Lot 2R
Four illuminated Qur'an leaves Persia, Herat, circa 1550
25 October 2021, 11:00 BST
London, New Bond StreetSold for £510 inc. premium
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Four illuminated Qur'an leaves
Persia, Herat, circa 1550
Persia, Herat, circa 1550
Arabic manuscript on paper, four leaves mounted together in one frame, 15 lines to each page, first, eighth and fifteenth lines written in thuluth script in gold, remainder of text in smaller naskhi script in black ink with diacritics and vowel points in black and red, gold and blue roundels between verses, naskhi text bordered by illuminated cusped vertical devices within side panels, inner margins ruled in blue and gold, catchwords in outer margins of two leaves
each leaf 320 x 222 mm.; frame 113 x 95 cm.
each leaf 320 x 222 mm.; frame 113 x 95 cm.
Footnotes
Text
(upper left) Sura XI, Hud, The prophet Hud, bismallah, verse 1 to part of verse 10.
(upper right) Sura VII, al-A'raf, The Heights, part of verse 184 to part of verse 194.
(lower left) Sura VII, al-A'raf, The Heights, part of verse 143 to part of verse 150.
(lower right) Sura VII, al-A'raf, The Heights, part of verse 164 to part of verse 172.
Compare with an illuminated Qur'an, Herat, Afghanistan, 16th Century, in the British Library (MS 13087), with the area allotted to the text partitioned within a rectangular framework to enable the use of a number of scripts, and with similar illumination (see John Reeve (ed.), Sacred: Books of the Three Faiths: Judaism, Christianity, Islam, London 2007, p. 113 & colour illustration).
For a bifolium from the same manuscript, see Christie's South Kensington, Arts and Textiles of the Islamic and Indian Worlds, 28th April 2017, lot 42. The format of this bifolium, with its three lines in gold and its panels of naskhi flanked by cusped vertical devices, is strikingly similar to that of a complete Qur'an, copied in Herat by Muhammad ibn Mirak, and dated AH 965/AD 1558, sold at Christie's, Islamic Art and Manuscripts, 29th April 2003, lot 18. There is another Qur'an, ascribed to Herat or Tabriz, circa 1525-50, written in a very similar if not identical hand, and with identical verse-markers, in the Nasser D. Khalili Collection (see D. James, After Timur: Qur'ans of the 15th and 16th Centuries, London 1992, pp. 128-135, no. 35).
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