Walters Ms. W.692, Single leaf from Anvar-i Suhayli by Khashifi

W.692

Single leaf from Anvar-i Suhayli by Khashifi

Vernacular: انوار سهيلى

Authority name: Kāshifī, Ḥusayn Vāʻiẓ, d. 1504 or 5

Supplied name: Ḥusayn ibn ʿAlī Vāʿiẓ Kāshifī

Name, in vernacular: حسين بن على واعظ كاشفى

This illustration is from a Mughal manuscript copy of Anvār-i Suhaylī (The lights of Canopus), a collection of fables by Ḥusayn ibn ʿAlī Vāʿiẓ Kāshifī (d. 910 AH / 1504-5 CE). It dates to the late tenth century AH / sixteenth CE or early eleventh century AH / seventeenth CE. The text narrates the fate of a man who, escaping from a wild camel, jumps into a well. There his predicament grows even more precarious when he lands on the heads of four snakes, grasps in desperation at a bush gnawed by two rats, and looks down to see dragon waiting to devour him should he fall.

Early 11th century AH / 17th CE

India

Leaf

Literary -- Prose

No linguistic content; Not applicable

Paper

Mounted on pasteboard

Foliation: Not applicable

21.0 cm wide by 33.5 cm high

1. Image: 12.4 cm wide x 20.7 cm high

1. Title: Anvār-i Suhaylī
2. Author: Kāshifī, Ḥusayn Vāʻiẓ, d. 1504 or 5
3. Decoration note: Bluish-gray paper with illuminated floral, bird, and animal decoration for the border

fol. W.692a:

1. 
2. Title: A dragon in a well
3. Form: Illustration
4. Label: This illustration is from a Mughal manuscript copy of Anvār-i Suhaylī (The lights of Canopus), dating to the late tenth century AH / sixteenth CE or early eleventh century AH / seventeenth CE. The text narrates the fate of a man who, escaping from a wild camel, jumps into a well. There his predicament grows even more precarious when he lands on the heads of four snakes, grasps in desperation at a bush gnawed by two rats, and looks down to see a dragon waiting to devour him should he fall.

fol. W.692b:

1. 
2. Title: A dragon in a well (back)
3. Form: Back

Walters Art Museum, 1931, by Henry Walters bequest

Grube, Ernst J. A Mirror for Princes from India: Illustrated Versions of the Kalilah wa Dimnah, Anvar-i Suhayli, Iyar-i danish, and Humayun nameh. (Bombay: Marg Publications, 1991), 67.

Principal cataloger: Gacek, Adam

Catalogers: Landau, Amy; Smith, Sita

Editor: Bockrath, Diane

Conservators: Jewell, Stephanie; Quandt, Abigail

Contributors: Barrera, Christina; Emery, Doug; Herbert, Lynley; Noel, William; Simpson, Shreve; Tabritha, Ariel; Toth, Michael B.; Valle, Chiara

The Walters Art Museum

Licensed for use under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported Access Rights, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/legalcode. It is requested that copies of any published articles based on the information in this data set be sent to the curator of manuscripts, The Walters Art Museum, 600 North Charles Street, Baltimore MD 21201.