2024 - Stars over Mashhad: Empiricism, Globalism, and the Creative Imagination in Seventeenth-century Iran, by Heather Ecker

This forthcoming book, edited by Dr. Heather Ecker, shines a spotlight on the remarkable scientific and artistic achievements fostered under the patronage of Abu’l-Fath Manuchihr Khan, governor-general of Khurasan in Safavid Iran. Stars over Mashhad brings together a team of international scholars to explore two extraordinary manuscripts produced during Manuchihr Khan’s tenure: an illustrated Arabic translation of Dioscorides’ Materia Medica and a stunning Persian version of al-Sufi’s famous Book of the Constellations of the Fixed Stars. Together with a specially commissioned celestial globe, these works represent an exceptional fusion of scientific rigor, artistic innovation, and Persian-Islamic intellectual life in the early 17th century.

Through close studies of the manuscripts’ texts, illustrations, and production methods, this richly illustrated volume offers new insights into the creative collaboration between astronomers and artists. It challenges the common notion that scientific activity was in decline in Safavid Iran and reveals a dynamic intellectual climate grounded in empirical observation and global connections.

The volume also places these masterpieces within the broader context of Mashhad’s vibrant kitabkhana (manuscript workshop), Safavid-era science, and the transmission of astronomical knowledge across Islamic and European traditions. By analyzing both Persian and Arabic copies of these texts held in New York and Cairo, the book uncovers layers of commentary and artistic experimentation previously unrecognized.

Dr. Heather Ecker is an established scholar of Islamic art and a former museum curator. This project, supported by The Barakat Trust, brings fresh attention to the intersection of science, art, and cross-cultural exchange in early modern Iran.