Even more important is the question of the pre-Seljuq work in the Masjid-i-Jami’ of Isfahan. It is the most interesting, and, in the loveliness of some parts, the most beautiful of Persian buildings. No one can stand in its great dilapidated court, or under the Seljuq domes, where the loud flight of agitated pigeons leaves a profound silence that seems to roar in the ears, without a sense of awe. It is the work of many periods. But in the succession of these it contains hardly anything that is not of the best…” (Eric Schroeder, Standing Monuments of the First Period, 1967).

The text publishes a thorough research of one element of the pre-Seljuq work of this monument, its wall painting. The few fragments discovered during the excavation of the Italian archaeological mission of the 1970s are here analysed with the help of various scholars from different fields of research. Their contribution reveals a fascinating glimpse of a little known artistic genre of the early Islamic art.

The Author: Michael Jung is Curator of the Department of Islamic Archaeology and Ancient Southern Arabia of the Museo Nazionale d’Arte Orientale/Rome. He has participated in numerous archaeological missions in Spain, Syria, Yemen and Iran. Currently he is scientific director of

CONTENTS

A short outline of the main building phases of the Great Mosque
Michael Jung

The wall paintings of the pre-Seljuq mosque
Michael Jung
Introduction to the research of the excavated fragments
The refined typology of the wall paintings
Chronological attribution and search for comparisons

The wall paintings of the post-Seljuq mosque
Michael Jung
The excavated mural paintings of sector 112
Two paintings of mosques and hand-prints
The wall paintings of the gav-chah

Materials and painting technique of the wall paintings of the pre-Seljuq Isfahani Mosque
Paolo Cornale, Fabio Frezzato, Michael Jung, Claudio Seccaroni
Digital microscope observations
Plaster
Final coating of the mud plaster
Polychromy and colored decorations
Blue
Red
Gilding
Discussion and additional observations

Botanical characterization of some iconographic painted elements
Antonella Altieri

Summary
Michael Jung, Claudio Seccaroni

Bibliography