Gulistan by Sa‘di

To increase the prestige of their libraries, later Safavid, Mughal, and Ottoman connoisseurs collected manuscripts that had been copied in nasta‘liq by master calligraphers. Chief among them were works by Sultan Ali Mashhadi. Not only was he one of the most illustrious calligraphers of his day, but he was also closely associated with the Timurid court, which set the standard for cultural sophistication for later rulers. This copy of the Gulistan (Rose garden), an anthology of poems by the Persian poet Sa‘di (died 1292), is acknowledged as one of the finest manuscripts Sultan Ali Mashhadi ever produced.

The calligrapher’s carefully penned signature appears in the triangular colophon. Later owners and librarians added their names and comments, more or less elegantly, in various styles of nasta‘liq. One somewhat clumsy example is located to the right of the triangle. Written by the Mughal ruler Jahangir (reigned 1605–27), the inscription maintains: “This is one of my earliest books. I read it constantly. Written by Nur al-Din Jahangir, son of King Akbar.”

Gulistan by Sa‘di

Compared to the calligraphy of Mir Ali Tabrizi, the nasta‘liq script of Sultan Ali Mashhadi introduces a different visual rhythm. Words above the baseline, for example, are executed in a steeper pitch. Variations in the width of strokes further emphasize how the master calligrapher controlled and modulated the script in a spacious, even delicate manner. These characteristics, which are evident in this copy completed early in Sultan Ali’s career, become more accentuated in his later works and in his examples of large nasta‘liq script.

Gulistan by Sa‘di

Signed by Sultan Ali Mashhadi (d. 1520) Historic Iran, present-day Afghanistan, Herat, Timurid period, dated 1468 (873 AH) Ink, color, and gold on paper

Album folio  

This elaborate folio presents four calligraphic panels (clockwise from upper left): two unsigned couplets; three couplets copied by Sultan Mahmud; two couplets by Shah Muhammad; and two couplets by Sultan Muhammad Nur. Writing in gold in the triangle above his work, Sultan Muhammad Nur states he penned this example by imitating the style of “Mawlana [our master] Sultan Ali al-Mashhadi.” The unsigned couplets in the upper left corner could well be the work of Sultan Ali Mashhadi. Its carefully modulated line and the visual balance between fluid and disciplined strokes are indeed distinctive of his work. Also, combining Sultan Ali Mashhadi’s calligraphy with examples by three of his outstanding students on a single page underscores the fundamental importance of the master-pupil relationship.

Album folio Signed by Sultan Mahmud, Shah Muhammad, and Sultan Muhammad Nur   Historic Iran, present-day Afghanistan, Herat and Ahmedabad, Safavid period, 16th century   Ink, opaque watercolor, and gold on paper

Folios from a Divan by Sultan Husayn Mirza

Nasta‘liq developed into a perfect vehicle to pen Persian prose and poetry. It was employed to transcribe works in Turkish, but it was seldom used to copy texts in Arabic. These two folios come from a collection of poetry (divan) written by Sultan Husayn, the Timurid ruler of Herat from 1469 to 1506. The poems in this now-dispersed manuscript are composed in Chaghatay, an eastern Turkic dialect.

The four lines of verse (quatrains) were executed in découpé calligraphy (qat‘), a virtuoso technique that was probably developed in the Timurid court workshop at a time when Sultan Ali Mashhadi was active there. Dots, letters, and syllables in light tones have been cut out and pasted onto a darker contrasting background, creating a dazzling effect. No trace of the collage process is visible even on close inspection. This dexterous cut-out work has been attributed to Shaykh Abdallah Haravi, a master of the genre.

Nevertheless, the script here, with its subtle balance between elongated and compressed strokes and the variation in thickness, points to the style of Sultan Ali Mashhadi.

Folios from a Divan by Sultan Husayn Mirza Attributed to Sultan Ali Mashhadi (d. 1520) Historic Iran, present-day Afghanistan, Herat, Timurid period, ca. 1490 Ink, opaque watercolor, and gold on paper

Khusraw u Shirin by Nizami  

This copy of the celebrated romance between Khusraw and Shirin by the author Nizami (died 1209) is the only known work signed by Mir Ali Tabrizi. The colophon (lower right image) not only mentions Tabriz, the capital of the Jalayirid sultanate, as the place where the manuscript was completed, but it also provides the full name of its master calligrapher: Ali ibn Hasan. Al-Sultani, the honorific epithet (laqab) placed after his name, indicates Mir Ali occupied a prominent position in the royal workshop or he worked directly for Sultan Ahmad Jalayir. Mir Ali Tabrizi’s nasta‘liq handwriting exemplifies the script used between 1370 and 1410 in the Jalayirid centers of Tabriz and Baghdad. According to later authors, he was not the “inventor” (mukhtari‘) of the script but rather the calligrapher who codified it.

Noticeable here is the first use of oblique lines within a text, a trait that was later widely adopted to underscore specific verses in Persian manuscripts.

Khusraw u Shirin by Nizami Signed by Mir Ali Tabrizi (act. ca. 1370–1410)  Iran, Tabriz, Jalayirid period, ca. 1400  Ink, opaque watercolor, and gold on paper