TWO LACQUERED PAPIER-MÂCHÉ PEN CASES (QALAMDAN) WITH SUFI LITERARY FIGURES
PROPERTY FROM AN IMPORTANT PRIVATE EUROPEAN COLLECTOR
Qajar Iran, 19th century

Each with rounded ends and sliding tray, lacquered, polychrome-painted and heightened in gold, each top and sides decorated with traditional compositions and portraits featuring Sufi sheykhs and pupils, hermits, wise men, teachers, and renowned literary figures, every portrait accompanied by its own identifying inscription in black ink, one qalamdan decorated in black against an amber yellow ground, signed on the top 'Raqam-e Kamtarin Javad', the portraits and figural scenes of Sufi acolytes wearing their traditional tall felt caps including Molavvi, Shams Tabrizi, Sheikh Attar and Sheikh Sa'adi, alternating with floral compositions of rose bushes with plump birds perched on their branches and further floral studies, the underside of this case with an oval cartouche depicting a Western-inspired landscape view with a castle on a mountain top, the sides of the sliding tray with a vine trellis and ripe grape bunches in gold against an amber yellow ground; and the other pen case painted in polychromes with similar subjects, showcasing a great variety of characters from meditating hermits to snake charmers and scholars, all identified by black inscriptions next to them and including Shams Tabrizi, Baba Hassan, Sheikh Sa'adi, Hafez, Ahmad Qutbuddin, Ansari, Mansur Hallaj and many more, the sliding tray and underside with scrolling lotus flower sprays in gold against deep red ground, the longest 24cm.