Persian silver hallmark reference book?

[smcloughlin]

Hi
Cant seem to find a good reference book for Persian /middle eastern silver can anyone recommend one?
Thanks
Sue

[WarrenKundis]

Sue,

That is an excellent question.

A few years ago I was assisting a friend with identifing a Persian pen box. Everything I had found in hard copy except for short articles in English and other languages on the subject was in Farsi. Eventually found a scholar at the V&A who had co-written a monograph on the subject with Dr Nasser D. Khalili who was able to assist.

The Khalili collection which made up of eight different massive collections, one of which includes Islamic Arts. See http://www.khalili.org/ Dr Nasser is himself Iranian. Their contact e-mail is nour@nourhouse.com I'm sure Dr Nasser himself will not be responding but hopefully you will hear back from them.

Please post anything you may find out here so that we might all benefit.

Warren

[dnl]

Hello,

The World Hallmarks book series is planning to come out with the second volume. The first was on Europe, the second is the Middle East, Africa, Asia. While the book is not released yet, it is suppose to be some time this summer.
It may not help you now but should have what everyone has been looking for in answers for hallmarks of Egypt, Tunisia, Morocco, etc...

Until then, I recommend Garo Kurkman's book Ottoman Silver Marks for coverage of Turkish marks which carries a lot of the same influences.

dnl

[WarrenKundis]

Good morning dnl,

That's excellent, I'm assuming that the series is coming out in a number of languages. What about the Turkish text?

Warren

[dnl]

Hi Warren,

Alas no, the only language the series is in now is English. Maybe someday there will be the push for more languages. As a publication focused on imagery, the need may not be as strong.

Garo's book is in Turkish and English.

cheers,
dnl