Artwork Page for The merchant has the hateful skull ground and put into a box, from a Tuti-nama (Tales of a Parrot): Twenty-third Night

Details / Information for The merchant has the hateful skull ground and put into a box, from a Tuti-nama (Tales of a Parrot): Twenty-third Night

The merchant has the hateful skull ground and put into a box, from a Tuti-nama (Tales of a Parrot): Twenty-third Night

c. 1560

Mughal India, court of Akbar

(reigned 1556–1605)
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Medium
gum tempera, ink, and gold on paper
Measurements
Overall: 20.3 x 14 cm (8 x 5 1/2 in.); Painting only: 10.5 x 10.2 cm (4 1/8 x 4 in.)
Credit Line
Gift of Mrs. A. Dean Perry 1962.279.161.a
Public Domain
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Location
Not on view
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Did You Know?

This story takes place in Tabriz, capital of Iran’s Safavid Empire from 1501 to 1555.

Description

A small, yellow box rests on the ground in the center foreground of the image. Inside are the remains of a skull inscribed with a warning that it had caused the death of eighty men and would cause the death of eighty more. The merchant, on the left, had the skull destroyed, unaware that his actions could not circumvent fate.
A vertically oriented gum tempera painting features five lines of Persian script in the upper third. Below, four people with light and medium skin tones meet in a room. A man in an orange robe gestures toward two seated women. Behind him, an attendant holds a fly-whisk and sword. Thin pillars and red patterned walls surround the figures, while a small box sits on the blue patterned carpet below.

The merchant has the hateful skull ground and put into a box, from a Tuti-nama (Tales of a Parrot): Twenty-third Night

c. 1560

Mughal India, court of Akbar (reigned 1556–1605)

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