AN INDIAN EMBROIDERED HERALDIC PANEL
Northern India, dated August - September 1890

A panel of burgundy silk velvet, heavily worked in a variety of stitches in gold and silver threads wound around silk cores, and spangles, with a rampant regardant lion and unicorn flanking a fleur de lys, each holding a flag, above an oval cartouche embroidered with an invocation to God as the opener (Ya Fattah), the name Ali Said bin Sultan, dated Muharram 1308, atop a flowering urn, all within a millefleur ground, the borders with sinuous scrolling flowers, laid on matching silk, backed, stretched and mounted, in fitted Plexiglas frame, 77cm x 123cm.