Floor plan

Time and placeThe 16th century

The 16th century

Portrait of a Young Man, by Dosso Dossi, c. 1530
"The Angel Gabriel meets 'Amr ibn Zaid (the Shepherd)", Folio from a Siyer-i Nebi (the Life of the Prophet), by Mustafa ibn Vali, ca. 1595
"Farhad Carves a Milk Channel for Shirin", Folio 74 from a Khamsa (Quintet) of Nizami of Ganja, by Nizami, dated 931 AH/1524–25 CE
The image shows a profile of a person's head and partial neck within a circular laurel wreath. The individual has distinct facial features, including a prominent nose and chin. The hairstyle is tight, wavy locks pulled back, and a laurel wreath crowns the head. The background is plain, with an inscription reading "IMP. CAESAR. TRAIANVS. AVG." Below the portrait are the initials "ISB" and the year "1546". The overall style resembles a classical engraving, featuring detailed line work and traditional iconography.
Phaeton, from "The Four Disgracers", by Hendrick Goltzius, 1588
"Shah Jahan on a Terrace, Holding a Pendant Set With His Portrait", Folio from the Shah Jahan Album, by Chitarman, recto: dated 1627–28; verso: ca. 1530–50
Shown from the waist up, a light-skinned woman sits angled slightly to our right in this vertical portrait painting. The woman has blue eyes, faint brows, and a sloping nose ending in a small bulb. Her upper lip is thin and her lower lip full over a slight double chin. Her blond hair is pulled back under a gold, cap-like headdress and a black, wide-brimmed hat with a shallow crown. She wears a high-necked white, black, and gold dress with intricate detailing, a gold chain necklace that falls to her waist, and a black belt with a gold clasp and medallions. She wears two gold rings set with gems on the pointer finger of her left hand, which is folded across her belly over the other hand. A scarlet-red wallcovering with pink floral designs fills two-thirds of the space behind her. The rightmost third of the background opens onto a landscape with a tall, spindly tree, a leaping animal, presumably a dog, and a bridge across a body of water leading to a town. Across another body of water, perhaps a lake, mountains are marine blue in the distance under a clear, celestial-blue sky.
A work made of engraving on ivory laid paper.

The works in this room are listed below.

Works in this room

Works made in the 16th century, anywhere in the world.

First room, north wall

  1. Portrait of a Young Man, by Dosso Dossi, c. 1530
    Portrait of a Young ManDosso Dossi, c. 1530Courtesy of the Cleveland Museum of Art
  2. "The Angel Gabriel meets 'Amr ibn Zaid (the Shepherd)", Folio from a Siyer-i Nebi (the Life of the Prophet), by Mustafa ibn Vali, ca. 1595
    "The Angel Gabriel meets 'Amr ibn Zaid (the Shepherd)", Folio from a Siyer-i Nebi (the Life of the Prophet)Mustafa ibn Vali, ca. 1595Courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art
  3. "Farhad Carves a Milk Channel for Shirin", Folio 74 from a Khamsa (Quintet) of Nizami of Ganja, by Nizami, dated 931 AH/1524–25 CE
    "Farhad Carves a Milk Channel for Shirin", Folio 74 from a Khamsa (Quintet) of Nizami of GanjaNizami, dated 931 AH/1524–25 CECourtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art
  4. The image shows a profile of a person's head and partial neck within a circular laurel wreath. The individual has distinct facial features, including a prominent nose and chin. The hairstyle is tight, wavy locks pulled back, and a laurel wreath crowns the head. The background is plain, with an inscription reading "IMP. CAESAR. TRAIANVS. AVG." Below the portrait are the initials "ISB" and the year "1546". The overall style resembles a classical engraving, featuring detailed line work and traditional iconography.
    TrajanSebald Beham, 1546Courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington

First room, south wall

  1. Phaeton, from "The Four Disgracers", by Hendrick Goltzius, 1588
    Phaeton, from "The Four Disgracers"Hendrick Goltzius, 1588Courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art
  2. "Shah Jahan on a Terrace, Holding a Pendant Set With His Portrait", Folio from the Shah Jahan Album, by Chitarman, recto: dated 1627–28; verso: ca. 1530–50
    "Shah Jahan on a Terrace, Holding a Pendant Set With His Portrait", Folio from the Shah Jahan AlbumChitarman, recto: dated 1627–28; verso: ca. 1530–50Courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art
  3. Shown from the waist up, a light-skinned woman sits angled slightly to our right in this vertical portrait painting. The woman has blue eyes, faint brows, and a sloping nose ending in a small bulb. Her upper lip is thin and her lower lip full over a slight double chin. Her blond hair is pulled back under a gold, cap-like headdress and a black, wide-brimmed hat with a shallow crown. She wears a high-necked white, black, and gold dress with intricate detailing, a gold chain necklace that falls to her waist, and a black belt with a gold clasp and medallions. She wears two gold rings set with gems on the pointer finger of her left hand, which is folded across her belly over the other hand. A scarlet-red wallcovering with pink floral designs fills two-thirds of the space behind her. The rightmost third of the background opens onto a landscape with a tall, spindly tree, a leaping animal, presumably a dog, and a bridge across a body of water leading to a town. Across another body of water, perhaps a lake, mountains are marine blue in the distance under a clear, celestial-blue sky.
    Margarethe Vöhlin [obverse]Bernhard Strigel, 1527Courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington
  4. A work made of engraving on ivory laid paper.
    Hercules Slaying the HydraJan Harmensz. Muller, c. 1602Courtesy of the Art Institute of Chicago

Second room, south wall

  1. "Bahram Gur Sees a Herd of Deer Mesmerized by Dilaram' s Music", Folio from a Khamsa (Quintet) of Amir Khusrau Dihlavi, by Amir Khusrau Dihlavi, 1597–98
    "Bahram Gur Sees a Herd of Deer Mesmerized by Dilaram' s Music", Folio from a Khamsa (Quintet) of Amir Khusrau DihlaviAmir Khusrau Dihlavi, 1597–98Courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art
  2. Hercules chasing Avarice from the Temple of the Muses, by Ugo da Carpi, ca. 1520–27
    Hercules chasing Avarice from the Temple of the MusesUgo da Carpi, ca. 1520–27Courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art
  3. "Shaikh San'an and the Christian Maiden", Folio 22v from a Mantiq al-Tayr (Language of the Birds), by Farid al-Din `Attar, ca. 1600
    "Shaikh San'an and the Christian Maiden", Folio 22v from a Mantiq al-Tayr (Language of the Birds)Farid al-Din `Attar, ca. 1600Courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art
  4. Dead Blue Roller, by Hans Hoffmann, 1583
    Dead Blue RollerHans Hoffmann, 1583Courtesy of the Cleveland Museum of Art

Second room, north wall

  1. The parrot addresses Khujasta at the beginning of the thirty-sixth night, from a Tuti-nama (Tales of a Parrot), c. 1560
    The parrot addresses Khujasta at the beginning of the thirty-sixth night, from a Tuti-nama (Tales of a Parrot)Unrecorded Indian maker, c. 1560Courtesy of the Cleveland Museum of Art
  2. A nearly nude man with peachy skin stands next to and looks up at a man with ashen, ivory-colored skin, wearing armor and riding a bright white horse in this vertical painting. The horizon line comes less than a quarter of the way up the composition, and the sky behind the men and horse is vivid, aqua blue with a few silvery-gray and pale, yellow clouds floating along the top edge of the composition. The painting is created with long, blended brushstrokes, and the limbs and features of the two men and horse are elongated and have delicate, dark outlines. The horse’s body is angled to our right but it looks at us from the corners of its dark eyes. One front leg is raised. The rider looks down toward the man on foot at his side, to our left. The rider has dark, arched eyebrows, a long, straight nose, a pointed chin, and short, copper-orange hair. Wide ruffs pleated into figure-eights encircle his neck and wrists. His chest and arms are covered with plates of steel-gray armor edged and decorated with gold bands and medallions. He wears crimson-red pantaloons and stockings with mustard-yellow boots. With his right hand, to our left, he holds the gold hilt of a long, thin sword along the horse’s body. With his other hand, he holds a swath of lime-green fabric, which drapes down the side of the horse and across the hips of the man standing next to the rider. The sheen of the fabric is suggested with canary-yellow highlights where it catches the light. The standing man has short, dark brown hair and eyebrows. He looks to our right in profile, toward the rider, with pink lips parted. He holds the green fabric with his left hand, to our right, and he has a bandage around his leg near his right ankle. The horse and man stand on a spit of dark brown land, with a landscape of trees, buildings, and mountains deep in the distance beyond.
    Saint Martin and the BeggarUnrecorded Greek maker, 1600/1614Courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington
  3. A work made of engraving on ivory laid paper.
    Fides, plate 1 from The Seven VirtuesHieronymous Wierix, c. 1598Courtesy of the Art Institute of Chicago
  4. Bright light from the upper left illuminates two muscular men and a winged angel against a dim landscape in this square painting. They all have pale skin, and the two men have dark brown hair and beards. One man, Jesus, stands ankle-deep in a rippling dark blue stream in the center of the composition facing us with downcast eyes. He is nude except for a white cloth that drapes over one shoulder and is tied around his hips. The other end of the cloth drops into the water. Jesus’s hands are pressed together in prayer at chest-height closer to his right shoulder, to our left. He leans his torso in the other direction and looks down at the water. The second man stands on the riverbank to our right. His body faces our left but his left shoulder, closer to us, dips down so his broad back is angled toward us. His lower body is wrapped in a cobalt-blue garment bordered with what looks like sheepskin. His near hand swings back to clutch the trunk of a tree growing immediately behind him. In his other hand, he holds up a pewter-grey dish that dribbles water onto Jesus’s head. On the left riverbank, the copper-haired angel looks on, facing our right in profile but the body faces us. The angel wears a sleeveless, pumpkin-orange robe with a shimmering salmon-pink mantle draped over the right shoulder, to our left. Petal-pink and dark grey wings extend from the shoulders, and the lower legs and feet are bare. The shadowy landscape has a dark green field stretching back to jagged, sapphire-blue mountains along the horizon, which comes four-fifths of the way up this composition. Pale blue clouds skim across the vivid blue sky, where three chubby, winged babies float. One holds a triangle and a rod with which to strike it, and another might hold a rectangular musical instrument. Blue clouds split nearby to show a sliver of golden yellow light, and possibly more angels.
    The Baptism of ChristParis Bordone, c. 1535/1540Courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington