This vessel unfolds like a dense manuscript in metal, where inscription, figural imagery, and symbolic ornament are interlaced into one continuous dialogue. Its surface is structured by broad registers of text and medallions, each framing scenes of authority, devotion, and divine order.

Calligraphic Inscriptions
Tall bands of Kufic and Thuluth script dominate the body, their elongated letters forming an architectural frame that binds together word and image. The inscriptions proclaim:

Arabic:
"العز لملكنا العادل مولانا السلطان الناصر القائد الولي المولى"

Transliteration:
al-ʿizz li-mālikinā al-ʿādil, mawlānā al-Sulṭān al-Nāṣir, al-qāʾid, al-walī, al-mawlā.

Translation:
“Glory to our just king, our lord the Sultan al-Nāṣir, the commander, the guardian, the master.”

The script circles the vessel like a halo of authority, its words punctuated by medallions of imagery, weaving a balance between speech and spectacle.

Artistic Details

• Royal Medallions: Within circular frames appear princes, viziers, and attendants, their postures leaning toward one another in subtle gestures of service, counsel, and ceremony. Judges preside over a trial of a criminal, suggesting justice rendered in the Sultan’s court.
• Animal Frieze: Along the upper border, elongated creatures, lions or hunting dogs, chase each other in rhythmic pursuit, a band of perpetual motion above the still dignity of the inscriptions.
• Hidden Faces: A narrower lower band is filled with tiny human visages, like a silent audience encircling the vessel, bearing witness to the authority it represents.
• Geometric & Fustūniyyah Framework: Between the medallions, geometric interlaces (dawāʾir fustūniyyah) radiate outward, structuring the design as though word and image were suspended in a cosmic order.
• Wildlife Border: Above the script, a crown of wildlife runs in procession, gazelles, birds, and beasts, merging courtly authority with the natural order.
• Royal Seals: Three distinct stamps of the Sultana appear toward the base, validating the vessel as a symbol of dynasty and legitimacy.
• Lower Decoration: The bottom is framed with Mamluk arabesques, flowing Islamic leaves, and vegetal tracery, grounding the vessel in the ornament of paradise gardens.

Interpretation
This sedryah is not merely a container but a theatre of rulership. Kings, viziers, servants, and judges are cast in metal as if performing within a perpetual trial of justice and governance. The surrounding wildlife and geometric star-forms situate the Sultan at the axis of worldly and divine order. In its layering of text, human figures, animals, and arabesque foliage, the vessel speaks with multiple voices, political, spiritual, and cosmic, each reinforcing the Sultan’s claim to authority.