"Whether by consulting the position of planets, casting horoscopes or interpreting dreams, the art of divination has been a universal practice for centuries. In the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries in Iran and Turkey, one of the most splendid tools to gain insight into the unknown was a series of illustrated manuscripts known as the Falnama (Book of omens). Popular at court and on the streets of Isfahan and Istanbul, only four 'monumental' copies of these exceptional works remain. They are notable for their impressive scale and brilliantly painted images of prophets, heroes, villains and signs of the zodiac. With their encouraging or dire omens, they represent some of the most original manuscripts associated with Safavid Iran and Ottoman Turkey." "Featured in this, the first publication ever devoted to the Falnama as a genre, are intact volumes as well as text folios and illustrations now dispersed among international public and private collections. Considering the Falnama's pictorial and verbal auguries as integrated ensembles, these images and their prognostications shed new light on the Safavid and Ottoman artistic, cultural, political and religious landscape of the period. Essays by scholars of Safavid, Ottoman and Byzantine history, culture and language, complemented by full-colour illustrations, offer detailed analysis of the form, content and meaning of these rarely seen works of art. The first ever translations of three of the four monumental copies provide insight into a vivid and enduring aspect of human concern - the unknown."--BOOK JACKET.

Published by the Freer Gallery of Art and the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery on the occasion of the exhibition...October 24, 2009 - January 24, 2010.

Includes bibliographical references and index.