The later period

The Blue Mosque, the Ardabil Carpet, and the Taj Mahal all date to this important period.

c. 1517 - 1924 C.E.

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Lacquer pen-case, signed by the artist Ashraf ibn Riza

This luxury pen-case is made from papier mâché with lacquer painting, a tradition inspired by Chinese lacquer.

Groom and Rider drawing

The precision of the line and the attention to texture allow this drawing to stand on its own as a finished work.

The Damascus Room at The Metropolitan Museum of Art

The luxurious space of the Damascus Room was ikely for an affluent family to host visitors. The opulent décor and poetic inscriptions were designed to make the space feel like a retreat from the bustling commercial center. Explore the masterpiece with Max Hollein, Marina Kellen French Director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

Mausoleum of Khoja Ahmed Yasawi

In this partly unfinished building, Persian master builders experimented with architectural and structural solutions later used in the construction of Samarkand, the capital of the Timurid Empire.

Looking at Persian painting

Explore the rich effects of a painting from an illustrated manuscript of the Shahnameh — or ‘Book of Kings’ — the national epic of Iran composed by poet Firdawsi around 1010.

Wine bearers in landscape, a Safavid textile

Safavid nobles wrapped themselves in poetries of love, wine, and youth

Riza-yi ‘Abbasi, portrait of a young page reading

The anonymous figure depicted in this painting embodies the fashion of Isfahan, Iran’s capital city under the rule of Shah 'Abbas I

Mir Afzal of Tun, a reclining woman and her lapdog

The single page format of this painting shows the trend among seventeenth-century art patrons to collect particularly fine examples of drawing, painting or calligraphy on single pages