A QAJAR POLYCHROME-PAINTED ENAMELLED COPPER QALYAN CUP
PROPERTY FROM AN IMPORTANT EUROPEAN PRIVATE COLLECTION
Iran, 19th century

Of typical flaring cylindrical shape, with an everted rim, the exterior painted with polychrome enamels depicting entertainment scenes with Qajar princes in the company of their favourite courtly ladies, some wearing provocative clothes and showing off their cleavage, alternating with gilt rosette roundels and foliage, black nasta'liq calligraphy bands of poetic content with puns with the words huqqa and smoke against a floral ground framing the lower edge of the cup, featuring two of the original four silver chainlets with spiky terminals, one of the portrait medallions signed Mirza Abd Al Rahim (faded), mounted on a wooden stem, 17.5cm high.