A very fine and rare bronze calf in standing position with naturalistic features including horns, pointed ears and raised eyes. A strap tied around the calf’s muzzle and a collar around its neck with bells in relief. The back with an openwork interwoven motif. The haunches are inlaid in silver with arabesques.

This remarkable bronze is one of a group of zoomorphic incense burners that was produced in the province of Khurasan during the Ghurid period (1148 - 1215 AD). Nearly all of these are in the form of lions or cats. Physical details such as hair are replaced by vegetal designs so as to accord with the Islamic principle of avoiding realism.

The only other published bronze figurine of this subject is a ewer in the form of a cow suckling her calf in the State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg. Signed by Ali ibn Muhammad ibn Abu al-Qasim and dated Muharram
603/August-September 1206, it is considered one of the masterpieces of
medieval Islamic metalwork. In both these bronzes the animals are wearing belts around their necks.

Khurasan, Persia
12th-13th Century

Height: 12 cm
Length 15.5 cm

cf: Piotrovsky (Mikhail B. et al), Earthly Beauty, Heavenly Art: Art of Islam, Amsterdam, 1999, no. 210, pp. 232-233.
Rachel Ward, Islamic Metalwork, London, 1993, figs. 3 and 20 and p. 72