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Early Quranic manuscripts

The production of the Quran was first prompted by preachings of the prophet Muhammad, who Muslims believe received revelations from God. Muhammad’s revelations were said to have been recorded orally and in writing, through Muhammad and his followers up until his death in 632 AD. These recordings make up what is known as the Quran, Islam’s most divine text. In Muslim tradition, the text of the Quran is traditionally said to have been united into its extant form during the reign of the third caliph Uthman (r. 644–656). According to Corpus Coranicum, a research organization funded by the Government of Germany, more than 60 fragments including more than 2000 folios (4000 pages) are so far known as the textual witnesses (manuscripts) of the Qur’an before 800CE (within 168 years after the death of Prophet Muhammad)[1]. However, in 2015, experts from the University of Birmingham UK introduced a manuscript which is possibly the oldest manuscript of the Quran in the world. Radiocarbon tests to determine the age of the manuscript revealed that this manuscript could be traced back to between 6th or 7th century (between 568 and 645 CE).[2] Selected manuscripts from the first four centuries after the death of Prophet Muhammad (632-1032CE) are listed below.

Contents 1 Hijazi manuscripts 1.1 Sana'a manuscript 1.2 Codex Parisino-petropolitanus 1.2.1 BnF Arabe 328(c) and Birmingham fragment 1.3 Tübingen fragment 1.4 Add. 1125 2 Kufic manuscripts 2.1 The Blue Quran Topkapi manuscript 2.2 Samarkand Kufic Quran 2.3 Gotthelf Bergsträßer Archive 3 Other Manuscripts 3.1 The Ma'il Quran 3.2 4 References 5 See also

Hijazi manuscripts

Hijazi manuscripts are some of the earliest forms of Quranic texts, and can be characterized by Hijazi script. Hijazi script is distinguished by its "informal, sloping Arabic script." The most widely used Qurans were written in the Hijazi style script, a style that originates before Kufic style script. This is portrayed by the rightward inclining of the tall shafts of the letters, and the vertical extension of the letters.

Sana'a manuscript

Main article: Sana'a manuscript The Sana'a manuscript, is one of the oldest Quranic manuscripts in existence. It was found, along with many other Quranic and non-Quranic fragments, in Yemen in 1972 during restoration of the Great Mosque of Sana'a. The manuscript is written on parchment, and comprises two layers of text (see palimpsest). The upper text conforms to the standard 'Uthmanic Quran, whereas the lower text contains many variants to the standard text. An edition of the lower text was published in 2012.[3] A radiocarbon analysis has dated the parchment containing the lower text to before 671 AD with a 99% accuracy.[4]

Codex Parisino-petropolitanus

Main article: Codex Parisino-petropolitanus The so-called Codex Parisino-petropolitanus formerly conserved portions of two of the oldest extant Quranic manuscripts. Most surviving leaves represent a Quran that is preserved in various fragments, the largest part of which are kept in the Bibliothèque nationale de France, as BNF Arabe 328(ab). 46 leaves are held at the National Library of Russia, and one each in the Vatican Library, and in the Khalili Collections.

BnF Arabe 328(c) and Birmingham fragment

Main article: Birmingham Quran manuscript BnF Arabe 328(c), formerly bound with BnF Arabe 328(ab), has 16 leaves,[5] with two additional leaves discovered in Birmingham in 2015 (Mingana 1572a, bound with an unrelated Quranic manuscript).[6] [7]

This manuscript may date to the mid-7th century: The parchment of the Birmingham fragment has been carbon-dated to between 568 and 645 with a confidence of 97.2%, indicating the animal from which the parchment was made lived during that time.

BnF Arabe 328(c) was part of the lot of pages from the store of Quranic manuscripts at the Mosque of Amr ibn al-As in Fustat bought by French Orientalist Jean-Louis Asselin de Cherville (1772–1822) when he served as vice-consul in Cairo during 1806–1816.

The 16 folia in Paris contain the text of sura 10:35 to 11:95 and of 20:99 to 23:11. The Birmingham folia cover part of the lacuna in the Paris portion, with parts of the text of suras 18, 19 and 20. The text is laid out in the format that was to become standard for complete Quran texts, with chapter divisions indicated by linear decoration, and verse endings by intertextual clustered dots.

Tübingen fragment In November 2014, the University of Tübingen in Germany announced that a partial Quran manuscript in their possession (Ms M a VI 165), had been carbon dated (with a confidence of 95%), to between 649 and 675.[8][9][10][11] The manuscript is now recognised as being written in hijazi script, although in the 1930 catalogue of the collection it is classified as "Kufic", and consists of the Quranic verses 17:36, to 36:57 (and part of verse 17:35). [12]

Add. 1125 This manuscript was acquired by University of Cambridge from Edward H. Palmer (1840-1882) and EE Tyrwhitt Drake.[13] It was created before 800CE according to Corpus Coranicum.[14]

Kufic manuscripts

Kufic manuscripts can be characterized by the Kufic form of calligraphy. Kufic calligraphy, which was later named after art historians in the 19th or 20th century is described by means of precise upstanding letters. For a long time, the Blue Qur'an, the Topkapi manuscript, and the Samarkand Kufic Quran were considered the oldest Quran copies in existence. Both codices are more or less complete. They are written in the Kufic script. It "can generally be dated from the late eighth century depending on the extent of development in the character of the script in each case."[15]

The Blue Quran

Further information: Blue Qur'an The Blue Qur'an (Arabic: المصحف الأزرق al-Muṣḥaf al-′Azraq) is a late 9th to early 10th-century Fatimid Tunisian Qur'an manuscript in Kufic calligraphy, probably created in North Africa for the Great Mosque of Kairouan.[24] It is among the most famous works of Islamic calligraphy,[24] and has been called "one of the most extraordinary luxury manuscripts ever created."[25] Because the manuscript was done in Kufic style writing, it is quite hard to read. "The letters have been manipulated to make each line the same length, and the marks necessary to distinguish between letters have been omitted." The Blue Quran is constructed of indigo-dyed parchment with the inscriptions done in gold ink, which arguably makes it one of the most rare Quran productions ever known. The use of dyed parchment and gold ink is said to have been inspired by the Christian Byzantine Empire, due to the fact that many manuscripts were produced in the same way here. Each verse is separated by circular silver marks, although they are now harder to see due to fading and oxidization.

Topkapi manuscript

Main article: Topkapi manuscript The Topkapi manuscript is an early manuscript of the Quran dated to the early 8th century. This manuscript is kept in the Topkapi Palace Museum, Istanbul, Turkey. It was wrongly attributed to Uthman Ibn Affan (d. 656), but judging from its illumination, the Topkapi manuscript does not date from the period (mid 7th century) when the copies of the Caliph Uthman were written.[16][17][better source needed]

Samarkand Kufic Quran

Main article: Samarkand Kufic Quran The Samarkand Kufic Quran, preserved at Tashkent, is a Kufic manuscript, in Uzbek tradition identified as one of Uthman's manuscripts, but dated to the 8th or 9th century by both paleographic studies and carbon-dating of the parchment.[18][19] Radio-carbon dating showed a 95.4% probability of a date between 795 and 855.[19]

Gilchrist's dating of any Kufic manuscript to the later 8th century has been criticized by other scholars, who have cited many earlier instances of early Kufic and pre-Kufic inscriptions. The most important of these are the Quranic inscriptions in Kufic script from the founding of the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem (692).[20] Inscriptions on rock Hijaaze and early Kufic script may date as early as 646. The debate between the scholars has moved from one over the date origin of the script to one over the state of development of the Kufic script in the early manuscripts and in datable 7th-century inscriptions.

Gotthelf Bergsträßer Archive

This almost complete Quranic manuscript was photographed by Otto Pretzl in 1934 in Morocco. In recent years, a few folios from the manuscripts have been sold by private companies and were dated to the 9th century or earlier by Christie's.[21][22]

Other Manuscripts

The Ma'il Quran The Ma'il Quran is an 8th century Quran (between 700 to 799) originated from Saudi Arabia. It contains two-thirds of the Qur’ān text and is one of the oldest Qur’āns in the world. [23] It is now kept in The British Library.

References

Blair, Sheila. Islamic Inscriptions. New York Univ. Press, 1998.

Ekhtiar, Maryam, and Julia Cohen. “Early Qur’ans (8th–Early 13th Century).” In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000–. http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/qura/hd_qura.htm (May 2014)

“Folio from the ‘Blue Qur'an.’” Metmuseum.org, www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/454662.

George, Alain. The Rise of Islamic Calligraphy. Saqi, 2010.

Korn, Hannah. “Scripts in Development.” Metmuseum.org, 2012, www.metmuseum.org/exhibitions/listings/2012/byzantium-and-islam/blog/topical-essays/posts/script.

Small, Keith E., and Francesca Leoni. Qur'āns: Books of Divine Encounter. Bodleian Library, 2015.