December 31, 1579

Cleveland Art

Art and Calligraphy

Akbar 1556–1605

DESCRIPTION

Bath Pail (satl)
c. 1580-1610

Iran, Isfahan, Safavid period, late 16th-early 17th century
Cast brass, turned, engraved, inlaid with black compound (niello)

Overall: 17 cm (6 11/16 in.); Diameter of base: 11 cm (4 5/16 in.); Diameter of rim: 16.8 cm (6 5/8 in.)

Gift of Rosenberg & Stiebel, Inc. 1969.291

DID YOU KNOW?

Three animal motifs are repeated within the geometric interlacing: a doe with its head turned backward; a water fowl; and a horned animal, possibly an ibex.

DESCRIPTION

This pail was made to carry traditional bathing equipment such as combs and a friction glove to the public bath, or hammam. Intended for the faithful’s purification, the hammam was also a meeting place and a center of social life as well as a popular theme with Iranian poets. The poem in the upper band of this pail employs bath imagery to express the Lover’s longing to see the Beloved. In the lower bands, verses by the celebrated poet Jami (died 1492) liken the sense of well-being induced by a visit to the bath to the elation experienced through ascetic detachment.

INSCRIPTION

Upper band: At the breath of dawn [my Beloved] came from her house toward the Bath,/ A thousand hearts became dust on the road beneath her steps./ From seeing Your face, the bath-house day and night/ [Has] a thousand colored eyes on the door and ceiling./ As soon as my Moon [-faced Beloved] comes into the Bath,/ My eye becomes this bathing cup, and by eyebrow its handle.

INSCRIPTION

Lower band: I remember an old master saying in the Bathhouse:/ One day a young person asked of an old man:/ "What is the secret that makes anyone who sets foot in the bathhouse,/ Find his saddened heart opened up to joy?"/ He said: "The secret is that the bather has nothing of the trappings of this world/ But a bathing-bowl and towel -- and even those belong to others.

INSCRIPTION REMARK

Persian verses about Bathing

PROVENANCE

de Rothschild collection, Paris, France

?-1969
Rosenberg and Stiebel, Inc., New York, NY, given to the Cleveland Museum of Art

1969-
The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH