Object details
Accession number
C7w4
Primary Creator
Iranian, Kashan
Full title
Tile from a Mihrab
Creation Date
about 1215
Provenance
Said to have come from a mosque in Mashhad, Iran. Three tiles from the same mihrab are now housed in the Victoria & Albert Museum, London (museum nos. 1481-1876, 1481A-1876, 1481B-1876).
Probably entered Isabella Stewart Gardner's collection by about 1897.
Marks
Inscribed (in thuluth script) ...with intelligence for those who remember A[llah]... (fragment of a koranic inscription; Koran 3:118-19)
Dimensions
47 x 44 cm (18 1/2 x 17 5/16 in.)
Display Media
Ceramic with cobalt and luster glazes
Web Commentary
This beautiful tile formed part of the frieze in a prayer niche of a mosque. Called a mihrab, this niche or arch in a wall marks the direction towards Mecca, toward which worshippers face during prayer. The inscription, in large dark blue script, is a verse from the Koran. The rich decoration consists of intertwining foliage and a patterned band at the top. Various blue glazes are balanced by copper luster glaze. Two other tiles from the frieze are in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London.Source: Eye of the Beholder, edited by Alan Chong et al. (Boston: ISGM and Beacon Press, 2003): 163.
Permanent Gallery Location
Spanish Cloister
Bibliography
Gilbert Wendel Longstreet and Morris Carter. General Catalogue (Boston, 1935), p. 52. (as Persian (Sultanabad), 14th or 15th century)
Yasuko Horioka et al. Oriental and Islamic Art: Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum (Boston, 1975), pp. 115-16, no. 51. (as Persian (Kashan), 13th century)
Alan Chong et al. (eds.) Eye of the Beholder: Masterpieces from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum (Boston, 2003), p.163, ill. (as Iranian (Kashan), 1200s)
Rights and reproductions
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