MIR SAYYID 'ALL

flourished 16th century, , India Persian miniaturist who, together with his fellow countryman 'Abd-us-Samad, emigrated to India and helped to found the Mughal school of painting (see Mughal painting). He was born probably in the second quarter of the 16th century in Tabriz, the son of a well-known artist of the Safavid school, Mir Musawwir of Soltaniyeh. He went to India at the invitation of the Mughal emperor Humayun, arriving first in Kabul about 1545 and from there going on to Delhi. He and 'Abd-us-Samad instructed the artists of the imperial atelier, most of them Indians, and superintended the production of the giant miniatures illustrating the Dastan-e Amir Hamzeh (Stories of Amir Hamzeh), a colossal undertaking that consisted of some 1,400 paintings, each of unusually large size. The few of his paintings that have survived were for the most part painted before his arrival in India. They are sufficient, however, to denote him as a highly gifted painter, wielding an unusually delicate brush and possessed of great powers of observation.