Revisiting the Fragmented Star Tile with Lovers

I first discussed the Fragmented Star Tile with Lovers as an object that signifies the rank of the poet in the Medieval world. The Middle Eastern ceramic tile was one of many made to decorate both religious and secular buildings in the 13^th-14^th century. Its points joined in intricate patterns with other tiles that displayed ornamental designs or verses from the Qur’an. Initially, I looked to the context of the tile’s placement for implications about the Medieval poet. However, after looking more closely at poetry as an art, I have realized that the star tile itself also embodies many aspects of poetry in the Middle Ages. It exemplifies the mixing of ideas that propagated Medieval culture and integration of art forms that were used to tell stories.

The combination of religious verse and a love scene at first seemed very unnatural, even taboo, to me. Why was a drawing of an intimate scene placed among Qur’anic verse? Would it not have been seen as vulgar? Wasn’t it perhaps disrespectful to the holy? I have since discovered that there was in fact a close connection between religious devotion and passionate love in Medieval world, particularly in Persian poetry. I was introduced to this concept through Rumi, whose work is commonly perceived as love poetry but is based in spirituality and devotion. It struck me as an unlikely pairing, especially since in modern culture we make a clear distinction between “love of God” romantic love. Through Rumi I learned that in the Middle Ages, these two emotions were one and the same. I was surprised by the intensity of the language in his poems­– from “O Love…Robbing the caravan of hearts along the highway” (Lewis 338) to “…this love of yours thirsts for my blood” (Lewis 348). It is natural to wonder if these lines were written to express feelings for a lover, as that is often how the poems are used now. I found it very interesting that the verses were actually dedicated to a friend and spiritual mentor to express love that is, in a sense, religious and devotional. This fact sheds some light on the placement of the Star Tile with Lovers among tiles containing lines from the Qur’an. Not only was it acceptable for the intimate to exist alongside the holy, it was a widespread idea expressed commonly in poetry.

Though we only have pieces of the poem that lined the edges of the star tile, what is left reads as follows:

“. . . wings were broken.
. . . from the prince, felicity came to me.
Even if fate is not auspicious, give in to
your destiny. “
I can safely guess that the man in the drawing is probably the prince and the poem was written from the perspective of the woman, admiring and worshipping him. In this star tile, the central image and bordering poetry work together not only in terms of design, but also to tell the story more completely and more effectively. This is especially important for this fragmented star tile, since the image gives us pieces of the poem that have been broken off and vice versa. A direct parallel can be made here between this sort of visual storytelling and the relationship between Medieval poetry and storytelling in general. When reading the Bayad wa Riyad, I saw how poetry and narrative could propel each other, each enriching the other and driving the plot forward while adding depth to the story. Similarly, on this star tile we see poetry and imagery enhancing each other. The calligraphic poetry frames the lovers both literally and figuratively, adding a unifying visual element to the tile and providing context for the scene depicted. I am curious as to whether this Tile with Lovers was placed with tiles representing more parts of the same tale. Did the storytelling extend beyond this tile to integrate other objects? Were tiles like this made to exist independently at all?

As my learning went beyond the role of the poet and to poetry itself, I was able to recognize that the Fragmented Star Tile with Lovers contained much more information about the Middle Ages than I had initially thought. What I previously pictured as a possible taboo, an outlier to its more pious surroundings, was actually a perfect example of spiritual ideas and a representation of integration in storytelling methods. Aside from the implications about the rank of the poet, the star tile essentially turned out to represent the exact opposite of what I had thought. I've learned that an object is not necessarily what it seems to be at first and that with further study, I can recognize the deeper implications that the artifact might hold.