluk Period, Haifa, 2014). Images of a stemmed cup appear on everything from textiles to metalwork, but there are few surviving glass examples. Those that are known include examples in the Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto (924.26.3); the British Museum, London (1924,0125.1) and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (23.189). All of these, like ours, have a wide bowl above tall cylindrical stem and a flat splayed foot. The design of ours with alternating bands of palmettes and roundels on the body is closest in style to the example in the Metropolitan Museum. It has been suggested, in discussion on these comparable pieces, that they were used as drinking vessels or, perhaps more likely given the scale, containers for fruit or sweetmeats (Linda Komaroff, ‘Color, Precious Metal, and Fire: Islamic Ceramics and Glass,’ Catherine Hess (ed.), The Arts of Fire: Islamic Influences on the Italian Renaissance, Los Angeles, 2004, p.44 and Carboni in Walker et al., Arte Islámico del Museo Metropolitano de Arte de Nueva York, Mexico City, 1994, cat.69, pp.182-3).
Made in separate sections and then reheated and fused together, the form of a bowl supported on a tall foot is also sometimes referred to as a tazza, which probably comes from the Arabic word tas, bowl (Esin Atıl, Renaissance of Islam: Art of the Mamluks, Washington, 1981, p.122). Most likely, the shape dates back to the period of transition between Ayyubid and Mamluk rule in Syria in the mid-13th century to which another related example in the Metropolitan has been dated (91.1.1538; Carboni in Mariam Ekhtiar et al. (eds.), Masterpieces from the Department of Islamic Art in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 2011, cat.110). Metalwork examples from Egypt or Syria probably served as prototypes for these. Two examples include the “Fano Cup” in the Bibliothèque nationale de France (Chabouillet no. 3192.) attributed to 13th-14th century (Esin Atil et al., Islamic Metalwork in the Freer Gallery of Art, Washington, 1985, fig.11) and a chalice in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London (761-1900), recently attributed to circa 1300-50 (Souraya Noujaim, ‘The Mamluk Society,' Carine Juvin (ed.), Mamluks: Legacy of an Empire, Dubai and Beirut, 2025 cat.19). It is worth noticing the knop on the stem of these metalware prototypes which is also found on all of the 14th century glass footed bowls listed above.
The Decoration
The decoration of this footed bowl is rich. The large blossoming lotus palmettes speak to the influence of Chinese art, where lotuses symbolise purification according to Buddhist thought (Yuka Kadoi, Islamic Chinoiserie: The Art of Mongol Iran, Edinburgh, 2018, pp.94). Although native also to ancient Egyptian art (Eva Wilson, 8000 Years of Ornament: An Illustrated Handbook of Motifs, London, 1994, pp.101-3), lotuses came to the Mamluk iconography in the 1320s through diplomatic contact with the Ilkhanid rulers of Iran during the third reign of al-Nasir Muhammad (1310-41; Rachel Ward, “Mosque Lamps and Enamelled Glass: Getting the Dates Right,” in Doris Behrens-Abouseif, The Arts of the Mamluks in Egypt and Syria, 2012, pp.63, 71). They soon became a ubiquitous feature of the Mamluk decorative repertoire across all media (Stefano Carboni and David Whitehouse, Glass of the Sultans, New Haven, 2001, p.206). A key chinoiserie motif across Islamic art more widely and one of its finest and most inventive patterns, the type of enamelled lotuses used by the Mamluks is very similar to the eight-pointed Ilkhanid examples dated circa 1300 and featured, for instance, on a star-shaped tile in the Freer Gallery of Art (F1999.12; Kadoi op.cit., pp.92, figs.3.12-3). On our footed bowl, the white enamel inventively represents the stamen of the bud on such prototypes. The influence also went the other way - imported Egyptian glass, including goblets and lamps, are depicted in Ilkhanid painting (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, obj.no.52.20.2; op.cit. p.102) and the goblet in the Royal Ontario Museum, mentioned above, was found in a mosque in Shanxi province, China.
A unique aspect on our bowl, and one of its most impressive technical feats, are the three gilded animal combat groups on the upper frieze of the body, finely outlined in red. In these, lions ferociously attack antelopes. The 13th century Ayyubid excellence in figural gilding and enamelling is epitomised by the “Palmer Cup” in the British Museum (WB.53), but by Al-Nasir Muhammad’s third reign, the Mamluk public space was marked by iconoclasm, led by political figures and jurists (Carboni and Whitehouse, op.cit.; Ward, “Brass, Gold and Silver from Mamluk Egypt: Metal Vessels Made for Sultan Al-Nasir Muhammad,” JRAS, Series 3, 14:1, p.59, 62). However before, and indeed during, this aniconic turn in favour of epigraphy, heraldry and chinoserie on glass and metalware, impressive secular examples survive. These include three examples in the Gulbenkian Museum, Lisbon (2293, 2370, 2378). The former, dated mid-14th century, includes a hunt scene identical to ours, across three impressive medallions, albeit slightly less refined in detail. The hunt, a favourite pastime of the wealthy Mamluks, featured regularly on contemporaneous glass and metalwork. Of the related examples, however, the hunt on our footed bowl stands out for its precision and detail (Maria Queiroz Ribeiro and Jessica Hallett, Mamluk Glass in the Calouste Gulbenkian Museum, Lisbon, 1999, cat.9, pp.48-51, see note 17). Similarly, the blue arabesque medallions with grotesque terminals are no less impressive. Alternated with the lion hunts and the lotuses, the frieze is a proper tour-de-force.
On the frieze just below, small roundels containing eagles are similar to those which appear on the Metropolitan footed bowl. A larger version of this motif appears in the blazon of a flask in the Louvre, Paris (OA 3365). Thanks to an inscription dedicated to al-Kamil, the viceroy of Syria, that flask can be fairly accurately dated to 1344-45 (Carine Juvin, Mamluks 1250-1517, Paris, 2025, p.276). A similar eagle appears on the second example in the Metropolitan Museum mentioned above that also has a foot (91.1.1538). More unusually, around the body of our vessel, the small roundels depict an eagle swooping on a smaller bird, possibly a goose or a duck – continuing the theme of the hunt. For a larger example of this motif, one can look to another bottle in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (36.33) or an unusual amphora-shaped vase in the treasury of the Cathedral of St. Stephen, Vienna (published Stephen Vernoit, “Islamic Gilded and enamelled glass in nineteenth-century collections”, in Rachel Ward, Gilded and Enamelled Glass from the Middle East, London, 1998, fig.25.10).
The Provenance
Since the 19th century, Mamluk glass has had a particular allure for collectors of Islamic art. The earliest known owner of this footed bowl was the French artist Jules-Albert Goupil (1840-84). It was sold at auction as part of his collection in Hôtel Drouot in 1888, with accompanying photographs in the catalogue from the Oriental rooms of his apartment on 7 Rue Chaptal, Paris, exhibiting the sheer quality of the collection (see image illustrated here, sadly our footed bowl does not feature). Our “tulip-shaped” footed bowl was titled Belle Coupe Arabe and is described as “très rare” (Collection Albert Goupil, Paris, 1888, lot 35, pp.18, 49, 51). Although Mamluk glass has been popular among wealthy European collectors since the 14th century, few private collectors of Islamic art were known in France before the Exposition Universelle in 1878. Among the few that were, were Goupil, Alexandre-Charles Sauvageot and Charles Pascal Marie Piet-Lataudrie (Yves Porter, ‘France xi. Persian Art and Art Collections in France,’ Encyclopaedia Iranica, Online, 2000). Importantly, the 1888 catalogue describes the foot of our chalice to be “moderne” (op.cit., p.18), perhaps a result of the excellent work of French glassworkers Philippe-Joseph Brocard or J. D. Imberton.
A later owner of our footed bowl was the German manufacturer and collector Richard Zschille. It is almost certainly the “high-footed bowl … which recently passed from R. Azchille’s collection into the possession of Herr Franz (Friedrich) Sarre of Berlin,” mentioned in a 1899 Vienna catalogue (Gustav Schmoranz, Old Oriental Gilt and Enamelled Glass Vessels Extant in Public Museums and Private Collections, Vienna and London, 1889, pp.34-5). Tantalisingly enough, however, the catalogue states confidently that this and another bowl “both have their lids”, something the Drouot catalogue does not mention. Given the shape of the edges on the entire extant group, original lids would have been likely, as suggested by Carboni (op.cit. in Walker et al., cat.69). It is, however, impossible to say with certainty that this was the same piece, given the lack of visual evidence.
Although we cannot say with certainty that it was part of this 1889 sale (Zschille also auctioned his glass collection with Rudolph Lepke’s Kunst-Auctions-Haus in Berlin in 1900) we can be certain that the piece passed into the hands of the preeminent German archaeologist, scholar and collector Friedrich Sarre (1865-1945), whose enamelled Mamluk glass collection also included a contemporaneous mosque lamp and a four-handled vase now in the Freer Gallery of Art (F1934.19)[NM1] . All three were exhibited at the landmark 1910 Munich exhibition Meisterwerke Muhammedanischer Kunst. He also exhibited and published the footed bowl with the Freer vase in a temporary enamelled Mamluk glass exhibition in Berlin in 1911 (Joachim Gierlichs, 'Friedrich Sarre (1865–1945): The Reconstruction of His Collection of Islamic Art,' Iván Szántó and Yuka Kadoi (eds.), The reshaping of Persian art: Art histories of Islamic Iran and Central Asia, Piliscsaba 2019. pp.19, 28, 29n97). Sarre particularly praised it, the Freer vase and a ribbed bottle with polo-riding players now in the Berlin Museum of Islamic Art (I. 2573) for their unique form, while claiming that the exhibition assembled a group of “the most artistically and technically remarkable products of the Islamic Orient” (Friedrich Sarre, ‘Vergoldete und Emaillierte Syrische Gläser, Leihgaben in der Islamischen Kunstabteilung,’ Amtliche Berichte aus den Königlichen Kunstsammlungen, 32, no.6, pp.9-11).
The fine quality of Mamluk glass was a topos in Persian poetry and well-known in East and West. So prestigious was it, that even Sultan al-Salih Salih (r. 1351-4), contemporaneous with our footed bowl, was a known glass-blower (Robert Irwin, ‘A note on textual sources for the history of glass,’ Ward (ed.), Gilded and Enamelled Glass from the Middle East, London, 1988, pp.25-6). But while Mamluk glass mosque lamps remain impressive symbols of the sultans’ piety, a more unusual object like this casts light on, and gives a tangible connection to, the shadowy and poorly-understood world of the Mamluk court.
Because of its fragility and the complexities associated with making it, examples of Mamluk enamelled glass are very rare. The most recent fine examples to come on the market were a mosque lamp sold at Bonhams London, 12 November 2024, lot 69, and a bowl sold at Sotheby’s, London, 25 October 2023, lot 70 while ‘The Rothschild Bucket’ was sold at Sotheby’s London, 1 April 2009, lot 96, and is now in the Museum of Islamic Art, Doha.
The Form
The form of this particular example, though rarely encountered, is iconic. Many surviving Mamluk objects bear the symbol of the saqi, or cup-bearer - a silhouette of a footed bowl with a distinctive raised boss in the middle of the stem. These court functionaries enjoyed unusual influence, due to their constant intimacy with the sultan. They might be asked to lead military campaigns, or even accompany the Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca. In 1327 a saqi named Qawsun married a daughter of al-Nasir Muhammad in a ceremony that lasted several days (Nader Masarwah, The Significance of the Cupbearer during the Mamluk Period, Haifa, 2014). Images of a stemmed cup appear on everything from textiles to metalwork, but there are few surviving glass examples. Those that are known include examples in the Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto (924.26.3); the British Museum, London (1924,0125.1) and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (23.189). All of these, like ours, have a wide bowl above tall cylindrical stem and a flat splayed foot. The design of ours with alternating bands of palmettes and roundels on the body is closest in style to the example in the Metropolitan Museum. It has been suggested, in discussion on these comparable pieces, that they were used as drinking vessels or, perhaps more likely given the scale, containers for fruit or sweetmeats (Linda Komaroff, ‘Color, Precious Metal, and Fire: Islamic Ceramics and Glass,’ Catherine Hess (ed.), The Arts of Fire: Islamic Influences on the Italian Renaissance, Los Angeles, 2004, p.44 and Carboni in Walker et al., Arte Islámico del Museo Metropolitano de Arte de Nueva York, Mexico City, 1994, cat.69, pp.182-3).
Made in separate sections and then reheated and fused together, the form of a bowl supported on a tall foot is also sometimes referred to as a tazza, which probably comes from the Arabic word tas, bowl (Esin Atıl, Renaissance of Islam: Art of the Mamluks, Washington, 1981, p.122). Most likely, the shape dates back to the period of transition between Ayyubid and Mamluk rule in Syria in the mid-13th century to which another related example in the Metropolitan has been dated (91.1.1538; Carboni in Mariam Ekhtiar et al. (eds.), Masterpieces from the Department of Islamic Art in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 2011, cat.110). Metalwork examples from Egypt or Syria probably served as prototypes for these. Two examples include the “Fano Cup” in the Bibliothèque nationale de France (Chabouillet no. 3192.) attributed to 13th-14th century (Esin Atil et al., Islamic Metalwork in the Freer Gallery of Art, Washington, 1985, fig.11) and a chalice in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London (761-1900), recently attributed to circa 1300-50 (Souraya Noujaim, ‘The Mamluk Society,' Carine Juvin (ed.), Mamluks: Legacy of an Empire, Dubai and Beirut, 2025 cat.19). It is worth noticing the knop on the stem of these metalware prototypes which is also found on all of the 14th century glass footed bowls listed above.
The Decoration
The decoration of this footed bowl is rich. The large blossoming lotus palmettes speak to the influence of Chinese art, where lotuses symbolise purification according to Buddhist thought (Yuka Kadoi, Islamic Chinoiserie: The Art of Mongol Iran, Edinburgh, 2018, pp.94). Although native also to ancient Egyptian art (Eva Wilson, 8000 Years of Ornament: An Illustrated Handbook of Motifs, London, 1994, pp.101-3), lotuses came to the Mamluk iconography in the 1320s through diplomatic contact with the Ilkhanid rulers of Iran during the third reign of al-Nasir Muhammad (1310-41; Rachel Ward, “Mosque Lamps and Enamelled Glass: Getting the Dates Right,” in Doris Behrens-Abouseif, The Arts of the Mamluks in Egypt and Syria, 2012, pp.63, 71). They soon became a ubiquitous feature of the Mamluk decorative repertoire across all media (Stefano Carboni and David Whitehouse, Glass of the Sultans, New Haven, 2001, p.206). A key chinoiserie motif across Islamic art more widely and one of its finest and most inventive patterns, the type of enamelled lotuses used by the Mamluks is very similar to the eight-pointed Ilkhanid examples dated circa 1300 and featured, for instance, on a star-shaped tile in the Freer Gallery of Art (F1999.12; Kadoi op.cit., pp.92, figs.3.12-3). On our footed bowl, the white enamel inventively represents the stamen of the bud on such prototypes. The influence also went the other way - imported Egyptian glass, including goblets and lamps, are depicted in Ilkhanid painting (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, obj.no.52.20.2; op.cit. p.102) and the goblet in the Royal Ontario Museum, mentioned above, was found in a mosque in Shanxi province, China.
A unique aspect on our bowl, and one of its most impressive technical feats, are the three gilded animal combat groups on the upper frieze of the body, finely outlined in red. In these, lions ferociously attack antelopes. The 13th century Ayyubid excellence in figural gilding and enamelling is epitomised by the “Palmer Cup” in the British Museum (WB.53), but by Al-Nasir Muhammad’s third reign, the Mamluk public space was marked by iconoclasm, led by political figures and jurists (Carboni and Whitehouse, op.cit.; Ward, “Brass, Gold and Silver from Mamluk Egypt: Metal Vessels Made for Sultan Al-Nasir Muhammad,” JRAS, Series 3, 14:1, p.59, 62). However before, and indeed during, this aniconic turn in favour of epigraphy, heraldry and chinoserie on glass and metalware, impressive secular examples survive. These include three examples in the Gulbenkian Museum, Lisbon (2293, 2370, 2378). The former, dated mid-14th century, includes a hunt scene identical to ours, across three impressive medallions, albeit slightly less refined in detail. The hunt, a favourite pastime of the wealthy Mamluks, featured regularly on contemporaneous glass and metalwork. Of the related examples, however, the hunt on our footed bowl stands out for its precision and detail (Maria Queiroz Ribeiro and Jessica Hallett, Mamluk Glass in the Calouste Gulbenkian Museum, Lisbon, 1999, cat.9, pp.48-51, see note 17). Similarly, the blue arabesque medallions with grotesque terminals are no less impressive. Alternated with the lion hunts and the lotuses, the frieze is a proper tour-de-force.
On the frieze just below, small roundels containing eagles are similar to those which appear on the Metropolitan footed bowl. A larger version of this motif appears in the blazon of a flask in the Louvre, Paris (OA 3365). Thanks to an inscription dedicated to al-Kamil, the viceroy of Syria, that flask can be fairly accurately dated to 1344-45 (Carine Juvin, Mamluks 1250-1517, Paris, 2025, p.276). A similar eagle appears on the second example in the Metropolitan Museum mentioned above that also has a foot (91.1.1538). More unusually, around the body of our vessel, the small roundels depict an eagle swooping on a smaller bird, possibly a goose or a duck – continuing the theme of the hunt. For a larger example of this motif, one can look to another bottle in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (36.33) or an unusual amphora-shaped vase in the treasury of the Cathedral of St. Stephen, Vienna (published Stephen Vernoit, “Islamic Gilded and enamelled glass in nineteenth-century collections”, in Rachel Ward, Gilded and Enamelled Glass from the Middle East, London, 1998, fig.25.10).
The Provenance
Since the 19th century, Mamluk glass has had a particular allure for collectors of Islamic art. The earliest known owner of this footed bowl was the French artist Jules-Albert Goupil (1840-84). It was sold at auction as part of his collection in Hôtel Drouot in 1888, with accompanying photographs in the catalogue from the Oriental rooms of his apartment on 7 Rue Chaptal, Paris, exhibiting the sheer quality of the collection (see image illustrated here, sadly our footed bowl does not feature). Our “tulip-shaped” footed bowl was titled Belle Coupe Arabe and is described as “très rare” (Collection Albert Goupil, Paris, 1888, lot 35, pp.18, 49, 51). Although Mamluk glass has been popular among wealthy European collectors since the 14th century, few private collectors of Islamic art were known in France before the Exposition Universelle in 1878. Among the few that were, were Goupil, Alexandre-Charles Sauvageot and Charles Pascal Marie Piet-Lataudrie (Yves Porter, ‘France xi. Persian Art and Art Collections in France,’ Encyclopaedia Iranica, Online, 2000). Importantly, the 1888 catalogue describes the foot of our chalice to be “moderne” (op.cit., p.18), perhaps a result of the excellent work of French glassworkers Philippe-Joseph Brocard or J. D. Imberton.
A later owner of our footed bowl was the German manufacturer and collector Richard Zschille. It is almost certainly the “high-footed bowl … which recently passed from R. Azchille’s collection into the possession of Herr Franz (Friedrich) Sarre of Berlin,” mentioned in a 1899 Vienna catalogue (Gustav Schmoranz, Old Oriental Gilt and Enamelled Glass Vessels Extant in Public Museums and Private Collections, Vienna and London, 1889, pp.34-5). Tantalisingly enough, however, the catalogue states confidently that this and another bowl “both have their lids”, something the Drouot catalogue does not mention. Given the shape of the edges on the entire extant group, original lids would have been likely, as suggested by Carboni (op.cit. in Walker et al., cat.69). It is, however, impossible to say with certainty that this was the same piece, given the lack of visual evidence.
Although we cannot say with certainty that it was part of this 1889 sale (Zschille also auctioned his glass collection with Rudolph Lepke’s Kunst-Auctions-Haus in Berlin in 1900) we can be certain that the piece passed into the hands of the preeminent German archaeologist, scholar and collector Friedrich Sarre (1865-1945), whose enamelled Mamluk glass collection also included a contemporaneous mosque lamp and a four-handled vase now in the Freer Gallery of Art (F1934.19)[NM1] . All three were exhibited at the landmark 1910 Munich exhibition Meisterwerke Muhammedanischer Kunst. He also exhibited and published the footed bowl with the Freer vase in a temporary enamelled Mamluk glass exhibition in Berlin in 1911 (Joachim Gierlichs, 'Friedrich Sarre (1865–1945): The Reconstruction of His Collection of Islamic Art,' Iván Szántó and Yuka Kadoi (eds.), The reshaping of Persian art: Art histories of Islamic Iran and Central Asia, Piliscsaba 2019. pp.19, 28, 29n97). Sarre particularly praised it, the Freer vase and a ribbed bottle with polo-riding players now in the Berlin Museum of Islamic Art (I. 2573) for their unique form, while claiming that the exhibition assembled a group of “the most artistically and technically remarkable products of the Islamic Orient” (Friedrich Sarre, ‘Vergoldete und Emaillierte Syrische Gläser, Leihgaben in der Islamischen Kunstabteilung,’ Amtliche Berichte aus den Königlichen Kunstsammlungen, 32, no.6, pp.9-11).
The fine quality of Mamluk glass was a topos in Persian poetry and well-known in East and West. So prestigious was it, that even Sultan al-Salih Salih (r. 1351-4), contemporaneous with our footed bowl, was a known glass-blower (Robert Irwin, ‘A note on textual sources for the history of glass,’ Ward (ed.), Gilded and Enamelled Glass from the Middle East, London, 1988, pp.25-6). But while Mamluk glass mosque lamps remain impressive symbols of the sultans’ piety, a more unusual object like this casts light on, and gives a tangible connection to, the shadowy and poorly-understood world of the Mamluk court.
Because of its fragility and the complexities associated with making it, examples of Mamluk enamelled glass are very rare. The most recent fine examples to come on the market were a mosque lamp sold at Bonhams London, 12 November 2024, lot 69, and a bowl sold at Sotheby’s, London, 25 October 2023, lot 70 while ‘The Rothschild Bucket’ was sold at Sotheby’s London, 1 April 2009, lot 96, and is now in the Museum of Islamic Art, Doha.