This collection most comprehensively represents practically all types of bronze and brass items that were prevalent in Khorasan and Mawarannahr from the 9th to the early 13th centuries.
Another remarkable object from the Bumiller Collection is closely connected with the previous one – a bronze (or brass) mirror that women would look in to make up their eyebrows. It is notable that the Bumiller Collection comprises practically all the types of Islamic mirrors known to scholarship, including some extremely rare examples.
One mirror that has been published here belongs to the rare type which is known in three samples only. The back side is embellished with a relief decoration showing a complicated composition that can be interpreted as follows. Two mountain sheep with powerful horns are on either side of the trunk of a tree or an altar. Above them are shoots of plants, among which, at the top of the composition, the head of a ruler appears wearing a crown with a crescent. Around it runs an inscription in Arabic letters, possibly Persian. The composition harks back to the pre-Islamic iconography of Central Asia, some elements of which continued to be used for centuries after Islam became established in the region. Judging by two other similar finds, the mirror from the Bumiller Collection could have been made in the north-eastern parts of Uzbekistan, perhaps in the Tashkent oasis.
Evidently the mirror’s unusual iconography caused it to be turned into a magic talisman, since its smooth working surface was later engraved with rows of geometrical symbols.
You can learn more about the topic in the book-album "Collections of the Federal Republic of Germany" (volume XI) in the series "Cultural Legacy of Uzbekistan in the World Collections".
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