Base of an Incense Burner

• Accession Number:AKM961
• Place:Northern Iraq or Syria, possibly Mosul
• Dimensions:12.8 x 12 cm
• Date:ca. 1275-1325
• Materials and Technique:brass; cast, engraved, and inlaid with silver, gold

• This three-legged base once belonged to an incense burner.[1] Both stylistically and technically, it relates to the tradition of inlaid metalworking that developed in the Jazira, Syria and Egypt during the 13th-14th centuries,[2] when lavishly inlaid objects were a prominent feature in courtly and elite households. The function of such burners is eloquently captured in an inscription found on a similar burner in the British Museum: “Within me is hellfire but without float the perfumes of Paradise.”[3]  Fragrant incense—rare and acquired through trade—would have been placed in the shallow saucers within the base. Smoke produced from burning incense would have passed through a now lost cover, probably domed and topped with an ornamental knob or finial. A horizontal handle, also lost, would have enabled the burner to be easily moved to diffuse the fragrance and purify the surroundings.[4] The inscription on the burner’s base, al-'izz (wa) al-d /a'im wa al-i /q[bal (?)].../wa al-jud wa a / l-majd wa al-i /fdal wa a; (Perpetual glory and Prosperity (?) ... and Generosity and Splendor and Excellence), may have had a talismanic function, offering protection to its owner. [5]

Further Reading

The distinctive inlaid metalwork on this base is associated with the al-Mawsili (from Mosul) school. Such craftsmanship was established in the city of Mosul (Northern Iraq) in the first half of the 13th century and spread in the following 50–100 years to areas extending from Syria to Egypt, and from Anatolia to Yemen, through the migration of craftsmen and trade, as well as through the exchange of gifts. The striking interlace design on alternating medallions is a hallmark of the school and was established in Mosul in the second quarter of the 13th century.[6]  The braid bands—one running along the lower edge of the body interrupted by the three feet, another decorating the interior of the upper rim and framing the radiant medallion composition decorating the shallow saucer—are known from objects of this group. An early example is the Ibn al-Hajji Jaldak ewer, dated 623H./1226, in the Metropolitan Museum of Art; another example is the circular domed incense burner from the British Museum, dated 641H./1243-44.[7]

The gold used to mark polychrome accents (seen here in the benedictory inscriptions and in the small rectangular elements holding together the scrolling vegetal branches of the three small and large medallions) suggest a slightly later date, probably after 1250. Though they appear in luxury objects as early as the 1240s, such inlaid highlights in gold became common only after the mid-13th century.[8] Both the star-like fretwork and the medallions with three pairs of birds that curve and interlace to form an animated arabesque pattern connect this work to objects attributed to the Ilkhanids (1256­–1353) and Mamluks (1250–1517) periods.[9]

— Deniz Beyazit

Notes
[1] This base of an incense burner was first published in the Sotheby’s catalog Arts of the Islamic World, April 25, 2012, lot 539.
[2] For a discussion of the place of inlaid metal objects in courtly households, see Beyazit, in Canby, Beyazit, and Rugiadi, 2016, pp. 155-156.
[3] For a discussion of the “speaking” inscription on a similar burner in the British Museum (“Within me is hellfire but without float the perfumes of Paradise”), see Ward, 1990-91, 67–82.
[4] Further indications of a horizontal handle are a small hole below the recessed rim, and traces of damaged inlaid decoration. According the catalog entry from Sotheby’s, the handle would have been attached, where the cartouches are partly left blank. However, the blank large medallion next to these adjacent ends of the two cartouches, suggests that this circular object might not have been finished.
[5] This base belongs to the “Syrian or Jaziran type” of incense burner that was common in the near east of the 13th-14th centuries. See Allan, 1986, 28, fig. 20. A comparable example is in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (ca. 1300, 17.190.1716); see also several examples without a handle in the British Museum (Ward, 1993, fig. 61). On this type of circular domed incense burner, see also Ağa-Oğlu, 1945, 28–45; Ward, 1990–91, 67–82, and Ward, 2014, 138–141, cat. 22–23.
[6] For a discussion of design hallmarks of the Mosul school, see Raby, 2012, 11–85; Ward, 1990, 71–94; Ward, 2014, cat. 21, 136; Beyazit, in Canby, Beyazit, and Rugiadi, 2016, 75, 155.
[7] For a discussion of the the Ibn al-Hajji Jaldak ewer, dated 623H./1226, in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the circular domed incense burner from the British Museum, dated 641H./1243-44, see al-Harithy, 2001, 355–68, on Ibn al-Hajji Jaldak, (Met #91.1.586); Ward, 2014, 138-141, cat. 22. See also the later Il-Khanid example from the David Collection, Copenhagen (Ward, 2014, cat. 23).
[8] The ewer in the Walters Art Museum, dated 644H./1246-47, figures among the earliest datable examples with inlaid highlights in gold. See Beyazit, in Canby, Beyazit, and Rugiadi, 2016, 138, cat. 68.
[9] The medallions with three pairs of birds that curve and interlace to form an animated arabesque pattern, together with the star-like fretwork, relate this work with objects attributed to the Il-Khanid period. See the ewer made by ‘Ali ibn ‘Abdallah al-‘Alawi al-Mawsili, probably Mosul, ca. 1275-1300 (Berlin, Museum für Islamische Kunst, Julian Raby in Ward, 2014, 61, fig. 35, 65, fig. 39, cat. 24); the candlestick made in 1317–18, by ‘Ali ibn ‘Umar al-Mawsili, (Athens, Benaki Museum, ibid, p. 61, fig. 34); The Nisan Tası, dated 1327–34, probably Mosul (Konya, Mevlana Museum, ibid, 58, fig. 31, 65, fig. 40. See the penbox, probably from Mosul from the Louvre Museum, Paris (Ward, 2014, 72, fig. 43. For a Mamluk example, see the sides of a mid-14th century penbox in the BnF de France (Beyazit in Boehm and Holcomb, 2016, 97, cat 40).

References
Sotheby’s catalog Arts of the Islamic World, April 25, 2012, lot 539. http://www.sothebys.com/en/auctions/ecatalogue/lot.539.html/2012/arts-of-the-islamic-world
Ağa-Oğlu, Mehmet, “About a type of Islamic incense burner,” The Art Bulletin 27, 1945, 28-45. DOI: 10.2307/3046978
Al-Harithy, Howayda, “The Ewer of Ibn Jaldak (623/1226) at the Metropolitan Museum of Art: The Inquiry into the Origin of the Mawṣilī School of Metalwork Revisited,” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, Vol. 64, No. 3 (2001), 355–68.
Allan, James, Metalwork of the Islamic World – The Aron Collection, London: Sotheby’s, 1986. ISBN: 978-0856673276
Boehm, Barbara, and Melanice Holcomb, Jerusalem 1000-1400: Every People under Heaven, New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2016. ISBN: 9781588395986
Canby, Sheila, Beyazit, Deniz, and Martina Rugiadi, Court and Cosmos: The Great Age of the Seljuqs, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2016. ISBN: 9781588395894
Gyselen, Rika (ed.), Parfums d’Orient, (Res Orientalis 11), Peeters, 1998. ISBN: 9782950826657
Meyer, Joachim, Sensual Delights: Incense Burners and Rosewater Sprinklers from the World of Islam, Copenhagen: The David Collection, 2015. ISBN: 978878846484
Newid, Mehr Ali, Aromata in der iranischen Kultur: Unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der persischen Dichtung, Wiesbaden: Reichert Verlag, 2010. ISBN: 9783895006807
Raby, Julian, “The Principle of Parsimony and the Problem of the ‘Mosul School of Metalwork,’ in Metalwork and Material Culture in the Islamic World: Art, Craft and Text, edited by Venetia Porter and Mariam Rosser-Owen, London: I.B. Tauris & Co, Ltd, 11–85. ISBN: 9780857721884
Ward, Rachel, “Incense and Incense Burners in Mamluk Egypt and Syria,” Transactions of the Oriental Ceramic Society, 1990–1991, 67–82. ISBN: 9780856673696
Ward, Rachel, Islamic Metalwork, London: British Museum Press, 1993. ISBN: 9780714114583
Ward, Rachel (ed.), Court and Craft: A Masterpiece from Northern Iraq, London: The Courtauld Gallery, 2014. ISBN: 9781907372650