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'Khosrow and Shirin', also spelled Khosrau and Shirin, Chosroes and Shirin, Husraw and Shireen and Khosru and Shirin, is the title of a celebrated Persian tragic romance by the Persian poet Nizami Ganjavi (1141–1209) who also wrote 'Layla and Majnun'.<br/><br/>

It tells an elaborate fictional version of the story of the love of the Sasanian king Khosrow II for the Armenian princess Shirin, who becomes his queen. The narrative is a love story of Persian origin which is also well-known from the great historical poem the Shahnameh.
This painting depicts a well-known passage from the story of Layla and Majnun described in the third book of Nizami's 'Khamsah or 'Quintet'. Separated by their respective tribes' hostility, forced marriage, and years of exile into the wilderness, the two ill-fated lovers meet again for the last time before their deaths thanks to the intervention of Majnun's elderly messenger.<br/><br/>

On seeing each other in a palm-grove outside  Layla's camp, they both faint of passion and pain. The old messenger attempts to revive the lovers, while the wild animals protect Majnun by attacking unwarranted intruders.<br/><br/>

The location and time of the narrative is suggested  by the two tents dressed in the middleground and the dark night sky in the background. The composition's style is typical of paintings made in the city of Shiraz during the second half of the 16th century.
Nizami Ganjavi (Persian: نظامی گنجوی; Kurdish: Nîzamî Gencewî, نیزامی گه‌نجه‌وی, Nezāmi-ye Ganjavi; Azerbaijani: Nizami Gəncəvi, نظامی گنجوی;‎ 1141 to 1209) Nizami, whose formal name was Niẓām ad-Dīn Abū Muḥammad Ilyās ibn-Yūsuf ibn-Zakkī, was a 12th-century Persian poet. Nezāmi is considered the greatest romantic epic poet in Persian literature, who brought a colloquial and realistic style to the Persian epic.<br/><br/>

His heritage is widely appreciated and shared by Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Iran, the Kurdistan region and Tajikistan.
The Isra and Mi'raj (Arabic: الإسراء والمعراج‎, transl. al-ʾIsrāʾ wa l-Miʿrāğ), are the two parts of a Night Journey that, according to Islamic tradition, the Prophet Muhammad took during a single night around the year 621. It considered as both a physical and spiritual journey.<br/><br/>

A brief outline of the story is related in surah 17 'Al-Isra' of the Qur'an, and other details come from the Hadith, supplemental accounts of the life ofthe Prophet Muhammad recorded by his companions. In the journey, the Prophet Muhammad travels on the celestial mount Al-Buraq to 'the farthest temple' (Holy Temple of Al-Quds or Jerusalem) where he leads other prophets in prayer. He then ascends through the seven heavens where he speaks to God, who gives Muhammad instructions to take back to the faithful on Earth about the number of times to offer prayers each day.<br/><br/>

According to traditions, the Journey is associated with the Lailat al Miraj, as one of the most significant events in the Islamic calendar.<br/><br/>

Representations of the Prophet Muhammad are controversial, and generally forbidden in Sunni Islam (especially Hanafiyya, Wahabi, Salafiyya). Shia Islam and some other branches of Sunni Islam (Hanbali, Maliki, Shafi'i) are generally more tolerant of such representational images, but even so the Prophet's features are generally veiled or concealed by flames as a mark of deep respect.