برگ خوشنویسی به خط عماد الحسنی

Quatrain of Kamal al-Din Isma'il

Quatrain of Kamal al-Din Isma'il (d. 634/1237), written by calligrapher 'Imad al-Hasani active in Safavid Persia and Mughal India. An zulf nagar bar rukh-i an shuhra sanam / Avikhta bi jang u khusumat dar ham / Va an abru bin basan-i gushti giran / Sar suya sar avarda u qadha zada kham Dimensions of Written Surface: 9.8 (w) x 19.4 (h) cm Look at that strand of hair and the face of that famous idol / It (the hair) is knotted up without a battle or adversary / Look at those eyebrows, which like wrestlers / Go head to head and arch their backs. Many works in international collections are signed by him (inter alia, Safwat 1996, cat. nos. 53 and 62; and Lowry and Beach 1988: no. 456), although whether all these pieces are by his hand remains uncertain. Other calligraphies bearing his name in the collections of the Library of Congress include: 1-84-154.3, 1-84-154.43, 1-85-154.72, 1-85-154.77, 1-90-154.162, and 1-99-106.13 R. The calligrapher has signed his work diagonally below the last verse, with the expression "katabahu al-'abd al-mudhnib 'Imad al-Hasani" (written by the humble servant, 'Imad al-Hasani). In the triangular panel below his signature and above the third line of poetry, 'Imad al-Hasani asks for God's mercy and forgiveness for his sins. Mir 'Imad (d. 1615) was born in 1552, spent time in Herat and Qazvin, and finally settled in Isfahan (then capital of Safavid Persia), where, as a result of his implication in court intrigues, he was murdered in 1615. He was a master of nasta'liq script, whose works were admired and copied by his contemporaries, and later collected by the Mughals (Welch et al 1987: 32-36). These verses describe the loved one's hair and eyes. The woman's hair is perfectly disheveled and her curved eyebrows meet in the center of her forehead, in the shape of wrestlers hunched over and ready for combat. This calligraphic fragment includes an iambic pentameter quatrain, or ruba'i, written by the famous mystical ('irfani) poet Shaykh Kamal al-Din Isma'il al-Isfahani (d. 634/1237). The author's name appears in the upper right illuminated corner (or thumbpiece) of the text panel. The four lines of verses are written in black nasta'liq in diagonal, framed by cloud bands, and placed on a gold background. The verses read: Script: nasta'liq 1-87-154.160

Provided by the Library of Congress