During a period of uneasy détente with Shah Abbas, the Safavid king of Iran, Jahangir dreamed the two rulers embraced—but in reality they never met. To proclaim the Mughal emperor’s superiority, the artist Abu’l Hasan cleverly manipulated symbols of sovereignty. The globe, which represents earthly rule and alludes to Jahangir’s name (World Seizer), becomes the stage for his disingenuous bear hug of the smaller, less opulently dressed shah. His lion mount even nudges the shah’s lamb back towards Iran.
