Page 170 - Christies Alsdorf Collection PART 2 Sept 24 2020 NYC

崇聖御寶 - 詹姆斯及瑪麗蓮 ·阿爾斯多夫珍藏

972

A CARVED WHITE LIMESTONE TOMBSTONE 伊朗 希吉拉423年（公元1031—32年） 石刻墓碑
IRAN, YAZD, DATED AH 423 (1031-32)
來源:
The main field carved with 11 lines of kufic on vegetal ground within a bolder border of
B.C. Holland，芝加哥，1979年10月16日。
similar kufic, rising in the centre to a cusped arched gable, the spandrels with scrolling vine
詹姆斯及瑪麗蓮·阿爾斯多夫珍藏，芝加哥。
around angled drop-shaped kufic panels
31æ x 16¿ in. (81 x 41 cm.)
$20,000-30,000

PROVENANCE:
B.C. Holland, Chicago, 16 October 1979.
The James and Marilynn Alsdorf Collection, Chicago.

Dated to the first half of the eleventh century, this tombstone presents a particularly
finely carved, complete example of early Persian stelae.

The arched mihrab format, though not unique to the Iranian tradition, was marked by a
complexity of design that surpassed those of other regions. A tombstone dated 1014-15
in the British Museum (inv.no. 1982,0623.1) is of similar arched layout to the present
example. The scrolls that terminate forming roundels at each side of the pointed arch
in the British Museum example are reprised in the present example in the calligraphic
drop-shaped cartouches. Further eleventh-century examples found in Yazd also show
calligraphic inscriptions at either side of their arch, see, for example, those illustrated by
I. Afshar in Yadegarha-yi Yazd. Anjuman-i Athar-i Melli, Tehran, 1975, pp. 1081, 1086,
1088 and 1143.

While the stylised kufic script was prevalent in contemporaneous stelae, the present
example stands apart from many of those published given the remarkably preserved,
crisp carving of the limestone. A notable feature of the ornamentation on this
tombstone is the vine which meanders loosely, only just reaching the center of each
line at its deepest point. While the eleventh-century examples mentioned above are
mostly calligraphic, two twelfth-century Yazd tombstones, one in the Metropolitan
Museum of Art (acc. no. 33.118) and the second sold at Christie's London, October
2001, lot 282, each echo this shallow scroll in their outer borders.

These later examples, along with several more published by Afshar have much fuller
ornamentation comprising multiple calligraphic borders and scrolling vine (Afshar,
op. cit., pp. 1307-8 and 1313-15, see also in M. Ekhtiar et.al., Masterpieces from the
Department of Islamic Art in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 2011, cat.
64, pp. 104-105, and in S. R. Canby et.al., Court and Cosmos: the Great Age of the
Seljuqs, New York, 2016, nos. 201, 203 and 204, pp. 304 and 306-308 and also one
in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (inv.no.31.711) published in A. R. Pope and P.
Ackerman, A Survey of Persian Art from Pre-Historic Times to the Present, London, 1938-
1939, vol. V, pl. 520). The simple, but elegant decoration of the present tombstone
perhaps foreshadows the more abundantly ornamented stelae that were to come.
Although the population in eleventh-century Iran was predominantly Sunni, the
names of `Ali, Fatima, Hassan and Husayn in the upper cartouches indicate that `Abd
al-Rahman al-Madani was a Shiite. Revered as al-Shaykh, he or his successors were able
to afford a richly decorated and delicately carved tombstone, sharing stylistic features
consistent with the tombstones of Yazd.

168 PART II