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The interplay of art, literature, and religion in Ṣafavid symbolism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 March 2011

Schuyler Cammann
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Extract

The Persian literati have always delighted in poetic symbols and metaphors, and subtle plays on words. Therefore we should not be surprised to find that, during a brief period in the first part of the Ṣafavid dynasty when it was possible to use pictures in patterns and designs, these pictures often held symbolic connotations, conveyed through visual puns. Moreover, it seems that the second meaning carried in these puns usually involved a religious message, relating to the spiritual tradition of those Muslim mystics known as Ṣūfīs, who had great influence at court during that same short period. This clever use of pictures to convey ideas was apparently soon forgotten, after the practice was abandoned. But it comes to light again when we undertake to analyse certain early Ṣafavid designs – especially the patterns on various carpets from that period, known to have been woven between approximately 1520 and 1620 of our era.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society , Volume 110 , Issue 2 , April 1978 , pp. 124 - 136
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 1978

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References

1 The carpets to be discussed are mostly illustrated in The survey of Persian art, ed. Pope, A. U., London and New York, 1939;Google Scholar in Beattie, M. H., The Thyssen-Bornemisza collection of Oriental rugs, Castagnola, Lugano, 1972;Google Scholar and in Dimand, M. S., Oriental rugs in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 1973.Google Scholar For some preliminary discussions regarding analysis of rug patterns and their symbolism, see Cammann, S. V. R., “Symbolic meanings in Oriental rug patterns”, The Textile Museum Journal, III, 3, 1972, 5–54,Google Scholar and idem, “Cosmic symbolism on carpets from the Sanguszko group”, in Studies in art and literature of the Near East, in honor of Richard Ettinghausen, ed. Chelkowski, P., New York, 1974, 181–208.Google Scholar

2 The Ardabīl carpet in London is pictured in the Survey of Persian art, VI, Pl. 1134.Google Scholar For the background of this carpet, and its much damaged mate in the Los Angeles County Art Museum, see Erdmann, K., Seven hundred years of Oriental carpets, tr. Beattie, M. H. and Herzog, H., Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1970, 29–32,Google Scholar and Sylvester, David, “On Western attitudes to eastern carpets”, in the Art Council's catalogue, Islamic carpets from the collection of Joseph V. McMullen, London, 1972, 9–10.Google Scholar

3 It seems quite difficult for most Westerners to comprehend the Oriental idea of an ongoing (hence incomplete) background pattern, running out under the border, and overlaid by medallions and other ornaments in superimposed layers; but this is a necessary first step for any understanding of Persian, Mughal, or Turkish rug patterns. See Cammann, , “Symbolic meanings”, 8et passim.Google Scholar

4 The high content of Arabic words in the symbol system we are considering reflects in part the fact that the Arabs, after conquering Persia in the 7th century A.D., introduced a high percentage of Arabic words into the Indo-Aryan language of Persia; but, more especially, since Arabic is the international religious language of Islam and its holy book, the Qur'ān, it also formed the basis for the vocabulary of the Ṣūfī tradition. See also Nasr, Seyyid Hossein, ”Religion in Safavid Persia”, in Iranian Studies, VII, 1 and 2, 1974, 274, regarding the strong influence of Arab scholars in Persia at that time.Google Scholar

5 The concept of the Sun Gate has been illustrated in dome patterns – and even by actual holes in domes – for many centuries, both in Iran and Turkey. For typical Ṣafavid examples, with designs recalling the centre of the Ardabīl carpet, see Pope, A. U., Persian architecture, New York, 1965, Pls. XXV and XXVI.Google Scholar For a Turkish example from the same period (built in 1543), in which the four outer “sun gates” are also indicated by smaller corner domes with symbolic “openings” in their ceilings, see Vogt-Göknil, Ulya, Living architecture: Ottoman, New York, 1966, Pl. 82.Google Scholar

6 The Qur'ān, LXXII, 14–15, says that God created the seven heavens, placing in them the moon for a light and the sun for a lamp. Accordingly, the moon is represented on the Ardabīl carpet pattern by a smaller light, and the sun by a large lamp.Google Scholar

7 Note that the four lesser gates are called “sun gates”, with small initials in contrast to the great central Sun Gate. These four “entrances to Heaven” were represented by actual gates in the original plan for Baghdād, as a universe in microcosm. See Wendell, C., “Baghdad: Imago Mundi”, International Journal of Middle East Studies, II, 1971, 99, 116;CrossRefGoogle Scholar and Ardalan, and Bakhtiar, , The sense of unity: the Sufi tradition in Persian architecture, Chicago and London, 1973, 88, and also pp. 71, 73.Google Scholar

8 The inscription on the Ardabīl carpet in London is pictured in Erdmann, , op. cit., Fig. 18.Google Scholar The original couplet can be found in Pazhmān, Ḥusayn, Dīwān-i Ḥāfiẓ Shīrāzī, Tehrān, 1921/1922, Ode 48, p. 24, first two lines.Google Scholar

9 The “Victoria and Albert Sanguszko carpet” is illustrated in the Survey of Persian Art, VI, Pl. 1208.Google Scholar

10 Prince Sanguszko's famous carpet is shown in ibid., Pl. 1206. For a detailed description of its pattern, see Cammann, , “Cosmic symbolism”, especially pp. 183–97.Google Scholar

11 The concept of “Dark Light” or “Divine Darkness”, associated with Highest Heaven, is well known to Western mystics as well as to the Ṣūfīs. See Underhill, E., Mysticism, 2nd. ed., New York, n.d. [1931], 347–8.Google Scholar

12 Peacocks – or, more especially, peacock-like birds rendered in gold – were considered as “birds of Paradise” (to be distinguished from the bird of Paradise, whose feathers were so valued in the Orient for turban-aigrettes). Their association with Heaven even enabled them to be represented in the precincts of mosques. Examples are cited in the Survey of Persian art, III, 2348Google Scholar n. 1. For an illustration of this from a Ṣafavid mosque in IṢfahān (Masjid-i Shāh), see S., and Seherr-Thoss, H., Design and color in Islamic architecture, Washington, D.C., 1968, Pl. 81.Google Scholar

13 The word gawr can also mean “graveyard”, but I have never seen an example of the onager being used to suggest this other connotation. The Ṣafavid artists were apparently very selective, and seem to have utilized only those words and double meanings that could convey specific messages from the Ṣūfī tradition.

14 For an illustration of this interesting textile, see Islamic art, ed. Pal, Pratapaditya, Los Angeles, 1973, item No. 474.Google Scholar This is stated to be recent; but the subject indicates that it must have been embroidered at a time when pun symbols were still in favour – hence probably some time before about 1620.

15 See Clarke, H. W., Dīvān-i Ḥāfīẓ, Calcutta, 1891, xxxix–xliv.Google Scholar

16 See Pazhmān, , op. cit, Ode 245, 72, p. 109, and Ode 362, 3b, p. 126.Google Scholar

17 For the traditional Chinese attitudes toward the fêng-huang and the ch'i-lin, see Cammann, S., “Types of symbols in Chinese art”, in Studies in Chinese thought, ed. Wright, A., Chicago, 1953, 208 and 211.Google Scholar See also “Cosmic symbolism”, 187–8.Google Scholar

18 The ”Béhague Sanguszko carpet” in the Thyssen-Bornemisza collection has in its border the motif of a Chinese phoenix attacking a ch'i-lin, and the field of this carpet displays several examples of a ch'i-lin being bitten by a red, Chinese-style lion. See Beattie, , op. cit., Pl. II. The field pattern on the “V. & A. Sanguszko carpet” also has this last motif, along with that of the onager being destroyed by a black tiger. See reference in n. 9 above.Google Scholar

19 References to the performance of the are often given in the poems of Ḥāfiẓ, Rūmī, and others; cf. Pazhmān, , Ode 242, p. 107, and Ode 247, p. 109.Google Scholar A detailed description of the is given by Clarke, H. W. in an extended note, op. cit., pp. 329–31.Google Scholar

20 The Béhague Sanguszko carpet and the V. & A. Sanguszko carpet both have, on their inner guard-straipes, the peony alternating with the stock flower, though the latter is depicted as overly large.

21 For “The Dark Night of the Soul”, see Underhill, , Mysticism, Ch. ix, pp. 380–412.Google Scholar

22 An elaborate rendering of this lattice or terrace is shown at the centre of the famous “Anhalt carpet” in the Metropolitan Museum. See Dimand, , op. cit., Fig. 69, p. 137.Google Scholar

23 The duck must have enjoyed an especially high status as a spiritual symbol in Ṣafavid times, because its representation was apparently permitted in the precincts of mosques along with the peacock. See Pope, , Persian architecture, Fig. 212, p. 162.Google Scholar

24 The motif of fish eating ducks is shown in the central medallion on the “Madrid Sanguszko carpet” in the Instituto de Valencia de Don Juan, Madrid, pictured in the Survey of Persian art, VI, Pl. 1207.Google Scholar This motif was also used in the borders of two related carpets; see ibid., Pl. 1204, A and B. In each case, the predatory fish has the shape of a pike, except for an excess number of dorsal fins which may only have been rendered in this way for an aesthetic effect.

25 See Erdmann, , op. cit., Fig. 220, p. 176.Google Scholar

26 For some Qur'ānic references to nār, meaning “Hell's fire”, see the Qur'ān, LIX, 16 and 19, and XL, 42.Google Scholar

27 See Seherr-Thoss, , op. cit., Pl. 93, p. 206.Google Scholar

28 See Nasr, , ”Religion in Safavid Persia”, 279–80.Google Scholar

29 “Herātī pattern” field designs are common on rugs from Joshaghān, Ferāghān, and many other districts of modern Iran. For an example, see Bennett, Ian, Oriental carpets and rugs, London and New York, 1972, 62.Google Scholar

30 Examples of Ming puns used at court are given in Cammann, S., “Ming festival symbols”, Archives of the Chinese Art Society of America, VI, 1953, 66–70.Google Scholar Chinese pun symbols or rebuses, in general, are discussed in Cammann, S., “Types of symbols in Chinese art”, 223–7,Google Scholar while those at the folk level, in popular tradition, are treated more fully in Cammann, , Substance and symbol in Chinese toggles, Philadelphia, 1962, ch. ix-xi, pp. 105–142.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

31 See the references in n. 30.

32 This is why one cannot expect to find many literary references to that ultimate aperture, the Sun Gate; knowledge of it was simply taken for granted. Another reference to it, in addition to those oblique ones in the writings of the poets, is included in the inscription around the base of the dome in the Masjid-i Du Dar, in Meshhed. There, the aperture leading to the Divine Throne is called darcha, “little door”, a term that recalls the strait gate of Christian tradition.