659 - Brass bowl with strainer insert, hand-washing basin with Arabic calligraphy, Mamluk Revival, c. 1900

Brass bowl with strainer insert, hand-washing basin with Arabic calligraphy, Mamluk Revival, c. 1900 Brass, bowl, also hand-washing basin or basin of a washing set, Mamluk Revival, probably Syria or Egypt, circa 1900. Round form with broad, flat rim and deeply set basin on a low foot ring, above with pierced strainer insert with central boss, round medallions with interlace and pierced scrollwork. Rim with a continuous band of round medallions in multifoil frames, alternating with Arabic characters and with interlace, rim edge with engraved interlace band, side with engraved arcade frieze. Basin wall outside with oval inscription medallions, foot ring with hatched band. Condition commensurate with age, dented, adhesive residue on the edge of the insert. D. 34 cm, H. 11.5 cm. Metalwork in the Mamluk Revival style was made from the late 19th century in Damascus and Cairo after the model of Mamluk brass work of the 13th to 15th centuries with silver and copper inlay. Specialised engravers decorated the brass vessels with calligraphy in thuluth script, geometric interlace and palmettes; buyers were travellers, European collectors and the antiques trade, and production continued into the 1920s. In the Orient basin and ewer were already used at court in the 13th century for washing hands at table; in sets with a pierced strainer insert, the water poured over the hands flows into the basin below. Cairoware denotes brass with silver motifs in cartouches with copper outlines from Egypt and Syria.