Lamp

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This mosque lamp was made in Syria between 1342 and 1345. It is made of transparent bubbly glass with trailed-on handles and painted in coloured enamels and gilding with inscriptions, interlacing foliage and floral motifs.

The Arabic inscriptions are in Thuluth script. There is a verse from the Holy Quran (Sura 2 v 256) round the neck and, round the body, the name of Zein al-Din Mubarak, who commissioned the lamp, and of Malik al-Salih, the Egyptian Mamluk Sultan who ruled from 1342 to 1345. The motif of a goblet set on a yellow stripe within a circular medallion is the professional emblem of Zein al-Din Mubarak as a court official.

This type of lamp was very common in Egypt and Syria under the Mamluk ruling dynasty. They were commissioned, probably mainly in Syria, for the mosques of medieval Cairo and Damascus. Donors were mainly the ruling sultans themselves or their senior officials and officers.

Record details

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• Online ID: 000-180-001-231-C
• Image Rights Holder: National Museums Scotland
• Project: National Museums Scotland Part 2
  Project description   View all records in project
• Ref: National Museums Scotland  A.1900.153
• Date: 1342 - 1345 AD
  Between 1342 and 1345
  
• Material: Glass with enamels. Inscription: [Koran book 2 verse 256]; ZAIN AD-DIN MUBARAK; al Malik as-Salih (all in Arabic in Thuluth script)
  Lamp, mosque
  
• Dimensions: 15.00" H x 10.50" D
  
• What: Lamp, mosque
  
• Subject: Glassware
  
• Who: Koran
  Sultan al Malik as-Salih
  Zain ad-Din Mubarak (Commissioning official)
  
• Where: Middle East, Syria
  
• Event:
• Description: Mosque lamp of glass painted in enamels, with Arabic inscriptions in Thuluth script of a verse from the Koran round the neck and two names round the body: Syria, 1342 - 1345 AD
  
• References:
• Translations:
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