Bahram Gur Hunts with Azada (text, recto; painting, verso), illustrated folio from the Great Ilkhanid Shahnama (Book of Kings)

Although Firdawsi completed the Shahnama (Book of Kings) in 1010, the earliest surviving illustrated manuscripts of the text can be dated no earlier than the first half of the fourteenth century. The finest and most important of these early manuscripts is the "Great Mongol Shahnama" believed to have been created for the last of the Ilkhanid rulers of Iran, Abu Saᶜid (r. 1317-35). The 57 surviving illustrations, which are unusually large, include dramatic compositions and eclectic details drawn from Islamic, Chinese, and European sources. This painting features Prince Bahram Gur on a hunting expedition with Azada, his musician and concubine. Seated behind him with harp in hand, Azada challenged him to prove his hunting skills by pinning the foot of a deer into its ear, changing a female deer into a male, and a buck into a doe. When Bahram Gur succeeded, however, Azada insulted him and pitied the slain gazelles. Infuriated, Bahram Gur trampled her beneath his camel’s hooves. The painting combines different moments of the story in a landscape featuring soft hills and tufts, inspired by Chinese painting.