Nasrid Capital

A Nasrid capital from the period of Yusuf I, Spain, Granada, c. 1350

31 cm (height); carved, chiselled, and polished ‘cubic’-style marble capital with palmette decoration; with cylindrical lower body, the ‘cubic’ upper body carved with vegetal motifs, a thin abacus crowning the capital.

Provenance
Collection of the antiquarian François Antonovich (1934-2023), Rue de Richelieu, Paris, France; as early as 1970

Carved from a block of marble, this Nasrid capital once functioned as an architectural element in a private home or palatial residence. It is formed of two distinct parts: the cylindrical lower body acts as an extension of the column shaft that would have once stood below it, and the cubic upper body with volutes and sinuous vegetal forms carved in low relief spreads to offer support to the roofline or lintel originally extending above it.

This is one of a group of distinctive capitals carved in Spain during the reign of the Nasrid Sultan Yusuf I (r. 1333-1354). The capitals created during this period are defined by low-relief carving of vegetal forms, their use of sophisticated geometry in the organisation of the carving, and a careful paring back or simplification of form.

Nasrid capitals from the first half of the fourteenth century largely survive in collections in Spain. A closely related example in the Museo Lázaro Galdiano in Madrid is of similar scale and composition to our capital (inv. 277). Another with very similar decorative forms is now in the Museum für Islamische Kunst in Berlin (inv. I. 5385). Other examples are held in the Museo de la Alhambra in Granada (inv. 003889) and the the Museo Arqueológico Nacional, Madrid.

Left: Nasrid capital, Spain, Granada, c. 1300-1350, 28 x 24 cm; marble, Madrid, Museo Lázaro Galdiano, inv. 277

Architectural ornament from the middle of the fourteenth century helps to date Nasrid capitals of this type. The Madrasa Yusufiyya was commissioned by Sultan Yusuf I in Nasrid Granada and dedicated in the month of Muharram 750 / March-April 1349. The surviving fourteenth-century section of the madrasa is decorated with micro-architectural stucco motifs that refer to the typology of our capital and others like it.

Right: Detail, stucco decoration of the Madrasa Yusufiyya, Spain, Granada, Muharram 750 / March-April 1349