Inventory

Jamdhar (katar) inscribed with Shi‘i legends

Full Description:

The hilt of this ‘jamdhar’¹ is beautifully decorated on every surface with graceful lines of Islamic calligraphy in naskh script. The hilt is silver, while the calligraphy is deeply inlaid into the metal in black enamel. On the bulbous centre of the hand grips, starting on one side and carrying over to the other, is a Persian couplet in praise of Imam ‘Ali:

یا قاهر العدو یا والی الولی

يا مظهر العجائب يا مرتضى على

‘O vanquisher of the enemy, O guardian of (God’s) friend!

O locus of wonders, O Murtaza ‘Ali!’

In smaller letters, on the sides of the grips, repeated:

الله

‘God!’

On the underside and top of the grips:

صاحب جمدهر / نشاط علی خان

‘The owner of the jamdhar is Nishat ‘Ali Khan.’

The possible owner has been identified as Nishat ‘Ali Khan, who is recorded as an officer of Shuja‘ al-Daula, the nawab of Lucknow.² It appears that he was made a eunuch by Muhammad ‘Ali Khan of Khairabad³ and then gifted to Shuja’ al-Daula. He was employed mostly by Bahu Begum, the Nawab’s queen, as a revenue collector and remained with her in Faizabad even after Shuja’ al-Daula’s death (instead of following Asaf al-Dawla to Lucknow).⁴

Along the exterior of one side arm of the hilt and down the inside of the other, reads the Nadi ‘Ali quatrain:

ناد علیا مظهر العجائب

تجده عونا لك في النوائب

کل هم وغم سینجلی

بنبوتك یا محمد بولایتك یا علی یا علی یا علی

‘Call upon ‘Ali, the locus of wonders and marvels,

You will find him a help in trials,

All difficulty and grief will disappear

Through your prophethood O Muhammad, through your trusteeship O ‘Ali, O ‘Ali, O ‘Ali!’

Inscribed down both the outside and interior of the two arms of the hilt and continuing along the base, is the call on God to bless the Fourteen Innocents:

اللهم صل علي محمد وعلی وفاطمة والحسن والحسین والعابد والباقر واصادق والکاظم والرضا والتقی والنقی والعسکری والمهدی صاحاب الزمان  صلوات  الله علیهم اجمعین

‘O God! Bless Muhammad and ‘Ali and Fatima and al-Hasan and al-Husayn and al-‘Abid and al-Baqir and al-Sadiq and al-Kazim and al-Rida and al-Taqi and al-Naqi and al-‘Askari and al-Mahdi, the Lord of Time. God’s blessings on all of them!’

The quality of the calligraphy is sublime and the use of elaborate diacritics is very aesthetically pleasing. Empty spaces are filled with various decorative dot arrangements, which serve not just to make the calligraphy more readable, but also provide an elegant embellishment to the divine words. The edges of the hilt provide a border to the religious text where four dots sit in small flower-like arrangements between double lines. The quality of the blade reflects the calibre of the hilt and is forged from jawhar steel, commonly known as wootz. The central area has the jawhar pattern and the edges are polished bright. A slim medial ridge sweeps down the blade from a trefoil pendant and converges with two others set at angles before coming together to form the tip.

Only a small group of weapons from Lucknow are known to include black enamel on silver, but none with such elaborate and deep-set calligraphy as this one. It is likely a special commission. As of yet, we know of no comparable weapon.

The beauty of the long flowing characters elevates this katar from a weapon to a work of art as well as an object of religion and devotion. In the words of Zebrowski “…it should be remembered that if the design is to have any originality, the excavation of a hard surface with a metal stylus demands as much, if not more, training, control and talent as painting with a brush”.⁵

My thanks to Will Kwiatkowski for the translation and identification of Nishat ‘Ali Khan, and to Arthur Bijl for additional information regarding the man’s life.

Provenance

Private European collection

Paris art market circa 2000

References