A Portrait of a man in Ottoman dress holding a book, Mughal, India, 1610

opaque watercolour heightened with gold on paper, inscribed on the attached sheet on the reverse with notes in Persian and Mughal seal impressions from the Shah Jahan and 'Alamgir periods, together with notes added in devanagari when this painting entered the Mewar Royal Library, accompanied by the Mewar library stamp and the Mewar royal inventory number 20/220

ex-Mewar Royal Library (inv. no.20/220)

overall good condition, as viewed
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inscriptions

Mughal library notes and seal impressions:

The grading is given as 'First' and there is one valuation written in raqam possibly 26 [rupees]

The portrait is identified as: 'Portrait of a man holding a book'

It was given as a gift by a certain Baha' al-Din on 6 Ordibehesht, [regnal] year 5 (26 April 1610).

During Jahangir's period, it was inspected in the regnal years 15, 19, 20 and 21 with no seal impressions.

A note: 'It was entrusted to Muhammad Sharif from the effects of Sultan Parviz on 19 Amordad first regnal year (10 August 1628) with the seal impressions of 'Abd al-Haq Shirazi, later title Amanat Khan, the scribe of the inscriptions of Taj Mahal. Other seal impressions of Shah Jahan period are those of 'Inayat Khan, I'timad Khan both superintendents of the Royal Library and Ahmad Shahid. Sultan Parviz was a son of Jahangir (d. 1626).

It was inspected in regnal years of 24 and 30 of 'Alamgir with one seal impression, that of Sayyid 'Ali the superintendent of the Royal Library. 

There is one crudely written note dated to 12 regnal year and it could belong to any of the emperors who ruled more than 12 years from 'Alamgir on.

This exquisite portrait of an Ottoman gentleman reading a book by a Mughal artist was evidently based on a European engraving in the modelling of the face and figure.  The bearded figure wears a large white turban, the red velvet pommel with the gold impression of a winged angel, and a rich green velvet robe with a red collar over a saffron jacket with delicate lavender flowers as seen in his sleeves.  He holds a staff and leather bound volume in his hands and facing right, lifts his eyes upwards as if contemplating its contents.  His furrowed brow shows deep concentration and his thick wispy beard trails over the edge of the book.  His fingers are beautifully drawn.  The play of light on the folds of the drapery and the modelling of the face with shadowing to the eye sockets and around the nose, demonstrate the mastery by the Mughal artist of European techniques to create volume and depth.  At the same time the jewel-like details such as the eyelashes are part of the Mughal legacy.  The deep rich colours suggest that European oil paintings have been seen and studied, and are here consciously evoked. 

This painting recalls the celebrated painting of a "Seated Scribe" now in the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston (inv.no.P15EB).   Dating to circa 1479 and depicting a scribe at the court of the Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II, this watercolour has been attributed to either the great Venetian master Gentile Bellini (circa 1429-1507) who made an official visit to the Ottoman court in the late 1470s, or Constanzo de Ferrara (circa 1450 to after 1524), another Italian painter who went to Turkey in the same decade.  

This painting was then adapted by a Muslim artist, traditionally attributed to the Herat master Bihzad after the Bellini original, now in the Al-Sabah Collection, Kuwait, demonstrating the compelling hold on artists of East and West as they observed and depicted the exotic "other", learning, copying then modifying techniques in fruitful exchange and finally the dissemination through European prints and engravings, and Ottoman, Safavid and Mughal watercolour studies and variations. 

Portraits of Ottoman Turks in Mughal painting are rare, most being of the Ottoman sultans: F.R.Martin, The Miniature Painting and Painters of Persia, India and Turkey, London, 1912, vol.II, pl.215; R.Ettinghausen, Paintings of Sultans and Emperors of India, Delhi, 1961, pl.14; T.Falk and M.Archer, Indian miniatures in the India Office Library, London, 1981, no.49. Refer also to the Mughal portrait of the Turkish Ambassador to the court of Shah Jahan, sold in these rooms, 23 October 1992, lot 503.

The present painting therefore has illustrious antecedents and its bust portrait format may have derived from that hitherto reserved for Ottoman Sultans, such as the equally celebrated Bellini portrait in oil of Sultan Mehmed, now at the National Gallery in London.  In the Topkapi Library are related portraits of Sultan Mehmet by Constanzo de Ferarra and by the Turkish court artist, Naqqash Sinan Bey.  The present Mughal watercolour, which subsequently entered the collection of the Royal Mewar Library, demonstrates the undiminished fascination that the various courts held for each other. 

The Bellini scribe and related paintings are illustrated and discussed in Barry, M., Figurative Art in Medieval Islam and the riddle of Bihzad, Paris, 2004, pp.28-29, 40-41.