Window with a Peacock Design
Late 18th–early 19th c., Ottoman Egypt
The Rotch windows from Ottoman Egypt preserve both popular and rare designs from the repertoire of nineteenth-century artisans. Some, like the flower-vase design and the cypress tree, abundantly decorate historic homes and mosques of Cairo. Yet few, if any, peacock designs remain among the stucco windows still intact in Egypt today, though some are recorded in situ within the watercolors of nineteenth-century travelers, like the painter John Frederick Lewis (d. 1876). Artisans may have produced models like these for individual purchase. Beyond local buyers, window artisans and regional dealers profited from sales of uninstalled models to foreign tourists. However, this MIT window preserves metal brackets along the top edge of the wooden frame, suggesting its removal from a standing structure after its installation. Such brackets still appear on windows installed on surviving Cairene mansions from this era.
Rotch / Lamb Art Collection, Department of Distinctive Collections, MIT Libraries:
Available at Distinctive Collections Noncirculating Collection 1 (Rotch Art Collection 8), Identifier: 1498530295