A Hunter Shoots a Leopard; Illustration to the Anwar-i Suhaili

Unknown

ca. 1570–75 · Opaque color and gold on paper · Islamic Art

This painting of a hunter shooting is leopard is a fragment of a larger illustration to the Anwar-i Suhaili (Lights of the Canopus), a Persian version of the Panchatantra (an ancient collection of didactic animal fables in Sanskrit). The story here is on the theme of retribution, told through the viewpoint of the lynx who observes the hunter kill a leopard which had killed a dog, in a chain of animals which had all sequentially killed each other before meeting the same fate—before the dog, a fox, a hedgehog, a snake, and a mouse who began all this when it gnawed a tree. The unflinching depiction of the shot leopard is perhaps the most arresting part of this painting. Communicating the pain of the arrow through its body curled up—and falling forward in shock, yelping face and copious bleeding, drives home the point of the moral tale.

Artist

Unknown

Date

ca. 1570–75

Medium

Opaque color and gold on paper

Department

Islamic Art

Credit line

Howard Hodgkin Collection, Purchase, Florence and Herbert Irving Acquisitions, 2020 Benefit, and Dodge Funds; Howard S. and Nancy Marks Gift; Louis V. Bell, Harris Brisbane Dick, Fletcher, and Rogers Funds and Joseph Pulitzer Bequest; and funds from various donors, 2022