More About the Works on View
Considered the greatest Persian-language poet of the Indian subcontinent, Amir Khusrau often described his poems as "pearls" spilling from his lips and—invoking the bird that symbolized eloquence in the Indo-Persian tradition—referred to himself as the "Parrot of India." More than two centuries later, in 1597–98, a sumptuously illustrated copy of Amir Khusrau's Khamsa was created for the famed library of the Mughal emperor Akbar. This manuscript, one of the most magnificent of India's early Mughal period, features illustrations of astounding virtuosity and superb calligraphy. Twenty-nine surviving full-page illustrations from the manuscript are now in the collections of the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore (which owns twenty-one paintings and the text within the manuscript's lacquer binding) and The Metropolitan Museum of Art (which owns eight illustrated folios). The temporary removal of the leaves from their binding for conservation presents a rare opportunity to unite and display the folios belonging to the two institutions.

"The showing of this spectacular Islamic manuscript in galleries that are usually reserved for the presentation of Asian art allows us to present an extremely important loan from our colleagues at the Walters Art Museum—and to share some of our own major holdings—while our galleries for Islamic art are under renovation," stated Philippe de Montebello. "Due to the encyclopedic nature of our collections, this placement will enable viewers to draw their own cross-cultural connections between Indian art of other centuries to art from the time of the Mughals."

Among the tales of the Khamsa are a story about Alexander the Great, a religious text, a metaphorical text, and two allegorical love stories that end tragically. The manuscript features illustrations and calligraphy executed by some of the most important artists in the service of Akbar, and the beautifully detailed illustrations by artists such as Basavan and Manohar tell us as much about everyday life in sixteenth-century India as they do the stories of the text. The writing in the graceful nasta'liq style is by the famed calligrapher Muhammad Husain al-Kashmiri, who was known as zarrin qalam (or Golden Pen) for his highly admired skills.

Amir Khusrau's Khamsa combines history and legend with mysticism and morality, providing much lively material for illustration. A folio from the famous love story of Khusrau and Shirin painted by the artist Sanval shows Shirin taking a ride with her maids and meeting the sculptor Farhad, who had just finished cutting a channel through the mountains to bring milk from his flocks to her court (Walters Art Museum). Another folio, painted by Manohar, from the Hasht Bihisht (Eight Paradises)—illustrating the story of the princess of the Blue Pavilion—depicts a youth in a pavilion in a tranquil garden, under a starry sky, being entertained by a fairy and her maidens (The Metropolitan Museum of Art).

In addition to the illustrated pages, the exhibition will include several folios featuring illumination, such as ornamented chapter headings and richly painted borders.

The Metropolitan Museum's Khamsa folios were part of a generous early gift to the Department of Islamic Art by the collector Alexander Smith Cochran, in 1913.

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