First of all the first page of a Khamsa of Nizami of around 1440 – 1447 with the portrait of Ulugbek and his court, in the Freer Gallery (Washington), and another page of the same book in the Keir Collection, are witnesses of the high quality of the artists working in Samarkand.
In the Topkapi Saray Library in Istanbul another manuscript of the Khamsa of Nizami (H. 786), in the same style and quality, contains 19 paintings. This manuscript was written in 850/1446 – 1447, according to the dedicatory inscription (F. 318 a and 1 a), copied by the calligrapher ‘Ali b. Iskandar al-Quhistani in a good nasta‘liq script, and written for Khwaja Yusuf-shah b. al-marhum Amir Miran al-Tabrizi, an unknown dignitary. The same inscription is also giving the name of the painter, Sultan ‘Ali al-Bavardi. Probably trained in Herat, this artist is unknown from the Persian sources.
You can learn more about the topic in the book-album "Illustrated manuscripts from Mawarannahr in the collections of France" (Volume XXIX) in the series "The Cultural Legacy of Uzbekistan".
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