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Lot Essay
This folio and that of the following lot come from a dispersed and recently re-discovered Shahnama of Firdawsi, closely related to at least four manuscripts associated with the master artist Siyavush Beg. Sivayush was active in the late 16th and early 17th century Qazvin school during the transformation of Persian painting under Shah Muhammad Khudabanda (r.1578-87) and Shah Abbas (r.1587-1629).
One of these manuscripts is in the British Library and dated 1604 AD (IO Islamic 966). In that manuscript, the depiction of Rustam shooting an arrow at Ashkabus shares the same composition as Rustam killing Kamus-i Kashani (f.169v) here. Despite earlier discussions by B.W. Robinson and Barbara Schmitz on the identity of the artist of almost all the paintings of this manuscript, Adel Adamova and Manijeh Bayani have convincingly argued in that this manuscript and a related Shahnama in the al-Sabah Collection, Kuwait (LNS 223 MS) were indeed done by Siyavush (Persian Painting: The Arts of the Book and Portraiture, London, 2015, pp.459-83, cat.32). Besides this volume, shared similarities may be found in two other manuscripts, a Shahnama in the Yahuda Collection of the Israel Museum (ms. 120) and a Garshaspnamah by Asadi, supplementing Firdausi's epic, in the British Library (Or. 12985).
Siyavush Beg Gurji (c.1536-1616) was a Georgian mamluk slave in the court of Shah Tahmasp (r.1524-76), who recognised his talent and introduced him to the courtly workshop. Highly praised in chronicles of his two contemporaries Qadi Ahmad and Sadiqi Beg, he progressed rapidly to become a master artist under four consecutive Safavid kings. In particular, he played a key role in the splendid Shahnama of Shah Ismail II (r. 1576-7), being one of the key artists out of the fifteen working on it (for an in-depth discussion on his life and work, see Anthony Welch, Artists for the Shah: Late Sixteenth-Century Painting at the Imperial Court of Iran, New Haven and London, 1976, pp.17-40).
With the discovery of the group of paintings to which our folios belong, Asim Saeed and Jaimee K. Comstock-Skipp indeed attribute them to Siyavush "or a painter working alongside him during the last quarter of the sixteenth century," adding: "Their sumptuousness vouches for an expensive production affordable to a prince or an aristocrat who could employ elite artists and cover the expenses of their studio." This is done based on "stylistic comparisons and the upsurge of sub-royal patrons who were commissioning richly illustrated manuscripts in parallel or in competition with princely ateliers during the second half of the sixteenth century" (Jaimee Comstock-Skipp and Asim Saeed, "From Georgian Slave to Safavid Master: Some Possible Additions to the Corpus of Siyavush Beg Gurji," (Asian and African studies blog, British Library, 9 May 2022).
These paintings were sold with five other paintings from the same manuscript, at Sotheby's, London, October 25 2023, lots 38-44. Six further paintings from the manuscript were similarly sold at Sotheby's, London, 26 October 2022, lots 43-48.
This scene depicts the episode of Rustam killing Ashkabus, rather than Rustam killing Kamus Kashani, as written in the marginal annotation.
One of these manuscripts is in the British Library and dated 1604 AD (IO Islamic 966). In that manuscript, the depiction of Rustam shooting an arrow at Ashkabus shares the same composition as Rustam killing Kamus-i Kashani (f.169v) here. Despite earlier discussions by B.W. Robinson and Barbara Schmitz on the identity of the artist of almost all the paintings of this manuscript, Adel Adamova and Manijeh Bayani have convincingly argued in that this manuscript and a related Shahnama in the al-Sabah Collection, Kuwait (LNS 223 MS) were indeed done by Siyavush (Persian Painting: The Arts of the Book and Portraiture, London, 2015, pp.459-83, cat.32). Besides this volume, shared similarities may be found in two other manuscripts, a Shahnama in the Yahuda Collection of the Israel Museum (ms. 120) and a Garshaspnamah by Asadi, supplementing Firdausi's epic, in the British Library (Or. 12985).
Siyavush Beg Gurji (c.1536-1616) was a Georgian mamluk slave in the court of Shah Tahmasp (r.1524-76), who recognised his talent and introduced him to the courtly workshop. Highly praised in chronicles of his two contemporaries Qadi Ahmad and Sadiqi Beg, he progressed rapidly to become a master artist under four consecutive Safavid kings. In particular, he played a key role in the splendid Shahnama of Shah Ismail II (r. 1576-7), being one of the key artists out of the fifteen working on it (for an in-depth discussion on his life and work, see Anthony Welch, Artists for the Shah: Late Sixteenth-Century Painting at the Imperial Court of Iran, New Haven and London, 1976, pp.17-40).
With the discovery of the group of paintings to which our folios belong, Asim Saeed and Jaimee K. Comstock-Skipp indeed attribute them to Siyavush "or a painter working alongside him during the last quarter of the sixteenth century," adding: "Their sumptuousness vouches for an expensive production affordable to a prince or an aristocrat who could employ elite artists and cover the expenses of their studio." This is done based on "stylistic comparisons and the upsurge of sub-royal patrons who were commissioning richly illustrated manuscripts in parallel or in competition with princely ateliers during the second half of the sixteenth century" (Jaimee Comstock-Skipp and Asim Saeed, "From Georgian Slave to Safavid Master: Some Possible Additions to the Corpus of Siyavush Beg Gurji," (Asian and African studies blog, British Library, 9 May 2022).
These paintings were sold with five other paintings from the same manuscript, at Sotheby's, London, October 25 2023, lots 38-44. Six further paintings from the manuscript were similarly sold at Sotheby's, London, 26 October 2022, lots 43-48.
This scene depicts the episode of Rustam killing Ashkabus, rather than Rustam killing Kamus Kashani, as written in the marginal annotation.