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Lot Essay
This starts with the Abu Mansuri preface with the addition that Firdawsi went to India after leaving Ghazni. Firdawsi's text given is as far as the reign of Bahman from which Bahmanama text starts. The rest of the text is from Bahnamnama, and not included is all that comes after his reign in the Shahnama (the reigns of Humay, Darab, Dara, Alexander, Parthians and Sasanians). There are slight differences between the text of the Shahnama here and that of the published version.
The miniatures of the Bahmannama section are considerably more exuberant than those of the Shahnama part. As the taste for storytelling in the Safavid period developed, interpolated texts were often included in Shahnama manuscripts.They often provided greater scope for more impressive illustration than Firdawsi's text alone (Karin Ruhrdanz, 'About a group of truncated Shahnamas: A case study in the commercial production of illustrated manuscripts in the second part of the sixteenth century', Muqarnas, Volume XIV, pp 118-133).
For a contemporary Shahnama manuscript with miniatures in a similar style, see B.W. Robinson, Persian Paintings in the John Rylands Library, London, 1980, pp.330-45, Ryl Pers 909.
This manuscript has recently been conserved and stabilised at The Conservation Department of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
The miniatures of the Bahmannama section are considerably more exuberant than those of the Shahnama part. As the taste for storytelling in the Safavid period developed, interpolated texts were often included in Shahnama manuscripts.They often provided greater scope for more impressive illustration than Firdawsi's text alone (Karin Ruhrdanz, 'About a group of truncated Shahnamas: A case study in the commercial production of illustrated manuscripts in the second part of the sixteenth century', Muqarnas, Volume XIV, pp 118-133).
For a contemporary Shahnama manuscript with miniatures in a similar style, see B.W. Robinson, Persian Paintings in the John Rylands Library, London, 1980, pp.330-45, Ryl Pers 909.
This manuscript has recently been conserved and stabilised at The Conservation Department of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.