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[DE-SMB-ISL] I. 4590

Shelfmark
  • I. 4590
Title
  • [Album of Paintings, Engravings, and Calligraphic Pieces]
Institution

Content

Title

↳ Established form
  • [Album of Paintings, Engravings, and Calligraphic Pieces]
Region
Content
  • The album is designed in the Mughal style of the 18th century with double pages of facing paintings or calligraphic pieces. The calligraphic pieces are in five different writing styles, including two in Shafīʿāʾī (f. 5v and 16v); two, written in Nasḫ, are dated: f. 6a to 1147/1734-35; f. 17a to 1132/1719-20. Among the pictures, monochrome drawings of animals dominate at the beginning (f. 1a, 2a, 2b, 4b, 5a), in the middle section European engravings (f. 4a, 8b, 9a, 9b, 10a, 10b) and in the final section portraits of rulers, scholars and courtiers (f. 7a, 13b, 14a, 15b, 16a, 17b, 18a, 19b, 21b, 22a, 24b, 25b, 26a, 27b, 29a, 30a, 31b, 32a). F. 13a bears seven impressions of contemporary seals from the reign of the Mughal ruler Muḥammad Shāh (r. 1720-48), which are dated 1147/1734-35 and 1148/1735-36. Some of the calligraphic compositions, miniatures and engravings are labelled with short Persian titles at the bottom of the page, e.g. an engraving with the allegorical head of a bearded man among vines (f. 8b) bears the inscription shabīh-i āftāb siyāh qalam-i farangī ("portrait of the sun, European black pen").
Completeness
Language
Script
  • Artist
↳ Name
↳ Note on the Person
  • The four drawings assembled together on f. 6b can be attributed to the school of Riz̤ā-i ʿAbbasī.
Editions/Literature
  • Gladiß, Almut von:
    Albumblätter: Miniaturen aus den Sammlungen Indo-Islamischer Herrscherhöfe. München: Edition Minerva, 2010.
    *
    Harris, Lucian:
    Archibald Swinton: A New Source for Albums of Indian Miniatures in William Beckford's Collection.
    In: The Burlington Magazine 143/1179 (June 2001), pp. 360–366.
    https://www.jstor.org/stable/889039
    *
  • Indische Albumblätter: Miniaturen und Kalligraphien aus der Zeit der Moghul-Kaiser / Regina Hickmann (ed.). Leipzig/Weimar: Gustav Kiepenheuer Verlag, 1979.
    *
    Kühnel, Ernst:
    Islamische Schriftkunst. Graz: Akademische Druck- u. Verlagsanstalt, 1972 (1. ed. 1942).
    [f. 26b = fig. 60]
  • Kühnel, Ernst:
    Arbeiten des Rizâ 'Abbâsi und seiner Schule.
    In: Forschungen und Berichte 1 (1957), pp. 122-131.
    [f. 6b = figs. 7, 8, 10, 11]
    https://www.jstor.org/stable/3880488
    https://doi.org/10.2307/3880488
Remarks
  • This is probably one of the eight albums mentioned in lot 80 of the Christie's auction catalogue of 6 June 1810:
    "A Catalogue of a very valuable collection of Persian, and a few Arabic MSS. selected many years ago, in the East, by Archibald Swinton, Esq. ... which will be sold by auction, etc Von Archibald SWINTON (Captain, H.E.I.C.S.)".
    Google Books: https://www.google.de/books/edition/ACatalogueofaveryvaluablecollectio/BxWzN3Swc_YC?hl=de&gbpv=1&

Description of the object

Record type
Format
Number of volumes
  • 1
Binding
  • red leather binding with dark brown lacquer cover on the front and back with golden ornaments; spine with gilded floral ornaments and the inscription 'Tusveerān 4'

Writing material

↳ Material
↳ State of preservation
  • disbound; f. 11, 12, 19, 20, 23, 28, 31 missing or incomplete
Number of folios
  • originally 32; European pagination
Dimensions
  • 34.5 x 23.5 cm

Script

↳ Style
↳ Ink
Illumination
  • margins with dense floral patterns in the style of the 18th century
Miniatures
  • 27 miniatures, 6 engravings, 19 calligraphic pieces, and one sheet with seals

History of the object

Entstehung

Autograph

17th to 18th centuries in India (GND: 4026722-2)

Provenance

Provenance
  • 1882
  • London
  • acquired by the Berlin Kupferstichkabinett from the 12th Duke of Hamilton, handed over to the Königliche Museum für Völkerkunde (Royal Museum of Ethnology) in 1891
  • 1844
  • Hamilton Palace, South Lanarkshire, Scotland
  • passed into possession of the Hamilton family through marriage of Alexander Hamilton Douglas (10th Duke of Hamilton) with Susan Euphemia Beckford
  • 1810 (?)
  • London
  • presumably acquired from Christie's on 6 June 1810 as part of lot 80; bequeathed on Beckford's death in 1844 to his daughter Susan Euphemia
  • between 1752 and 1766
  • India
  • acquired during his stay in India
Provenance entry
  • Other: f. 13a:
    from top right to bottom left (all seals read from bottom to top):
    1. Mīrzā Ghālib ʿAlīkhān-i ṣafavī / fidvī-i pādishāh / Muḥammad Shāh-i Ghāzī sana 18 / 1148/1735-36
    2. Ghālib ʿAlīkhān-i ṣafavī / fidvī-i pādishāh / Muḥammad Shāh-i Ghāzī sana 17 / 1147/1734-35
    3. Muḥammad Ḥusaynkhān-i ṣafavī / fidvī-i pādishāh / Muḥammad Shāh-i Ghāzī sana 17 / 1147/1734-35
    4. Ghālib ʿAlīkhān 1147/1734-35
    5. Muḥammad Ḥusayn al-Ḥasanī 1147/1734-35
    6. ʿAbd al-Ghanī al-Mūsavī 12 – ibn ʿAbd al-Ghafār
    7. Muḥammad Ḥusayn al-Ḥasanī 1147/1734-35

Access and usage

Institution
Shelfmark
  • I. 4590
↳ alternate
  • Old shelfmark : IC 24335
Editor
  • Weis
Status of edit
  • First input complete
Static URL
https://mymssportal.dl.uni-leipzig.de/receive/DEMUS019014Book_manuscript_00000009
MyCoRe ID
DEMUS019014Book_manuscript_00000009 (XML view)
Export
Metadata license
CC0 1.0
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