Mir Ali Heravi (Mir Ali al-Katib)
1476–1544 · Herat & Bukhara
Mir Ali Heravi, who signed as Mir Ali al-Katib or Ali al-Husayni, was born in Herat to a family of Husayni sayyids, around 1476 according to Encyclopaedia Iranica (Reed College gives 1465). He trained with Zayn al-Din Mahmud, a pupil of Sultan Ali Mashhadi, and, by Qazi Ahmad's account, with Sultan Ali himself. In Herat he copied royal decrees in the chancery and wrote manuscripts, album pieces and inscriptions in nastaliq. Around the Uzbek siege of Herat in 1528-29 he went, or was taken, to Bukhara, where he became the principal calligrapher of Abd al-Aziz Khan; a poem in his hand complains that his skill kept him there. He died in Bukhara in 951 AH (1544-45). Most of his known pieces are mounted in the albums made for the Mughal emperor Jahangir, now in Tehran and Berlin, and his son Mir Muhammad Baqir took his manner to India.
Achievements
- Worked in nastaliq for manuscripts, inscriptions and single album pieces (qit'a).
- Copied royal decrees in the Timurid chancery of Herat as a young man.
- Chief calligrapher of Abd al-Aziz Khan in Bukhara from 1529.
- Around ninety-nine of his pieces survive in the Golshan Album (Tehran) and twenty-four in the Berlin album made for Jahangir (Iranica).
- Set a standard of proportion (qanun) that later scribes followed.
- Wrote poetry in Persian and Turkish, with a taste for chronograms and riddles.
Taught by: Zayn al-Din Mahmud, Sultan Ali Mashhadi
Taught: Mir Muhammad Baqir, Mahmud ibn Ishaq al-Shihabi, Malik Daylami (Malek Deylami), Mir Sayyid Ahmad Mashhadi, Mir Husayn Bukhari, Mir Chalama
His work
about 1530–1540 · Freer Gallery of Art, Washington
Photo: Wikimedia Commons, public domain
16th century · Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Washington
Photo: Wikimedia Commons, public domain
about 1525–1543 · Library of Congress, Washington
Photo: Wikimedia Commons, public domain
1505–1545 · Asian Art Museum, San Francisco
Photo: Wikimedia Commons, public domain
Write in the tradition this hand shaped.
Write in this tradition now →Living calligraphers you can buy from — signed originals on paper, from AED 550: Anwar Alhulwani (Thuluth) · Ahmed Alhawary (Jali Thuluth, Naskh) · Rasha Kasim (Kufi) — or every Nastaliq piece the store makes: Nastaliq collection.
Sources
- Encyclopaedia Iranica, P. P. Soucek, "ʿALĪ HERAVĪ" (archived copy): life, Bukhara, death, albums, son web.archive.org
- Reed College anthology: birth 1465, signatures, forgeries, Madad al-khutut attribution, Golshan album, student al-Shihabi reed.edu
- en.wikipedia: titles Kateb al-Soltani, list of seven students en.wikipedia.org
- fa.wikipedia: c. 880-951 AH, students, Bustan 1519 in Istanbul fa.wikipedia.org
- Wikidata (no en/ar Wikipedia article under the name "Mir Ali Haravi"; ar label مير علي هروي) wikidata.org
Written by the MASHQ studio · last updated 2026-10-05. Further reading, the standard references in English: Sheila S. Blair, Islamic Calligraphy (Edinburgh University Press, 2006) · Annemarie Schimmel, Calligraphy and Islamic Culture (New York University Press, 1984) · Yasin Hamid Safadi, Islamic Calligraphy (Thames and Hudson, 1978).