SAFAVID IRAN, CIRCA 1575

Eight folios from two manuscripts of Jami in the Chester Beatty Library have very similar borders. The more finely illustrated are five leaves from a copy of Jami's Salaman wa Absal. The scrolls are decorated with various waq-waq motifs including numerous human faces. Three other leaves from Jami's Subhat al-Abrar are similarly illuminated but the scrolls are simply decorated with leaves and palmettes. The figures painted within the marginal medallions show musicians, half-length figures and other seated figures depicted frontally in a very similar way to those visible in the present pages. They are painted in the simplified form of the metropolitan Qazvin style practiced circa 1565-85 (M. Minovi, B.W. Robinson et.al, The Chester Beatty Library, A Catalogue of the Persian Manuscripts and Miniatures, Dublin, 1960, cat. 209 and 210).