- Title
- Star Shaped Tile
- Date Made
- 1261-1262/660 A.H.
- Medium
- Fritware, overglaze luster-painted
- Dimensions
- Height: 12 3/8 in. (31.43 cm); Depth: 9/16 in. (1.43 cm)
- Accession Number
- M.2002.1.76
- Collecting Area
- Art of the Middle East: Islamic
- Curatorial Notes
A main function of the ceramics industry at Kashan in the thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries was producing luster tiles for the shrines of Shi’ite holy men and Sufis across Iran. This star-shaped example comes from one such building, the Imamzadah Yahya in Varamin, south of modern Tehran, commemorating the sixth-generation descendent of the Prophet’s grandson Hasan, who is interred there. Scattered today across museums and private collections, tiles from this monument are identifiable by their distinctive vegetal designs in gold-olive luster glaze framed by Qur’anic inscriptions; most are dated either AH 660, as here, or 661 (AD 1261–63).
