Rhazes Examines a Boy

What it is

This is a colour print of a painting by the modern Iranian artist Hossein Behzad, showing a bearded man in a turban examining a kneeling boy who has his mouth open, set in a room full of medical equipment, jars, and instruments.

Why it matters

The painting does not come from al-Razi's own lifetime. It was made centuries later to celebrate him as a founder of medicine, especially as the figure who in modern Iran is remembered as the father of pediatrics. It tells us more about how he is remembered than about what he actually looked like or did.

Look closer

• What details in the room suggest this is a medical setting?
• Why might an artist centuries later choose to paint al-Razi with a child patient?
• What might this image leave out about the real conditions of medicine in his time?