Bustan,

fine safavid manuscript

Abu-Muhammad Muslih al-Din bin Abdallah Shirazi, (1210-1291), better known as Sa'di Shirazi, was a major Persian poet and prose writer of the medieval period. He studied in Baghdad then returned to his native Shiraz in 1256. He is recognized for the quality of his writings and for the depth of his social and moral thoughts; the Bustan (Fruit Garden) being an ethical-didactic text composed entirely in Masnavi form (rhyming couplets).

The present manuscript is a beautifully presented Safavid example of the text, copied in a very elegant nasta'liq script and with each page splendidly presented with gold-speckled pink paper margins, showcasing the absolute splendour of Persian manuscript production of the mid-17th century.

The binding is likely slightly later, from the eighteenth-century and of Shirazi production. the filigree details are in an excellent state of preservation and it is most comparable to Haldane's item 108 'style of Shiraz 17th/18th century' (Haldane, Islamic Bookbindings, 1983, p.114).

Single volume, illuminated manuscript on polished paper with pink gold-speckled borders, complete, 165 leaves, 250 x 160 mm; double-column, 14 lines elegant scribal black nasta'liq, headings in gold and red, leaves ruled in gold and blue, light blue decorations between the columns often decorated with gilt spiraling vines, illuminated head-piece opening the text, every leaf with decorated pink paper margins speckled in gold, some occasional rubbing else very clean and attractive internal condition, early auction description loosely inserted; housed in eighteenth-century sheepskin over boards, edges ruled in blind, central decoupé motifs to boards with delicate gilt filigree detailing against a pale blue background, a little rubbed.