COPIED BY SULTAN 'ALI MASHHADI, SAFAVID HERAT, AFGHANISTAN, DATED AH 923/1517-18 AD

Details

AN ARABIC GRAMMAR
COPIED BY SULTAN 'ALI MASHHADI, SAFAVID HERAT, AFGHANISTAN, DATED AH 923⁄1517-18 AD
On grammar, Arabic manuscript on cream paper, 41ff. plus 3 fly-leaves, each folio with 9ff. of elegant black nasta'liq, catchwords, important words and phrases picked out in gold or blue, laid down between gold and blue rules, opening headpiece with the bismallah in blue naskh, a few marginal notes at the beginning, colophon signed Sultan 'Ali al-Mashhadi bi dar al-sultaniyya Herat and dated 923, some waterstaining mainly restricted to the margins, some folios loose in binding, in later purple velvet binding with gilt stamped central medallion and spandrels
Text panel 6½ x 3 3⁄8in. (16.5 x 8.5cm.); folio 9 5⁄8 x 6in. (24.5 x 15cm.)

Provenance

Collection of the Late Djafar Ghazi, sold Christie's London, 7th October 2008, lot 331

Conditions of sale

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Lot Essay

Sultan 'Ali Mashhadi was a well-known scribe who worked at the court of Husayn Mirza Bayqara in Herat. Following the invasion of Herat by the Uzbeks, he returned to his hometown Mashhad where he died in AH 926 (1519-20 AD). His numerous recorded works include inscriptions in Herat and are dated between AH 849 (1444-45 AD) and AH 921 (1515-16 AD). The present manuscript is particularly important in that it is the latest recorded work copied by Sultan 'Ali Mashhadi and demonstrates that he was still in Herat three years before his death (Mehdi Bayani, Ahval va Asar-e Khosh Nevisan, Vol. I, Tehran, 1345 sh, pp.241-66).

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