Object details
Accession number
C27w74
Primary Creator
Syrian
Full title
Fragment of a Mosque Lamp
Creation Date
mid 14th century
Provenance
Possibly purchased by Isabella Stewart Gardner from an unknown dealer for $400 on 19 February 1915, through the painter Joseph Lindon Smith (1863-1950).
Marks
Inscribed (around the rim, in thuluth letters): The mosques of God shall be tended / By those who believe in God / And in the Final Day, and who observe / Regular prayers, and give / Alms regularly, and who fear / No one but God. / Only these can be of the truly guided (Koran 9:18)
Dimensions
10 x 23.5 cm (3 15/16 x 9 1/4 in.)
Display Media
Enamel and gilding on brownish glass
Web Commentary
This fragmentary, 14th century mosque lamp bears an inscription from the Qur'an. The words are formed from enameled letters decorating its flare and rim. They are taken from Sura 9, verse 18, celebrating the true believer's all encompassing commitment to God.
The Qu'ran sanctioned mosque lamps in one of its most famous passages (Sura 24, verse 25):
God is the light of the heavens and the earth.
The parable of His light is as if there were a niche,
And within it a lamp, the lamp inside a glass,
The Glass like a brilliant star
Lit from a blessed tree, an olive from neither East nor West,
Whose oil is almost luminous though scarcely touched by fire...
Permanent Gallery Location
Long Gallery
Bibliography
Gilbert Wendel Longstreet and Morris Carter. General Catalogue (Boston, 1935), p. 232. (as Arabian, 14th century)
Rollin Hadley. “Notes, Records, Comments.” Gardner Museum Calendar of Events 8, no. 3 (20 Sep. 1964), p. 2. (as 14th century)
Yasuko Horioka et al. Oriental and Islamic Art: Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum (Boston, 1975), pp. 123-25, no. 58. (as Syrian or Egyptian, mid 14th century)
Rights and reproductions
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