.jpg?w=1)
.jpg?w=1)
.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
This tray was produced in 14th century, when the art of the Mamluk metalworker was at its apogee. Between 1275 and 1350 artists produced unique and spectacular pieces and amongst their most zealous patrons was Sultan Nasir al-Din Muhammad ibn Qalawun, for whom this tray was produced. Sultan Nasir al-Din Muhammad, the most long-lived and magnificent of the Mamluk sultans, reigned with short interruptions, for almost half a century until 1341.
Although the decoration of our tray is quite rubbed, it incorporates two bold circular thuluth inscription bands. The area between them is divided into panels punctuated by the pierced roundels. These panels are alternately filled with floral motifs - bold flowerheads and elegant lotuses - and small flying ducks, each also with a small blazon at the centre. The lotuses, as well as the smaller five-petalled flowerheads that surround them, can be easily paralleled in a basin in the British Museum which also bears the Sultan Nasir al-Din Muhammad’s name (51 1-4 1; Esin Atil, Renaissance of Islam. Art of the Mamluks, exhibition catalogue, Washington DC, 1981, pp.88-89, no.26). The epigraphic blazon that we see here in each of the flower and duck panels, is of a type that evolved around 1320-30 and became identified with royalty. The British Museum basin, mentioned above, also employs them in its decoration.
The ducks which also feature heavily in the decorative repertoire of our tray are known on other examples of the metalwork of the period of Sultan Nasir al-Din Muhammad ibn Qalawun – see for example an important incense burner in the Museum of Islamic Art in Doha, formerly in the Nuhad al-Said Collection (James W. Allan, Islamic Metalwork. The Nuhad Es-Said Collection, London, 1982, pp.86-89, no.15). There a similar ring of birds fly around the outer edge of the internal incense tray. In his discussion on that incense burner, Allan spends some time discussing the symbolism of both the ducks and the lotuses. He determines that both have some solar symbolism – derived either from ancient Egyptian traditions or perhaps, with the introduction of the Buddhist lotus into Islamic art, from the Far East (Allan, op.cit., p.88).
The form of our tray is very rare. It is what is known a gulla tray - used for carrying water jugs. Because the jugs were unglazed in order to keep the water cool in the heat of the sun, they sweated. The perforated sunken well – one for each jug – ensured that water didn’t gather at the bottom of the tray. Very few of these trays appear to have survived. One other is published, bearing the name of the Amir Taibuga and attributed to the 13th/14th century, in the Museum of Islamic Art in Cairo (Gaston Wiet, Catalogue général du Musée arabe du Caire, Objets en cuivre, Cairo, 1984, pl.L). A slightly later gulla tray, attributed to the 15th century, sold in these Rooms, 8 October 1991, lot 207.
A basin also made for the Sultan Nasir al-Din Muhammad ibn Qalawun recently sold in these Rooms, 20 October 2016, lot 132.
Although the decoration of our tray is quite rubbed, it incorporates two bold circular thuluth inscription bands. The area between them is divided into panels punctuated by the pierced roundels. These panels are alternately filled with floral motifs - bold flowerheads and elegant lotuses - and small flying ducks, each also with a small blazon at the centre. The lotuses, as well as the smaller five-petalled flowerheads that surround them, can be easily paralleled in a basin in the British Museum which also bears the Sultan Nasir al-Din Muhammad’s name (51 1-4 1; Esin Atil, Renaissance of Islam. Art of the Mamluks, exhibition catalogue, Washington DC, 1981, pp.88-89, no.26). The epigraphic blazon that we see here in each of the flower and duck panels, is of a type that evolved around 1320-30 and became identified with royalty. The British Museum basin, mentioned above, also employs them in its decoration.
The ducks which also feature heavily in the decorative repertoire of our tray are known on other examples of the metalwork of the period of Sultan Nasir al-Din Muhammad ibn Qalawun – see for example an important incense burner in the Museum of Islamic Art in Doha, formerly in the Nuhad al-Said Collection (James W. Allan, Islamic Metalwork. The Nuhad Es-Said Collection, London, 1982, pp.86-89, no.15). There a similar ring of birds fly around the outer edge of the internal incense tray. In his discussion on that incense burner, Allan spends some time discussing the symbolism of both the ducks and the lotuses. He determines that both have some solar symbolism – derived either from ancient Egyptian traditions or perhaps, with the introduction of the Buddhist lotus into Islamic art, from the Far East (Allan, op.cit., p.88).
The form of our tray is very rare. It is what is known a gulla tray - used for carrying water jugs. Because the jugs were unglazed in order to keep the water cool in the heat of the sun, they sweated. The perforated sunken well – one for each jug – ensured that water didn’t gather at the bottom of the tray. Very few of these trays appear to have survived. One other is published, bearing the name of the Amir Taibuga and attributed to the 13th/14th century, in the Museum of Islamic Art in Cairo (Gaston Wiet, Catalogue général du Musée arabe du Caire, Objets en cuivre, Cairo, 1984, pl.L). A slightly later gulla tray, attributed to the 15th century, sold in these Rooms, 8 October 1991, lot 207.
A basin also made for the Sultan Nasir al-Din Muhammad ibn Qalawun recently sold in these Rooms, 20 October 2016, lot 132.