From Sequence to the Chosen Moment: A Comparative Study of Figural Representation and Narrative Time in the Painting "The Killing of Arjāsp by Esfandiyār" in the Bāysunghurī and Ṭahmāsbī Shāhnāmas

Abstract

Narrative texts and narrative images organize time through fundamentally different representational systems. A literary narrative unfolds events sequentially, allowing the reader to encounter actions in a linear progression, whereas a painting presents all visual information at once within a fixed pictorial field. The painter therefore cannot reproduce narrative succession and must instead select a single stage of the event and construct it so that it carries the weight of the whole story. Among the illustrated episodes of Ferdowsi's Shāhnāma, "The Killing of Arjāsp by Esfandiyār" offers an exceptional opportunity for comparative analysis, since it was illustrated both in the Bāysunghurī Shāhnāma (833 AH/1430 CE) and in the Ṭahmāsbī Shāhnāma (sixteenth century). Although both derive from the same literary source and depict the same narrative episode, they differ markedly in temporal organization.

Previous studies of these two paintings have concentrated on stylistic characteristics, compositional design, geometric structure, symbolism, or iconographic interpretation. Comparatively little attention has been paid to the question of which narrative moment each painter selected, and no study has proposed a criterion by which that moment might be identified. Moreover, the Bāysunghurī painting has almost always been read on its own, without being set against another pictorial account of the same event; without such a comparison it is impossible to establish which pictorial decisions were unavoidable and which were choices of the workshop.

This study therefore seeks to establish an operational definition of the "chosen moment" and to compare the two paintings through concrete figural evidence rather than stylistic judgment. The chosen moment is defined here as the stage of the narrative sequence selected for representation, identified through the figural condition of the defeated figure: if he retains his military equipment and his body remains active, the moment precedes the outcome; if his equipment has been removed and his body is inverted or lifeless, the moment follows it. The study adopts a qualitative, descriptive-analytical and comparative methodology. The tertium comparationis is the figural representation of the principal characters. Data were collected through a standardized analytical sheet applied independently to each painting before any comparison was made. Four indicators carry the argument: bodily posture and gesture, position within the composition, attached equipment, and colour.

The theoretical framework operates on four levels. Lessing's Laocoön (1766) supplies the governing proposition: because a painting can show only one moment, the selection of that moment is both unavoidable and meaningful, and the most fruitful moment is not the climax itself. Dehejia's typology of visual narration (1990) supplies the instrument for identifying which pictorial solution each painting adopts, the decisive criterion being whether figures are repeated within the frame. Baer (2004) supplies the rule for reading figures in this tradition: where a figure lacks individual features, identification proceeds from the narrative structure of the chosen scene, so that what is read are conventional signs rather than naturalistic expression. Finally, Imdahl's notion of narrative suspension, as applied to Persian painting by Alipour et al., shows that the problem of moment-selection is already operative within this tradition.

The comparative analysis shows that neither painting repeats a principal figure, and that both therefore stand closer to the monoscenic mode than to continuous narration. What separates them is not the mode of narration but the moment selected. In the Bāysunghurī painting Arjāsp is bare-headed, stripped of armour and helmet, and shown inverted: the moment represented follows his death and the capture of the fortress. Narrative stages are distributed across three distinct pictorial zones corresponding to three locations, so that the passage of time is signalled through change of place and through the hierarchical rank of the figures. In the Ṭahmāsbī painting Arjāsp is still alive, with a blade held at his throat: the moment precedes his death. Here the unity of place is preserved, and the decisive encounter is enclosed within a separate frame at the lower edge of the composition — a device of isolation and emphasis rather than a temporal device.

Closer examination confirms that bodily posture, attached equipment, spatial placement, and colour function not as descriptive detail but as indicators of narrative time. The evidence converges across three independent groups of figures. Arjāsp's equipment and bodily condition distinguish the two temporal states; the two sisters appear calm and centrally placed in the Bāysunghurī painting, indicating that deliverance has been accomplished, whereas in the Ṭahmāsbī painting they stand at the margins, anxious and withdrawn, sustaining the tension of an unresolved situation; and the soldiers are settled after victory in the first painting but engaged in scattered combat in the second. The relation between image and inscribed text points the same way: the Bāysunghurī page carries no verses at all, while the twelve verses of the Ṭahmāsbī page speak of the beheading that the image itself withholds.

The comparison ultimately demonstrates that the fundamental distinction between the two paintings cannot be explained by stylistic differences between the Herat and Tabriz schools alone. It originates in a narrative decision about which stage of the event to represent, and that decision governs the figural condition of every character in the scene. The finding also qualifies Lessing's formulation: he treated the fruitful moment as a single objective point, whereas these two paintings show two workshops selecting opposite sides of the climax, so that fruitfulness proves to be a directed choice determining whether the viewer reconstructs the story backwards or forwards.

Keywords: Figural representation; Narrative time; Chosen moment; Bāysunghurī Shāhnāma; Ṭahmāsbī Shāhnāma.