A large Safavid mosaic work tile reading 'Allah', Iran, 17th century or later, comprising cut rectangular sections in cobalt, turquoise, white and yellow, with a design of highly stylised square kufic, 41 x 41cm. square.Note: Mosaic or cut tiles were produced to great effect in the Timurid and Safavid periods. It was an extremely time-consuming technique, which continued up to the 19th Century in Central Asia, and in Iran under the Safavids. While tile mosaic continued to be employed in Safavid Iran, Shah ‘Abbas’ impatience to see his religious monuments completed encouraged the greater use of the quicker cuerda seca technique. These tiles can be compared to a tile on the Friday Mosque, Isfahan, datable to the Safavid era (Gerard Degeorge and Yves Porter, The Art of the Islamic Tile, 2002, p. 139). The design is also similar to that on a tile in the cuerda seca technique, said to have come from the tomb of Sheikh Baha al-Din Nuri at Khojand in Turkestan, now in the British Museum (Venetia Porter, Islamic Tiles, London, 1995, fig. 65, p. 70).Some pitting to glaze, losses to edges, wear, and areas of restoration