# Mosque Lamp Bearing the Name of the Mamluk Sultan al-Malik al-Nasir > Unidentified Mamluk glass workshop, Syria - ca. 1340 > Canonical HTML: https://iconotheca.com/artworks/mamluk-glass-workshop-syria/mosque-lamp-al-nasir-met/ > Published by Servola Systems GmbH. Last verified: 2026-08-29 ## Tombstone - **Artist:** Unidentified Mamluk glass workshop, Syria - **Date:** ca. 1340 - **Medium:** Glass, colorless with a brown tinge; blown, with an applied blown foot and applied handles; enamelled and gilded - **Dimensions:** Height 33 cm (13 in.); rim diameter 21.9 cm (8 5/8 in.) - **Object type:** Glass - **Period:** Mamluk (Bahri period); dated to the third reign of Sultan al-Nasir Muhammad ibn Qalawun, 1310-1341 - **Current location:** Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York - **Attribution:** accepted ## Summary An enamelled and gilded Mamluk glass mosque lamp, about 33 centimetres tall, made around 1340 and attributed by the Metropolitan Museum to Syria. Its titulature names the sultan al-Malik al-Nasir, almost certainly al-Nasir Muhammad ibn Qalawun in his long third reign, but its most specific inscription is a separate one on the foot: a waqf endowment naming an otherwise undocumented founder, 'the convert Al-Kerimi,' at a place given as Al-Karafa, almost certainly Cairo's Qarafa cemetery district.Its documented modern history is short and precise where it exists and honestly blank where it does not. It belonged to the Paris auction expert and collector Charles Mannheim until his death in 1910, was sold at his estate sale that year, and entered the collection of J. Pierpont Morgan; his estate gave it to the Metropolitan Museum in 1917, four years after his own death, as part of a gift of eight Mamluk mosque lamps. How Mannheim acquired it, and what it made at auction in 1910, are not established in any source consulted for this record.The lamp also sits inside a live scholarly tension rather than a settled fact: the Museum's own Syria attribution runs against its own curators' broader observation that glass of exactly this date is more often Cairo-made. This record states that openly instead of picking a side its sources do not support. ## Provenance Every link carries a grade. `documented` means a cited source supports it, `disputed` means the identification is argued but not established, `unknown` means we have no owner for that span and have not bridged it. - **ca. 1340** The convert known as Al-Kerimi, founder of a waqf at Al-Karafa (probably al-Qarafa, the southern cemetery of Cairo) `[documented]` (commission and religious endowment) Established directly by the lamp's own foot inscription, translated for the Metropolitan Museum by Nicholas Martinovitch. The founder's fuller identity, and the specific building he endowed, are not established in the sources consulted. - **-1910** Charles Mannheim, Paris `[documented]` (ownership until death) The Metropolitan Museum's own provenance record places the lamp with Mannheim (1833-1910), a leading Paris auction expert and collector, until his death, without stating its earlier history. His own published 1898 collection catalogue covers Renaissance decorative arts, not Islamic material, so it does not document this piece. - **-1910** Charles Mannheim, Paris `[unknown]` (means and date of acquisition) The Metropolitan Museum's own provenance record places the lamp with Mannheim (1833-1910), a leading Paris auction expert and collector, until his death, without stating its earlier history. His own published 1898 collection catalogue covers Renaissance decorative arts, not Islamic material, so it does not document this piece. - **1910** Sale of the Mannheim estate `[documented]` (auction) Sold at the estate sale of Charles Mannheim, Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, 1910, lot 131, per the Metropolitan Museum's own provenance record. The specific dated sale session and the price realized are not established in the sources consulted. - **1910-1913** J. Pierpont Morgan, New York `[documented]` (ownership until death) Morgan owned the lamp until his death in 1913. Whether he bought it directly at the 1910 Mannheim sale or acquired it afterward through a dealer is not stated in the sources consulted. - **1910-1913** J. Pierpont Morgan, New York `[unknown]` (specific transaction (direct purchase at the 1910 sale vs later, via a dealer)) Morgan owned the lamp until his death in 1913. Whether he bought it directly at the 1910 Mannheim sale or acquired it afterward through a dealer is not stated in the sources consulted. - **1913-1917** Estate of J. Pierpont Morgan `[documented]` (held by the estate pending disposition) On Morgan's 1913 death the lamp passed into his estate. His son, J. Pierpont Morgan Jr., gave the largest portion of the collection, including eight Mamluk mosque lamps of which this was one, to the Metropolitan Museum in 1917. - **1917-present** Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York `[documented]` (accession by gift) Accessioned as 17.190.987, Department of Islamic Art, with the credit line 'Gift of J. Pierpont Morgan, 1917' following Museum convention for a gift completed by an estate in the original collector's name. Currently not on view. ## Auction results Hammer and buyer's premium are stated separately. Where a source conflates them this record says so. - **1910** Galerie Georges Petit, Estate sale of Charles Mannheim, Paris, lot 131 - Estimate: unknown - Hammer: unknown - With premium: unknown - The Metropolitan Museum's own provenance record cites this lot number and sale house but does not give a hammer price, premium, buyer of record at the time, or which of the Mannheim estate's several 1910 sale sessions included this lot. No sale catalogue was independently consulted for this record; the gap is stated rather than guessed at. ## Open questions - Who was the 'convert Al-Kerimi' named in the foot inscription as the founder of the waqf, and is he identifiable with any other documented Mamluk-period figure? No source consulted identifies him further. - Which specific mosque, madrasa, mausoleum or khanqah in Cairo's Qarafa cemetery did this lamp originally light? The inscription names the district, not the building. - Where, from whom, and when did Charles Mannheim acquire the lamp? His documented 1898 collection catalogue does not cover Islamic material, and no source consulted traces the object before his ownership. - Which specific 1910 Galerie Georges Petit sale session included lot 131? The Mannheim estate was dispersed across more than one 1910 sale (paintings and objets d'art separately), and the sources consulted for this record do not specify which. - What price did the lamp make at the 1910 Mannheim sale, and did J. Pierpont Morgan buy it there directly or acquire it afterward through a dealer? Neither is established in the sources consulted. - Why does the Metropolitan Museum attribute this specific lamp to Syria when its own published scholarship on the wider craft places most glass of this exact date (the 1330s-40s) in Cairo workshops? No source consulted argues the point for this object in particular. ## Sources - [1] Metropolitan Museum of Art, object record for 'Mosque Lamp Bearing the Name of the Mamluk Sultan al-Malik al-Nasir,' accession 17.190.987, object ID 447002, including its Overview, Signatures/Inscriptions/Markings, Provenance and References tabs. - [2] Metropolitan Museum of Art, Open Access Collection API, object record 447002 (public-domain status, primary and additional images). - [3] Metropolitan Museum of Art, press release, 'The Making of a Collection: Islamic Art at the Metropolitan,' October 31, 2011, on the Edward C. Moore and J. Pierpont Morgan gifts and the ten major donor-collectors of the Islamic Art department. - [4] Carboni, Stefano, and Qamar Adamjee, 'Enameled and Gilded Glass from Islamic Lands,' Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History, Metropolitan Museum of Art, October 2002. - [5] Yalman, Suzan, 'The Art of the Mamluk Period (1250-1517),' Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History, Metropolitan Museum of Art, October 2001. - [6] AGORHA (Institut National d'Histoire de l'Art), biographical notice, 'Mannheim, Charles (29/03/1833 - 01/05/1910), Paris.' - [7] Wikimedia Commons, file records and extmetadata (license, categories) for the five CC0-licensed photographs of accession 17.190.987, queried via the Commons API. - [8] Wikipedia, 'Al-Nasir Muhammad,' consulted only for a general cross-check of reign dates and titulature, not as evidence about this specific object. Flagged for replacement with a scholarly biography such as the Encyclopaedia of Islam entry on al-Nasir Muhammad ibn Qalawun. --- Images on this record are public domain or CC0 and are hosted by us. No image on this site is generated or simulated. If you quote this record, quote the provenance grades with it.