Oliver White
Head of Department
Lot 18
A Mamluk silver inlaid brass box base, signed "Ali ibn Husayn ibn Muhammad Al-Mawsili" Egypt, dated AH 674/AD 1275-76
23 April 2013, 10:30 BST
London, New Bond Street£20,000 - £30,000
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A Mamluk silver inlaid brass box base, signed "Ali ibn Husayn ibn Muhammad Al-Mawsili"
Egypt, dated AH 674/AD 1275-76
Egypt, dated AH 674/AD 1275-76
of deep oval form with rounded ends, remains of fittings, decorated with lobed cartouches to either end and each side containing a bird, a band of inscriptions running between, the underneath with central geometric design and inscriptions either side contained within a rope design
11.2 x 5.2 x 4 cm.
11.2 x 5.2 x 4 cm.
Footnotes
Inscriptions: naqasha 'ali ibn husayn / ibn muhammad al-mawsili / bi'l-qahira sana arba'a / wa sab'in wa sittam'ia
"'Ali ibn Husayn ibn Muhammad al-Mawsili decorated it in Cairo the year six-hundred and seventy four/ AH 1275-6"
The rest seem to be two couplets in Arabic which are very difficult to read, starting with inna al-marid 'truly, the patient (the ill/ailing) which may indicate this box may have had a medicinal use.
Between 1275 and 1350 the art of Mamluk metalwork reached its apogee. The majority of Mamluk objects bearing signatures of metalworkers date from this period.
'Ali ibn Husayn Muhammad al-Mawsili was one of a group of artists signing their name al-Mawsili, and whose work may related to the refined metalworking traditions of Mosul. His name is inscribed on three works of imperial quality all made in Cairo: A bronze ewer dated AH 674/ AD 1275-6 made for the Rasulid Sultan Yusuf (Musee des Arts Decoratifs, Paris); a bronze candlestick dated AH 681/AD 1282-83 in the Museum of Islamic Art in Cairo; and a basin dated AH 684/ AD 1285-86 in the Musee du Louvre, Paris(see L.A. Mayer, Islamic Metalworkers and their Works, Geneva, 1959, pp. 34-5).