A YAK HORN-SHAPED COPPER AND BRASS HUQQA BASE PROPERTY FROM THE JOURDAN-BARRY COLLECTION OF INDIAN ART Skardo, Gilgit-Baltistan, Upper Indus Valley, Northern Pakistan, late 18th century With a cylindrical curved and faceted copper body, crafted imitatingthe shape of a yak horn, embellished with overlaid openwork brass plaques decorated with meandering stylised tulip tendrils andfloral and vegetal scrolls, and with a row of copper palmettes at the bottom and top, the centre of the body with a subtle inscription in simplified nasta'liq script, possibly an abjadpun, referring to either the owner or maker of the huqqa, 20cm high. Inscription: The Creator of Nature spoke its date // The Huqqa of Ghulam Hossein is without parallels. Unusual and rare, yak horn-shaped huqqa bases such as ours started attracting the attention of Western visitors travelling through the vale of Kashmir and the Punjab hills in the 19th century. The first ones mentioning them on a published source were the Count and Countess de Ujfalvy, who travelled in those areas in 1881 (the same year as Purdon-Clarke). They acquired one of these huqqas in Skardo (specific location remains unknown) and mentioned that there were several others, of lesser quality. Mark Zebrowski suggests that the earliest huqqas from Baltistan were indeed made of genuine yak's horns, thus the shape, moving to the metal medium at a later stage, possibly around 17th - 18th century. The decorative vocabulary of these water pipe bases with marshes and water plants reflects the long-lasting impact of Indian culture upon these distant border lands of Central Asia (Mark Zebrowkski, Gold, Silver and Bronze from Mughal India, London, 1997, pp. 243 - 245). Yak horn-shaped huqqas from Baltistan have been previously offered at auction with very successful results. Please see for reference Christie's South Kensington, 8 April 2011, lot 330 and 331; and Bonhams, 5 November 2014, lot 248.