Sultan Ali Mashhadi (; fl 1453âÂÂ1519, d. 1520) was a Persian calligrapher and master of the nastaliq script.
Born in Mashhad, Sultan âÂÂAli lost his father when he was seven and that early on in life he began practicing calligraphy on his own. He was autodidact till he moved to Herat somewhere around the year 1468. There he was trained by Azhar, or by one of AzharâÂÂs students. From 1470 Sultan âÂÂAli worked for the major bibliophiles of the time, Sultan Husayn (1469âÂÂ1506) and his boon companion Ali-Shir Nava'i. He designed architectural inscriptions, such as the one (1477âÂÂ8) on the marble platform for the tombstones of Sultan HusaynâÂÂs ancestors erected in the Shrine of Khwaja Abd Allah. He also calligraphed some of the finest Persian and Turkish manuscripts produced for the Timurid court, such as a copy of SaâÂÂdiâÂÂs Gulistan (1486; Art and History Collection, LTS1995.2.30), copy of âÂÂAttarâÂÂs Mantiq al-tayr (1487; Met., 63.210) and a copy of SaâÂÂdiâÂÂs Bustan (1488; Egyptian N. Lib., Adab Farsi 908).
After Sultan Husayn's death in 1506 and the overthrow of the Timurid dynasty Sultan âÂÂAli retired to Mashhad. There in 1514 he wrote Adab-e Khatt (âÂÂEtiquette of CalligraphyâÂÂ), a verse treatise in Persian on writing and teaching calligraphy, which was later incorporated in Qazi Ahmad's biography of calligraphers and painters. This work contains both practical and autobiographical information and shows the close association between religious discipline and the practice of calligraphy. He died in Mashhad.
Compared to the hand of his predecessor Jafar Tabrizi (fl. 1412âÂÂ1431), Sultan âÂÂAli's is more spacious, delicate and fluid. He shows a mastery of control and modulation, introducing visual rhythms by elongating and emphasizing certain forms, like the stroke on letter kaph. Sultan âÂÂAli's nastaliq "demonstrates a fine balance between fluidity and discipline, the same characteristics that he mentioned in his treatise on calligraphy". In his writings the eastern, or Khorasani, style of nastaliq, associated with Jafar and Azhar, reached its classic form, and in the Safavid era also became the predominant in western Iran. "The eastern style, as further perfected in the following centuries, is the nastaliq now in use in Persia". Because of this nastaliq of Sultan âÂÂAli "remained the epitome of the style, assidously collected and treasured by later connoiseurs and emulated by his successors for centuries to come". Qazi Ahmad wrote about Sultan âÂÂAli that "His writing conquered the world and is among other writings as the sun among other planets". Sultan âÂÂAli trained many great calligraphers of the 16th century, like Sultan Muhammad Nur or Sultan Muhammad Khandan.