THE ART OF FALCONRY IN THE MUGHAL EMPIRE. By Sami ur Rahman.

2017 1st edition. 4to (220 x 285mm). Pp[viii],xxviii,247. Colour paintings throughout, colour photograph. Pictorial boards - issued without a dust-wrapper.

A large-format, beautifully illustrated, art book which examines Mughal falconry and its very extensive artistic tradition. The Mughal empire was established by a small group of Turkic-speaking descendants of Genghis Khan, who invaded northern India around 1526, during the reign of Henry VIII. This book covers the period between the Mughals' achievement of total victory, about 1550, and 1750 when the empire's disintegration had become terminal. "Wherever and whenever the art of falconry might have its genesis, one thing is for sure: that is, there has been no other civilization in the world history - both in the Middle Ages and medieval times - that has depicted hawks, hounds, and hawking scenes more aesthetically and exhaustively in art than the Mughal empire that flourished in the Sub-continent between 1526 and 1857. The sheer artistic brilliance of the Mughal atelier surpasses the collective oeuvre of any individual civilization - ancient or medieval. This is apparent from the multitude of miniature paintings that have survived during all these centuries and are now preserved in major museums, libraries, and private collections around the world. The present book, in a sense, is the very first attempt to treat the subject matter in a holistic and comprehensive manner. It mainly covers the historical period from 1550 to 1750, when the Mughals ruled much part of the Sub-continent, comprising modern-day Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, and Afghanistan." "This volume is for research purposes, to be distributed among the participants of the 4th International Festival of Falconry on 4-9 December 2017 in Abu Dhabi, U.A.E."