A FATIMID CARVED INTERLACE WOODEN PANEL probably originally from a minbar or screen, arranged with a hexagonal lattice centred on a diagonal grouping of six-pointed stars, each of the panels carved with a variant of scrolling arabesques and palmette terminals, occasionally with fruit or flowerheads, some of the long panels with single benedictory words in kufic overlaying the interlace designs, 'shamila, da'im, kamila wa ni'ma' (complete, eternal, perfect and God's favour) divided by interlaced wooden strips with central narrow bone ridge, circa 1150 (slight rubbing and restoration), mounted in two panels of uneven size within a Syrian wood frame inset with bone and wooden hexagons and lozenges divided by wooden stringing, the cross-bar also with the date 1211 (1796-7AD) when the frame was created

Details

A FATIMID CARVED INTERLACE WOODEN PANEL probably originally from a minbar or screen, arranged with a hexagonal lattice centred on a diagonal grouping of six-pointed stars, each of the panels carved with a variant of scrolling arabesques and palmette terminals, occasionally with fruit or flowerheads, some of the long panels with single benedictory words in kufic overlaying the interlace designs, 'shamila, da'im, kamila wa ni'ma' (complete, eternal, perfect and God's favour) divided by interlaced wooden strips with central narrow bone ridge, circa 1150 (slight rubbing and restoration), mounted in two panels of uneven size within a Syrian wood frame inset with bone and wooden hexagons and lozenges divided by wooden stringing, the cross-bar also with the date 1211 (1796-7AD) when the frame was created
90¼ x 28¼in. (228.5cm. x 71.5cm.)

Lot Essay

This is a fine example of Fatimid wood carving of the 12th century when individual polygonal and star-shaped panels were assembled in a geometric composition. Precisely the same composition of hexagonal panels about a central six-pointed star is found in the back panels of the mihrab from the tomb of Sayyid Ruqayya in Cairo and now preserved in the Islamic Museum in Cairo (Pauty, E.: Catalogue Général du Musée Arabe du Caire, Les Bois Sculptés jusqu'à l'époque ayyoubide, Cairo 1931, pl.LXXX). It is dated between 1154 and 1160 AD. Some of the units of this panel have the same tightly voluted scroll of the panels in Cairo. Also in the Islamic Museum is a door from the mosque of Sayyida Nafisa (1138-1146) which consists of four rectangular panels in each leaf (Pauty, op.cit., pl.LXXVIII). The arabesque ornament resembles that of the present panel. Certain of the Sayyida Nafisa panels also have benedictory words rendered in the same style of kufic.

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