Preface (verso) from a double-page frontispiece of a Shahnama of Firdausi (940-1019 or 1025) (c. 1444): Art, History and Details

Preface (verso) from a double-page frontispiece of a Shahnama of Firdausi (940-1019 or 1025) (c. 1444) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

This text page is the first page of a Shahnama manuscript with an illuminated heading containing the basmala ("In the name of Allah, etc.") followed by the text of the preface to the Shahnama.

Object facts

• Title: Preface (verso) from a double-page frontispiece of a Shahnama of Firdausi (940-1019 or 1025)
• Date: c. 1444
• Culture: Iran, Shiraz, Timurid period (1370-1501)
• Type: Manuscript
• Technique: opaque watercolor, ink, and gold on paper
• Dimensions: Overall: 32.7 x 22 cm (12 7/8 x 8 11/16 in.)
• Collection: Islamic Art
• Department: Islamic Art
• Accession number: 1956.10.b

Collection credit

John L. Severance Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• The Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art Handbook. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1958.
• Neils, Jenifer. “The Twain Shall Meet.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art, vol. 72, no. 6, 1985, pp. 326–359.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.