PROBABLY MAMLUK SYRIA, LATE 15TH CENTURY

Within the group of 15th and 16th century metalwork objects conventionally described as "Veneto-Saracenic", three distinctive groups can be identified (James Allan, “Cairo, Damascus or Venice”, in Metalwork of the Islamic World, the Aron Collection, London, 1986, pp.48-61). The present covered bowl belongs to the largest of these three groups, characterised by pronounced knotted motifs of broader drawing. This group is now widely agreed be the product of Mamluk Syria, although the popularity of this school of metalwork in Venice, and Europe more broadly, reflects a cosmopolitan taste in the medieval Eastern Mediterranean.