# Tripod Candlestick > Unidentified metalworking workshop in the al-Mawsili tradition - 1250-1300 (current Met catalogue); previously catalogued as first half of the 14th century > Canonical HTML: https://iconotheca.com/artworks/unidentified-mosul-tradition-metalworker-1250-1300/mamluk-tripod-candlestick-met/ > Published by Servola Systems GmbH. Last verified: 2026-08-31 ## Tombstone - **Artist:** Unidentified metalworking workshop in the al-Mawsili tradition - **Date:** 1250-1300 (current Met catalogue); previously catalogued as first half of the 14th century - **Medium:** Brass; cast, then inlaid with silver, gold, and a black compound - **Dimensions:** H. 12 5/8 in. (32 cm); Diam. 7 1/2 in. (19.1 cm) - **Object type:** Islamic metalwork - **Period:** Islamic, Ayyubid-to-early-Mamluk transition in Syria or the Jazira, second half of the 13th century - **Current location:** The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Islamic Art department, on view in Gallery 454 at The Met Fifth Avenue - **Attribution:** disputed ## Summary A brass candlestick standing on three cast feet, inlaid with silver, gold, and black compound, made for a named patron, Sharaf al-Din 'Abd al-Rahman, whose dedicatory inscription runs around the neck. The Metropolitan Museum has dated and located it two different ways in its own published catalogues: first half of the fourteenth century and Egypt in 1981, second half of the thirteenth century and probably Syria or northern Iraq in 2021. The later, current attribution ties its heraldic double-headed eagles to Badr al-Din Baysari, a Syrian Mamluk amir who died in 1298, though the link to this candlestick's own patron is a proposal, not a documented fact.It has been in the Metropolitan Museum since 1891, part of the roughly 400 Islamic objects Edward C. Moore left the Museum out of a collection he assembled as a source of design ideas for Tiffany and Co. No owner before Moore is recorded, and nothing is published about how or when he acquired it. ## 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. - **1250-1300** Made to order for Sharaf al-Din 'Abd al-Rahman `[documented]` (origin) The dedicatory inscription on the neck names the original patron, an unidentified dignitary titled 'our Lord, the illustrious, the well-served.' Nothing else about him is recorded on the object or, so far as this research found, in the published literature beyond the proposal that he may have served under the Mamluk amir Badr al-Din Baysari (d. 1298), which is argued, not documented. - **-by 1891** Unknown `[unknown]` (gap) No owner is documented between the candlestick's manufacture in the second half of the thirteenth century and its presence in Edward C. Moore's New York collection by the time of his death in 1891. How, when, and through which dealer or route it left the Islamic world is not published in any source consulted for this record. - **-1891** Edward C. Moore (1827-1891), New York `[documented]` (collection) Moore was the design director of Tiffany and Co. and one of the earliest serious American collectors of Islamic art, assembling roughly 400 Islamic objects among more than 2,000 pieces from around the world that he used as source material for Tiffany's silver designs. This candlestick is catalogued as object no. 110 in the Museum's 2021 study of that collection. No acquisition date, dealer, or price for this specific piece is published. - **1891-present** The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York `[documented]` (bequest) Bequeathed to the Museum on Moore's death in 1891 as part of the Edward C. Moore Collection. It has remained in the Museum's Islamic Art department continuously since, was shown in the Museum's own 1981-82 presentation of the Smithsonian's traveling exhibition 'Renaissance of Islam: Art of the Mamluks,' and is currently on view in Gallery 454. ## Exhibitions - Renaissance of Islam: Art of the Mamluks (suppl. no. 6), The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, November 21, 1981 - January 10, 1982, 1981-1982 ## Open questions - Where, precisely, was this candlestick made? The Museum's own attribution has moved from Egypt (1981) to probably Syria or northern Iraq (2021), and no technical or metallurgical study resolving the question was found in the sources consulted. - Was the patron, Sharaf al-Din 'Abd al-Rahman, actually connected to the Mamluk amir Badr al-Din Baysari, whose heraldic emblem decorates the piece? The Museum's own catalogue entry presents this as a proposal, not a documented fact. - How and when did the candlestick leave the Islamic world and enter Edward C. Moore's collection? No dealer, date, or route of acquisition is published in any source consulted. - Has the object undergone any conservation treatment since entering the Museum in 1891? No conservation record was found. - Was the ring on the back of each leg part of the object's original design, or a later addition? Its function - a chain, presumably - is described but its date is not. - Does a matching second candlestick survive? Candlesticks of this type and value were sometimes made or used in pairs, and none is identified as a pair to this one in the sources consulted. ## Sources - [1] The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Open Access Collection API, object record for object ID 444572 (accession 91.1.572), retrieved 2026-08-31. - [2] The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 'Tripod Candlestick,' object page, catalogue entry by Deniz Beyazit, plus the Signatures/Inscriptions, Provenance, Exhibition History and References panels. - [3] Atil, Esin. Renaissance of Islam: Art of the Mamluks (Nahdat al-fann al-islami fi al-ahad al-mamluki). Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1981, exhibition checklist no. 6. Cited from the Museum's own bibliography and exhibition history in source 2; the exhibition catalogue itself was not independently examined and should be consulted directly before this record is relied on for the 1981 dating and Egypt attribution, and for the identification of the double-headed eagle as Badr al-Din Baysari's heraldic emblem. - [4] Beyazit, Deniz, Maryam Ekhtiar, and Asher Ethan Miller. 'Between Fact and Fantasy.' In Orientalism. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2026, p. 216. Cited from the Museum's own bibliography in source 2; not independently examined. - [5] The Metropolitan Museum of Art, publication page for Collecting Inspiration: Edward C. Moore at Tiffany and Co., ed. Medill Higgins Harvey (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2021), listing this candlestick among the objects illustrated in the volume and giving Moore's dates and collecting activity. - [6] Wikimedia Commons, File:Tripod Candlestick MET 91.1.572.jpeg, file and licensing page, confirming CC0 status and the Museum as the source of the upload. - [7] Alamy stock image caption, image ID 2HJ12C1, reproducing the Museum's earlier catalogue text for this object ('first half 14th century,' 'Attributed to Egypt,' medium given without gold inlay). A commercial stock-photo reseller, not a primary or scholarly source; used here only as evidence that the Museum's own cataloguing of this piece changed, and should be replaced with a dated copy of the Museum's earlier public record if one can be located. - [8] Muslim Heritage, 'A Candlestick Base Sold for $9.1 Million!' - on the October 2021 Sotheby's London sale of an unrelated, privately owned Mosul-tradition candlestick base, used here only as market comparanda for the class of object. - [9] Arab News, 'Candlestick breaks Sotheby's record for sale of an 'Islamic object' at $9.1 million.' Independent corroboration of the same 2021 sale, with the sale date given as October 27, 2021 (Muslim Heritage gives October 28; the discrepancy is unresolved in the sources consulted). --- 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.