Title: 19th-Century Persian Book Illustration: Portraying the Lovers of The Thousand and One Nights

Abstract: The Thousand and One Nights was illustrated under the supervision of the royal court painter, Sani’ ol-Molk, between 1854 and 1859 in Iran. In this article, I analyze the only image in the manuscript that displays the two main characters of story, Shahrzad and Shahrbaz, in sexual relation. I argue that since an illustration is a dynamic field of meaning production, in analyzing this illustration, the context of production (e.g. social norms) must be considered; this is specifically relevant because the painter and his team adapted, and therefore re-narrated, the stories. In analysis I address three factors: first, the handwriting on the top left corner of the illustrated page and its role in content analysis; second, the divergences between the illustration and the narrative in terms of the timing of the story; third, the absence of Donyazad from the image. These factors reveal the painter’s adaptation techniques and his complex interpretation of the scene. This is not only key to the appreciation of the visual particularities of this manuscript, but also to understanding the Persian art of book illustration.

Keywords: Persian painting, Qajar art, Shahrzad and Shahrbaz, Sani’ ol-Molk, The Thousand and One Nights

Author: Elham Etemadi, Associate Professor, Foreign Studies College, Hunan Normal University, Changsha, Hunan, China.