[Sca-cooks] Sultan's Book of Delights-- late 15th century

[Huette von Ahrens]

Hi!

My copy arrived today! [Saturday, Feb. 5th]

I have spent quite some time pouring over it.

At first, I was somewhat disappointed as 2/3rds
of the book is the facsimile of the original,
which is printed in black and white.  However,
once I started reading the text and the recipes,
about 130 pages or so, I grew more excited.  Not
all the recipes are for food, but that is okay
because what food recipes there are are
interesting.  The author has taken out the 
colored miniatures from the text and printed them
in full color with a brief description of what 
the people in them are doing.

Huette

--- Johnna Holloway
<johnna at sitka.engin.umich.edu> wrote:

> Here's a new one from Routledge.
> 
> Johnnae llyn Lewis
> 
> 
> The NI'Matnama Manuscript of the Sultans of
> Mandu: The Sultan's Book of
> Delights
> 
> 
> # 576 pages (February 2005)
> # Publisher: RoutledgeCurzon
> # ISBN: 041535059X
> 
> 115 US dollars
> 
> Routledge says:
> 
> The Ni'matnama is a late fifteenth-century book
> of recipes written for
> the Sultan of Mandu, in what is now Madhya
> Pradesh, India. It contains
> recipes for cooking a variety of delicacies and
> epicurean delights, as
> well as providing remedies and aphrodisiacs for
> Nasir ad-Din Shah of
> Mandu and his court. The text provides a unique
> account of courtly life
> in a fifteenth century Indian Sultanate and
> documents a fascinating
> stage in the history of Indian cookery.
> 
> There is only one copy of The Sultan's Book of
> Delights in existence,
> held in the Oriental and India Office
> Collections of the British Library
> (BL-Persian 149). The book manuscript is
> illustrated with fifty elegant
> miniature paintings, most of which show showing
> the Sultan observing the
> women of his court as they prepare and serve
> him various dishes. These
> illustrations are important historical art
> documents in their own right.
> Painted in a distinctive Shirazi (Southern
> Iranian) style, they are also
> stylistically influenced by indigenous styles
> of book painting found in
> Central and Western India, and are the earliest
> known example of
> miniature painting in an Islamic Deccani style.
> 
> For the first time, a facsimile of the original
> text is reproduced for a
> scholarly audience. Norah Titley, formerly
> assistant keeper, Oriental
> Collections at the British Library, has
> masterfully translated this
> unique book.
> 
> 
> Contents:
> 1. Preface 2. Introduction 3. List and
> description of the manuscript's
> illustrations 4. Facsimile of the manuscript
> including colour inserts
> for illustrations 5. Translation of the
> manuscript 6. Bibliography 7.
> Glossary 8. Index
> 
> 
> 
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>
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> 


=====
Blessed are they who can laugh at themselves for they 
shall never cease to be amused.


		
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