A LACQUERED PAPIER-MÂCHÉ PEN CASE (QALAMDAN) WITH BAHRAM GUR AND THE SEVEN PRINCESSES
PROPERTY FROM AN IMPORTANT PRIVATE EUROPEAN COLLECTOR
Qajar Iran, late 19th - early 20th century

With rounded ends and sliding tray, lacquered, polychrome-painted and heightened in gold, the horizontally arranged curved top and sides painted with seven scenes of leisure depicting Bahram Gur in the seven pavilions from Nizami’s romance, Haft Peykar, chapter 25, describing Bahram’s winter bazm (private banquet), each cusped cartouche depicting the crowned youth, semi-reclined and dallying with a louche princess in an interior, with food and drink and music, the scenes interspersed with tronies of courtly beauties, against a black ground in-filled with gold scrolling foliage, the sides of the sliding tray and the underside of the case painted in gold with stylised lotus flower scrolls against a red ground, 22.5cm long.