Enrica Medugno
Sale Coordinator
Lot 13•
A fine illuminated Qur'an Kashmir, first quarter of the 19th Century
12 November 2024, 11:00 GMT
London, New Bond StreetSold for £12,800 inc. premium
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Oliver White
Head of Department
A fine illuminated Qur'an
Kashmir, first quarter of the 19th Century
Kashmir, first quarter of the 19th Century
Arabic and Persian manuscript on paper, 540 leaves, 10 lines to the page written in naskhi script in black ink with diacritics and vowel points in black, interlinear Persian translation in small nasta'liq script in red, interlinear rules in gold, inner margins ruled in blue and gold, verse-endings marked by gold roundels, extensive commentaries written diagonally in nasta'liq and naskhi script in black and orange in wide outer margins throughout, sura headings written in riqa' script in blue or white on a gold ground within illuminated panels, one double-page illuminated frontispiece in colours and gold, followed by an illuminated headpiece at the beginning of sura II, al-Baqarah, closing double-page illuminated finispiece, contemporary Kashmiri painted lacquer binding, inside covers with attractive stylised cypress trees
305 x 200 mm.
305 x 200 mm.
Footnotes
Provenance
Perhaps formerly in the personal library of Prince Farhad Mirza.
Private UK collection.
The extensive marginal commentaries are on the meaning of phrases in nasta'liq in black on each part of the Qur'an (which are written in orange-red in naskhi), ending with quotations from the Jawahir al-tafsir of Kamal al-Din Husayn Wa'iz Kashifi (d. AH 910/AD 1504-06), and also giving the date of its composition, in a poem by his son, in abjad, as AH 892/AD 1486-87.
There is an entry note to a personal library dated Shawwal 1243/AD August-September 1827, as well as a note by the Qajar Prince Farhad Mirza, dated Tuesday 8 Muharram 1302/28th October 1884, who also wrote two couplets quoted from Amir 'Alishir Nava'i, the contemporary of Husayn Wa'iz Kashifi. He mentions the date 2nd Shawwal 899/6th July 1494 which may be date of the composition of Jawahir al-tafsir.