8/11/2019 GRABAR - Painting of Six Kings Qusayr 'Amrah

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Regents of the University of Michigan

The Painting of the Six Kings at Quayr 'AmrahAuthor(s): Oleg GrabarSource: Ars Orientalis, Vol. 1 (1954), pp. 185-187Published by: Freer Gallery of Art, The Smithsonian Institutionand Department of the History ofArt, University of MichiganStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4628994.Accessed: 24/07/2011 00:24

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8/11/2019 GRABAR - Painting of Six Kings Qusayr 'Amrah

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NOTES

THE PAINTING OF

THE SIX KINGS

AT

QUSAYR

'AMRAH

The now greatlydamagedpaintingof the

six

rulers

in the Umayyad desert

bath of

Qusayr

'Amrah has for

a long time

been the

subject

of controversy

among

scholars. If

we

except

the fantastic

interpretation

by

Kara-

bacek

in

Musil's

publication

of the building,

two

explanations

of the famous

painting

are

to

be

found. One group

of scholars,

from

Max van Berchem

1

to

Creswell,2

xplainsthe

representation

of the six rulers

as a symbol

of the defeated enemiesof Islam. Herzfeld,3

on

the other

hand,

has

suggested

that

we

see here a Umayyad copy

of the Sasanian

representation

of the

Kings

of the Earth,

as

there was one,

described

by Yaqiit,4

near

Kermanshah.

The

first

explanation

is

inadequate,

be-

cause

in

both

Sasanian

and

Byzantine

art,

the

iconography

of

the defeated

enemies

shows

specific

traits

absent

in

Qusayr

'Amrah,5

and

one cannotimaginethat the Umayyad rulers

had,

at

that

time,

developed

their own

iconog-

raphy

of

that

subject.

Herzfeld's

explanation

seems

to

rely

too much on the theoreticalser-

vility

of

Umayyad

artists

in

assuming

that

'

M.

van Berchem,

Au

pays

de

Moab et

d'Edom,

Journal

des Savants,

n. s.,

7eme annee (I909),

pp.

293-309,363-372,40I-411.

2

K. A. C.

Creswell,

Early

Muhammedan

archi-

tecture,

London,

I932, VOl.

I, pp.

263-264.

3

E. Herzfeld,

Jrchiologische

Parerga,

Orienta-

lische Literaturzeitung,

vol.

22

(I919),

pp.

254-255;

and

Die K6nige

der

Erde,

Der

Islam,

vol.

2I

(I933),

pp.

233-236.

4

Yaquit,

Mu'jam al-bulddn,

ed. F.

Wiustenfeld,

Leipzig,

I866-I873, vol.

4, p. 70.

5

For

Sasanian

examples,

see,

for instance,

A. U.

Pope, ed.,

A

survey

of

Persian

art,

London-New

York,

I938,

VOl.

4,

p. I55.

For Byzantine

examples,

see

A.

Grabar,

L'empereur

dans l'art byzantin,

Paris,

1936,

pls. 4,

I2, 23, and

in the

text, passim.

der maler,

der fur al-Walid

I in

Qusair

Amra

arbeitete,

hat ganz

naiv

den Sasaniden

des

urbildesbeibehalten, rotzdemder nichtmehr

in die

zeit passte.

The six kings

are not

the

kings

of the earth

described

by

Yaqut,but

each

one represents

a specific

hase

of Umayyad

his-

tory.

We shall

try to

show that

this painting

is an

illustration

of a

Umayyad

idea, part

of

which was

borrowed

from

the Sasanians,

but

which was adapted

to the

Umayyads'

histori-

cal situation.

A line

froma poem

attributed

oYazid

III

ibnal-Walid,oneof the last Umayyadcaliphs

who

reigned

briefly

during

he

year 744,

intro-

duces

an

idea which

perhaps

can explain

the

painting

of

Qusayr

'Amrah. It is

found

in

Mas'fzdi

and reads

as

follows: V

Z)ki; s9;

5

99 9