The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of July 7, 2022

Fragment from a funeral garment or pall

1649-1955 (radiocarbon date, 95% probability)

Iran ?, in the style of the Buyid period

(945–1055)

Silk: lampas weave

Overall: 21 x 23.5 cm (8 1/4 x 9 1/4 in.)

Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund 1968.227

Location

not on view

Description

An incomplete pearl-bordered roundel frames a diamond containing a pair of confronting peacocks that flank a Tree of Life and stand on a pair of confronting lions or dogs. Interspaces between diamond and border contain a pair of griffins (above) and a floral/vine motif (below). Winged bodies of confronting goats(?) stand on top of roundel and at right is an ornate palmette supported by a griffin. Tangential to the roundel at the upper right is a smaller pearl-framed medallion containing a circular Kufic inscription around a diaper-patterned center.

Inscriptions

Inscription

'izz wa-iqbal lil-sahib Abi Sa'id Yahya bin Ziyad

Inscription Translation

Glory and prosperity to the master Abu Sa'id Yahyá bin Ziyad.

Inscription Remark

This circular Kufic inscription is around the diaper-patterned center of a smaller pearl-framed medallion.

Provenance
?-1968
(Nassiri Amini, Tehrān, Iran, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art)
1968-
The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
Citations
Lee, Sherman E. “The Year in Review for 1968.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art, vol. 56, no. 1, 1969, pp. 3–50. Mentioned: p. 48, no. 124 www.jstor.org
“Annual Report for 1968.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art, vol. 56, no. 6, 1969, pp. 209–248. Mentioned: p. 225 www.jstor.org
Blair, Sheila S., Jonathan M. Bloom, and Anne E. Wardwell. "Reevaluating the Date of the "Buyid" Silks by Epigraphic and Radiocarbon Analysis." Ars Orientalis 22 (1992): 1-41. Reproduced: p. 37; Mentioned: p. 15 www.jstor.org
Mackie, Louise W. Symbols of Power: Luxury Textiles from Islamic Lands, 7th-21st Century. Cleveland; New Haven: Cleveland Museum of Art; Yale University Press, 2015. Reproduced: P.155, fig. 4g; Mentioned: P. 154-155
Exhibition history

Year in Review: 1968. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (January 29-March 9, 1969).

Source URL: https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1968.227