Vintage Indo Persian Engraved Steel Pear Fruit

This is a wonderful piece of decorative Indo Persian metalwork, a hand engraved steel pear in the Qajar tradition. Persian and Indian metalworkers made these sculptural fruits in engraved steel as ornaments for the home, and the type is well documented, with related examples held in the National Museum of Iran. The auction house we bought it from described the decoration as Indo Persian, and the engraving here is a joy, blossoms and scrolling foliage wrapping right around the body, with a seated figure worked into the design that rewards a closer look.

We would call it vintage or antique rather than fix it to a single year, since these fruits were made across a long span and the earlier and later pieces look much alike. What is not in doubt is the age and the hand work. Time has given the steel a deep smoky patina, near black in the hollows and lifting to soft pewter on the high points, with warm flecks of rust where the bare metal shows through, a finish no reproduction can copy. A looped stem and a spray of cut leaves with serrated edges complete it, and its tall pear shape gives it real sculptural presence.

It measures 15.5 x 15 cm and has a satisfying weight in the hand, so it holds its own wherever you set it. We love a piece like this for the history it brings to a room. Stand it on a stack of antiquarian books, group it with its matching apple and orange for a striking still life, or set it alone on a mantel or console where the engraving and splayed leaves can be admired from every angle. It also makes a brilliant, slightly unexpected paperweight for a desk or study.

There is honest age and wear here, with surface pitting, patina and light rust in keeping with its years. To our eye it only deepens the charm, and we would simply keep it somewhere dry to preserve the surface.