Vahshi Bafqi, Farhad va Shirin, copied by Muhammad Hakim al-Husayni, Persia, Mashhad, Safavid, dated 1046 AH/1636-37 AD

Persian manuscript on gold-sprinkled paper, 52 leaves plus 3 flyleaves, 11 lines to the page, written in nasta'liq script in black ink within 2 columns, margins ruled in colours and gold, catchwords, opening leaf remargined with later illuminated headpiece, 4 miniatures in gouache heightened with gold, brown morocco binding with large panels of 18th-century Persian floral brocade

Sotheby's London, 1 February 1960, lot 217.
Sotheby's London, 17 October 1983, lot 186.

In reasonably good overall condition, later illuminated heading to opening leaf, heavy water staining, as viewed.
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The patron of this manuscript is Qarajaghay Khan (Qarachaqay), governor of Mashhad most probably under Shah ‘Abbas II (r.1642-66) and Shah Safi II (r.1666-94). It was copied for his library in 1046 AH/1636 AD.

The scribe Muhammad Hakim al-Husayni is a reasonably obscure seventeenth century nasta’liq calligrapher, whose recorded work (apart from the present one), is the Shahnameh at the Windsor Royal Library dated Rabi’ II 1058 AH/April-May 1649 AD) (B.W. Robinson and Eleanor Sims, The Windsor Shahnameh of 1048, 2007); a Haft Paykar dated 1036 AH/1626 AD (sold in these rooms, October 1981, lot 241); a Mu’ammiat Husayni, dated 1034 AH/1625 AD, in the Library of the Uzbekistan, Academy of Sciences (Tashkent, no.4637 (2993); B.W. Robinson, ‘Two Manuscripts of the Shahnama in the Royal Library, Windsor Castle’, The Burlington Magazine, March, 1968, p.133, footnote 1) and Ghurar wa durar, dated 1040 AH/1630-31 AD, in the Gulistan Palace Library, Tehran (Mehdi Bayani, ahval va athar-e khosh-navisan, vol 3, Tehran, 1348 sh, p.711).

The four miniature paintings listed below are attributed by both I. Stchoukine and B.W. Robinson to Muhammad Qasim (see I. Stchoukine, Les Peintres de Shah Abbas 1er, Paris, 1964, p.151, pl.LXVII and B.W. Robinson op.cit., pp.133-8, and pls.20-35.

The miniatures are as follows:

1. Farhad conversing with an old man (f.23a).
2. Shirin and her maids standing beside a stream (f.35a).
3. Fruit offered to Shirin with Farhad in attendance (f.46a).
4. The meeting of Shirin and Farhad (f.50a).