A Khurasan bronze medical box, Persia, 13th century
Auction Closed
October 23, 01:24 PM GMT
Estimate
20,000 - 30,000 GBP
Lot Details
Description
of elongated ovoid form with hinged lid, incised with two calligraphic bands in naskh and Kufic on a scrolling ground, divided by a frieze of animals in chase, with openwork hinges, the interior divided in compartments
23.4cm. length
11.5cm. height
inscriptions
Around the lid, in cursive, al-‘izz al-da’im wa al-iqbal al-salim al-dawlah al … afiyah (sic) al-salamah al-karamah wa al-dawlah li-sahibihi, ‘Perpetual glory, sound (sic) prosperity, wealth, … well-being, generosity and wealth to its owner’
In one cartouche: 'amal Ibrahim ibn Hasan, ‘The work of Ibrahim ibn Hasan’
Around the base, in Kufic:…[a]l-i‘izz al-d[a’im] al-baqiyah al-salamah .. al-birr nasr (?) li-sahibihi, ‘… Perpetual glory (?), lasting well-being … piety, victory (?) to its owner’
Incised in Kufic: sahibuhu wa (sic) Muhammad ibn ‘abd al-kafi al-kahhal al-ma’ruf bi-babwayh, ‘Its owner and (sic) Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Kafi, the oculist, known as Babwayh’
Unlike pen boxes and inkwells, boxes and caskets came in a variety of forms. Their uses would have ranged considerably, and the range of sizes and shapes of surviving examples pose a challenge in reconstructing their original use. This elaborately engraved box, however, bears an inscription allowing us to narrow down its function to a medical context. The inscription states that it was owned by Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Kafi, the oculist, known as Babwayh. The interior of the box is divided into compartments for the placement of his tools.
In form and scale, the present box relates to a surgeon’s box produced in Iraq in the second half of the thirteenth century in the Museum of Islamic Art, Cairo (inv. no.7597, see Paris 1996, p.167). Another, later, example produced in fifteenth century Syria for the chief physician Yunus, is in the David Collection (inv. no.2/1996; see also Replica Shoes ’s, London 9 October 1995, lot 96). The decoration, however, relates to the contemporaneous metalwork tradition of Khurasan. The openwork mounts can be compared with a pen box in the David Collection (inv. no.11/1982) and another in the L.A. Mayer Museum for Islamic Art, Jerusalem (Baer 1983, p.70, no.50). The David Collection example further shares a comparable decorative scheme of scrolls and registers of animals in chase.
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