A History of Fine Art in India and Ceylon, from the Earliest Times to the Present Day c20.s1.17

c20.s1.17

In Persia and India, as in China, calligraphy was regarded as a fine art worthy of the most serious study, and masters of it enjoyed fame throughout Asia like that of great painters in Europe. They were careful to sign and date their works, which were eagerly collected by connoisseurs. Abūl Fazl gives a list of calligraphic experts, among whom in Akbar's time the most eminent was Muḥammad Husain of Kashmīr, who survived the emperor for six years. Many of the albums in the London collections containing 'miniatures' include hundreds of specimens of beautiful writing in various styles and of different periods, which often seem to have been more valued than the drawings and paintings associated with them. Abūl Fazl enumerates eight calligraphical systems as current during the sixteenth century in Irān (Persia), Turān (Turkistan), India, and Turkey, distinguished one from the other by differences in the relative proportion of straight and curved lines, ranging from the Kūfic with five-sixths of straight lines to the Nastalik, Akbar's favourite script, with nothing but curved strokes. The forms of the Arabic alphabet used for writing Persian, although not distinctly reminiscent of pictorial hieroglyphs, as the Chinese characters are, lend themselves readily to artistic treatment, and even Europeans may understand to some extent the high technical skill of the masters of the calligraphic art, and admire the beauty of their productions. But full enjoyment and appreciation are possible only to persons familiar with the character from infancy and sensitive to all the associated ideas. The subject is not of sufficient general interest to warrant detailed treatment in this work.²