Collection ID: 0023 | Metadata type: TEI | TEI XML | Data

Title

al-Qurʼān.
القرآن

Authors

• Free Library of Philadelphia. Rare Book Department. John Frederick Lewis collection of Oriental Manuscripts

Other related names

• Gobindpurshad, Pandit, Priest, former owner
• Burton, John E. 1847-, former owner
• Lewis, John Frederick, 1860-1932, former owner
• Lewis, Anne Baker, 1868-1937, donor
• Anderson Galleries, Inc, auctioneer

Call number

Lewis O 16
(Philadelphia, Free Library of Philadelphia, Rare Book Department)

Alternate identifiers

• bibid: 2450064
• http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/1091900583
• https://know.freelibrary.org/Record/2450064

Publisher

Free Library of Philadelphia

Language

Arabic and Persian

Origin

Date

between 1600 and 1799?

Summary

Complete copy of the Qurʼān with Persian interlinear translation and marginal notations. Two pages concerning istikhārah follow the text of the Qurʼān (f. 221r-221v), but are incomplete. First two pages remounted and several pages have had their edges evened.

Notes

• Ms. codex.
   
• Title from sūrah heading (f. 1v).
   
• Newspaper clipping with headline, "A Book Worth $125,000," about a different copy of the Qurʼān, a gift from the Amir ʻAbd al-Raḥmān of Afghanistan, pasted onto the upper corner of flyleaf 1 recto at the front of the copy.
   
• A page from another Qurʼān (210 x 103 mm) pasted sideways onto back cover pastedown with a note in pencil recording the name of the previous owner, Pandit Gobindpurshad in English, Sanskrit and Perso-Arabic script. The note also says, "His Signature in the three languages" and is signed J. E. B.
   
• A note beginning, "hādhā al-kitāb" and signed Fahda Jabaly upside down on the first flyleaf recto.
   

Extent

221 leaves : 380 x 230 (285 x 162) mm bound to 388 x 250 mm

Foliation

Modern foliation in pencil added, top left recto; catchwords lower left verso.

Support

Paper

Binding

Bound in brown leather over pasteboard with flap (Type II). Boards are gold tooled with rectilinear design and have blind stamped central mandorla, pendant and cornerpiece paper onlays. Flap has matching embossed onlays and gold tooling. Spine and fore-edge flap have been reinforced with red leather. Front board is detached.

Layout

14 long lines of Arabic with 14 lines of Persian in red, border-ruled.

Decoration

Dual page illuminated first opening in gold and blue (f. 1v-2r). Textblock is border-ruled in gold. Gold roundels with a red center mark verse endings. Sūrah titles in red set off by gold rules. Rubrications in red, including text divisions markers in the margins.

Script

Written in naskh in black ink, pointed and vocalized; Persian written in nastaʻlīq in red for translation and black for marginalia; pointed.

Provenance

• Gift of Anne Baker Lewis in 1933.
   
• Formerly owned by Pandit Gobindpurshad, a priest in Delhi, India with the remark, "Mohamadan Kurran or Bible with its translation in Persian" (inscription upside down on first flyleaf recto).
   
• Formerly owned by John E. Burton (clipping from sale of his collection pasted onto front pastedown; his initials on Qurʼān leaf pasted onto back cover pastedown).
   
• Sold in the John E. Burton sale at Anderson Galleries, November 17, 1915, lot 1487 (Catalog entry for the sale pasted onto the front pastedown with added note in pencil dated 11/17/1915).
   
• Formerly owned by John Frederick Lewis.
   

Subjects topical

• Manuscripts, Arabic--17th century
• Manuscripts, Arabic--18th century
• Manuscripts, Persian--17th century
• Manuscripts, Persian--18th century

Genres

• Codices (bound manuscripts)
• Illuminations (painting)
• Manuscripts (documents)
• Qurʼans
• Islamic bindings (Binding)
• Full covers
• Envelope flaps (features)

Licenses

• Text

  These images and the content of Rare Book Department Lewis O 16: al-Qurʼān. are free of known copyright restrictions and in the public domain. See the Creative Commons Public Domain Mark page for usage details, http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/.

  URL

  http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/

• Text

  To the extent possible under law, Free Library of Philadelphia, Special Collections has waived all copyright and related or neighboring rights to this metadata about Rare Book Department Lewis O 16: al-Qurʼān.. This work is published from: United States. For a summary of CC0, see https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/. Legal code: https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/legalcode.

  URL

  https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/legalcode

Table of contents

• fol. 1v — al-Qurʼān.

Decorations

• fol. 1v — Dual page illumination
• fol. 2r — Dual page illumination