more brilliant period in a long series. Again architecture
was clothed in sumptuous color such as has never been
surpassed, and the arts of the book attained supreme
perfection.

With the coming of the Safavids ( 1501-1734), the
last of the great artistic phases, the inexhaustible vitality
of the Iranian artistic tradition was once more demon-
strated. Shah Ismael ( 1501-1524), Shah Tahmasp ( 1524-
1576), and Shah Abbas I ( 1589-1627) presided over
courts in which artists ranked with ambassadors, one
more epoch in which art was held the attribute of kings
and the most worthy expression of the state's power.

Misfortunes thereafter afflicted Persia. A series of
weak and incompetent rulers, a cruel and bloody inva-
sion from Afghanistan ( 1722), a temporarily successful
but violent and exhausting imperialistic revival under
Nadir Shah ( 1729-1747), left the country in no condi-
tion to adjust successfully to a developing Europe with
its industrial productivity and new lines of commerce
which by-passed Iran, so that she was condemned to
frustration and perilously declining power under the
uncouth Kajars in the nineteenth century.

But the significant feature of Iranian history is its
power of survival and revival. She has so often responded
to catastrophe and depression with a new and creative
burst of vigor that her ability to recover has become
something of an historical mystery. The restoration of
the country under Riza Shah Pahlavi ( 1925-42) dem-
onstrated that the nation still had reservoirs of energy
and adaptability.

Despite the crippling loss of intelligent patronage of
the arts for nearly two centuries, the disintegration of
their essential economic support, the temporary weaken-
ing of the national tradition, the imposition through
the prestige of European power of tasteless styles of the
industrial era, the corruption of native taste incidental
to poverty and the demoralization of standards in educa-
tion, religion, and social life, -- despite all this the artistic
spirit of Iran is not dead. There are still draftsmen of
superb capacity. Work in some of the ceramic techniques
is as good as ever, and the best of the contemporary
carpets, as yet not seen in the West, in color and weav-
ing-skill hold their own with their famous prototypes.
A revival of design, the foundation and soul of Iranian
art, awaits discipline and a deepening of the national
life, the slowly returning prestige of the artist, and the
inspiration of a serious and informed clientele, indis-
pensable to high achievement.

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