Important Album Page With Calligraphy Signed Ali Al-Husayni (Mir Ali Al-Heravi D. 1544)

Important Album Page With Calligraphy Signed Ali Al-Husayni (Mir Ali Al-Heravi D. 1544).

Safavid, Persia.

This is a rare calligraphy by Mir Ali Heravi who also signed his name as Ali al-Husayni. According to David Roxburgh the best known example of this application is the anthology of poetry, made in 1524, for vizier Khawaja Malik Ahmad, who was governor of Herat under Shah Ismail. In Roxburgh’s words: “The anthology bears the signatures of several masters including Ali al-Husayni (that is, Mir Ali), Muhammad Qasim b Shadishah and Muhammad Khandan”.

Please see: David Roxburgh, The Persian Album, Yale University Press, 2005, p. 179. An illustrated copy of the Panj Ganjof Abd al-Rahman Jami, similarly signed Ali al-Husayniis in the Golestan Palace Library (inv. no. 709). A Gulistan copied in 975 (1567/68) and signed Mir Ali al-Husayni (Mir Ali al-Husayni al-Katib al-Sultani) in Bukhara is in the British Library (BL Or 5302). It includes six Bukhara-style paintings which were commissioned on Akbar’s request.

Mir ‘Ali al-Heravi was one of the greatest masters of Persian calligraphy. He learned his trade from Zayn al-din Mahmud and Sultan ‘Ali Mashhadi, and worked at the court of the Timurid Sultan Husayn Mirza. He lived there until the capture of the city by the Uzbeks in 1528-29, when he, together with other artists, were taken to Bukhara. He was put in the charge of Prince ‘Abd al-‘Aziz Khan and worked in the Royal Library. After some sixteen years, he died in Herat. His recorded works are dated between 914 AH/1508-09 AD and 948 AH/1541-42 AD (Mehdi Bayani 1959, pp.126-31). He passed away in 1544.

Price on application

This object is eligible for a Certificate of BADA Provenance