1777-1778
Cover and sliding compartment with rounded ends. The top is decorated in horizontal format with a scene that probably represents the battle of Marv in 1510 between the Safavid and Uzbek armies. The sides are decorated with a continuous landscape with herdsmen tending cattle, sheep, goats, and horsemen crossing bridges over rivers. The base is decorated with a gold arabesque on a red background. The sides of the compartment feature panels filled with blossoms on a red ground.
3.7 × 4.1 × 23.5 cm (1 7/16 × 1 5/8 × 9 1/4 in.)
Ezzat-Malek Soudavar, Geneva, Switzerland (by 2014), by descent; to her son Abolala Soudavar, Houston, Texas (2014), gift; to Harvard Art Museums, 2014. Note: Ezzat-Malek Soudavar (1913-2014) formed this collection over a period of sixty years. She purchased the works of art on the international art market.
Red-and-white ware: porcelain with decoration painted in underglaze copper red
18th centuryKoreanDouble-sided carved wooden printing block
18th centuryJapaneseOpaque watercolor, gold-colored pigments, copper particles, and lacquer over brass layer on pasteboard
18th centuryEnameled porcelain: porcelain with decoration painted in overglaze polychrome and gold enamels; with red enamel mark reading "Qianlong nian zhi" in seal-script characters immediately above the bristles; with white hair bristles covered with a silk cap
18th centuryChineseDark green nephrite with black inclusions (so-called spinach-green jade); with dated inscription of the Qianlong Emperor (r. 1736-95) incised around the rim
18th centuryChineseCast bronze
17th-19th centuryKoreanDark green nephrite with black flects and gray veins (so-called spinach-green jade), the stone of Siberian origin, probably from the area around Lake Baikal
18th-19th centuryChineseOpaque watercolor, gold-colored pigments, and lacquer on pasteboard
18th centuryPale greenish white nephrite
18th centuryChineseOpaque watercolor and lacquer over papier-maché
18th-19th centuryPersianPale greenish white nephrite
18th centuryChineseCast bronze
17th-19th centuryKorean