Timurid Mounted Falconer Hunting Ducks

Iran; c. 1420 Drawing: 11.4 × 20.5 cm
Early Timurid painting was in many ways a further development of the refined art that was created under the Jalayirids and the Muzaffarids. An elegant and painstakingly detailed work is this depiction of a mounted falconer about to send his falcon aloft through a flock of flapping ducks.
We do not know whether the drawing was a draft for a larger composition or an independent study. It is, however, a fact that in the 15th century, people began to collect exquisite drawings and calligraphy in an album (muraqqa). This can be considered the first signs of a development in which Islamic painting liberated itself from being only an illustration to a text.
Inv. no. 20/2006
From The David Collection, Copenhagen, Denmark.