The manuscript sold for £8,061,700/$9,091,179. The manuscript set a new record in British pound sterling for any Islamic object or work on paper at auction, surpassing the previous record set by another leaf from the same manuscript at Sotheby’s in 2011. It was sold from the collection of renowned scholar Stuart Cary Welch, making £7,433,250 ($12,153,364).
The page shows the great hero Rostam about to lasso his horse, Raksh, or Lightning, and features trees, partridge chicks in a nest and two herdsmen who have just spotted a thief, reported etnews.uk.
It comes from the ‘Shahnameh of Shah Tahmasp’, which is regarded as the single finest work of art from the modern Persian Empire.
The book is a 16th-century illustration by court artists of the central epic of Persian culture, the ‘Shahnameh,’ written by the poet Ferdowsi.
Today, folios from the ‘Shahnameh’ are treasured in museum collections internationally, including New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Smithsonian Institution in Washington D.C., the Aga Khan Museum Collection, the Museum of Islamic Art, Doha, and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Tehran.
Benedict Carter, head of Islamic and Indian art at Sotheby’s, said: “The Shahnameh of Shah Tahmasp is widely recognized as one of the supreme highlighted manuscripts of any kind of duration or society and also rankings amongst the best artworks worldwide.”
“It is a testimony to the large imaginative ability, patronage and also elegance that 2 folios from the exact same famous manuscript currently hold the leading 2 greatest rates for any kind of Islamic deal with paper, with a brand-new public auction document collection.”
The Islamic and Indian art department totalled £13,922,327, as part of Sotheby’s Islamic, South Asian & Middle Eastern Week in London. The sale also saw a monumental leaf from one of the largest Kufic Qur’ans of the eighth century sell for £819,000, and a monumental cast and engraved bronze multiple-wick oil lamp from 11th century Andalusia bring £1,608,000.
Source: Iran Daily