Tuesday, April 3, 2012

Ancient Manuscript Review 50 : Antique Daghestan Quran ( 1165 AH)







This is my another large Daghestan Quran. The first 2 pages are water painted with various colors. This Quran is copied by Ibnu Ismail in 1165 AH. Actually this is a mistaken purchase. I asked a dealer from Lebanon to find for me a Kashmiri Quran which then I didnt have any. So he showed me this Quran and he insisted that it was Kashmiri. I paid quite a good sum for this Quran. However after the purchase, Dr Annable Gallop told me that this Quran is not Kashmiri but Daghestani.
I was a bit dissapointed with this purchase. I purchased a good quality Daghestani Quran before and it costed me 3 times cheaper than this Quran. Yet this Quran is not in a good shape. Very inconsistent handwritings suggesting few scribes or might be a compliation of Quran from other manuscripts. The calligraphy is poor suggesting it was written by a non professional scribe.

The first 2 pages were gilded in gold. However it was obviously a later addition. See below pictures under the lighting panel. I could see similar inscriptions below the gold background. I couldnt understand why someone might have wanted to erase this surah Fateha,glide in gold and rewrite it. If it was done to upgrade the quality and the price, it didnt do well. Definitely these frontispieces lost their beauty with this modifications.




Manuscript Specs

Item : A Handwritten Daghestan Quran
Content : A complete Quran
Dim : 13.5" x 9" x 2.5"
Date : 1165 AH ( 1751 CE))
Copyist : Ibnu Ismail
Origin : Daghestan
Calligraphy : Naskh
Design : Text written in Naskh script on laid paper with vowel & diacritical signs in black and red. 15 lines per page.Margin or most pages were decorated with beautiful floral motive water painted. Leather cover was not original.
Purchased Price :USD

3 comments:

  1. I like your collection its quite good . If you are buyer so i have very important royal books like mamulke , mughal and persian and many more if you are selling so kindly contact me if you have any important books

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Please send me email to bluebell913@hotmail.com.

      Many thanks,

      Delete
  2. Hallo Abu Dervish. I want to ask how mach is this Quran? Please send me emael to baeder_w@yahoo.de

    ReplyDelete