Horseman with two shields and two swords, from Manual on the Arts of Horsemanship (Nihayat al-su’l wa al-umniya fi ta‘allum ‘amal al-furusiyya) by al-Aqsara'i

`Umar b. `Abdallah b. `Umar al-Shafi’i

Detached folio, ink, pigments and gold on paper, painting (on recto) and Arabic text, from a set of twelve detached folios and one codex, Cairo, Egypt, dated 1366. Painting: horseman with two shields and two swords, with side-caption: “Image of a horseman with two swords and two small hide shields, one up at his face and the other in his hand with the sword". First composed in Mamluk Damascus, al-Aqsara'i's well-known military encyclopaedia describes the many skills required for an effective cavalry army, organised in twelve lessons. This painting is from Lesson Three, "On the Use of the Sword", under Method Five, "On the Use of Two Swords and Two Small Shields". There is an extensive Arabic literature on the arts of horsemanship, and this copy (made in Cairo in 1366) is one of the earliest illustrated examples in existence. These arts include the care and training of horses, the correct handling of weapons, and equestrian parade displays for the hippodrome, as well as cavalry formations in battle, just distribution of war booty, and treaty negotiations.