hes have survived in smaller numbers
and very rarely in perfect condition. Common motives of decoration were
animals and birds (sometimes showing Chinese influence), the hare and
the deer being favourites; roughly drawn sack-like figures of men and
women, mounted or on foot (probably heroes of Persian legend),
conventional foliage and arabesques. The designs are usually reserved in
a lustred ground, which is relieved by small scrolls, curls and dots
etched in the lustre (as though the glazed piece had been covered all
over with the lustre mixture and the ornament scratched out of this when
it was dry), and showing beneath the ivory-white tin-enamel with which
the early wares are generally coated. The lustre itself when viewed
directly may look like some golden or deep chocolate-brown colour, but
as the piece is turned to catch a side-light this deep colour is seen to
bear a thin iridescent film, which glows with golden, green, purple or
ruby-red metallic _reflets_. On the earliest examples the decoration is
often entirely in lustre, but later, lustre is often used to eke out a
pattern painted with masses of pale cobalt-blue or turquoise under the
glaze. Similar tiles with rather more elaborate ornament bear
14th-century dates, and another variety has parts of the decoration,
more particularly the large letters of the inscriptions, raised in low
relief and heightened with blue. Yet another class, belonging to the
14th century, has a fine dark-blue alkaline glaze, with designs in low
relief, picked out with scrolls and arabesques in white enamel or bold
floral sprays in leaf-gold. Lustre is frequently found applied to the
rich cobalt-blue ground, and there are still existing a few magnificent
vases which show the artistic possibilities of this scheme of
decoration. It should be noted that when the pieces are in the round,
the pattern is usually painted in lustre and not reserved in a lustre
ground as on the flat tiles. In the later examples the tin-enamel was
replaced entirely by white slip, and the lustre decoration continued in
use until the end of the reign of Shah Abbas I. (1587-1629). To the last
period belong many charming bowls, narghilis, cups and dishes in a brown
lustre, with ruby _reflets_, on a white or a deep blue ground; this ware
is pure white in substance and generally translucent, and the pieces are
occasionally signed (see _Persian porcelain_ above).

[Illustration: FIG. 41.--Lamp from the Mosque of Omar.