A RARE AND IMPORTANT QUR'AN LEAF IN GOLD MAGHRIBI SCRIPT ON PARCHMENT, MARINID MOROCCO OR NASRID KINGDOM OF GRANADA, 13TH-14TH CENTURY

Text: Surat Al-Nisa' (iv), vv.23-24
Arabic manuscript leaf, ink, colours and gold on parchment; 9 lines per page written in bold, flowing Maghribi script in gold, tashdid and sukun marked in blue, hamzat al-wasl marked with a green dot and hamzat al-qat' with a yellow dot; verse division marked with an illuminated roundel containing the word aya in white Kufic script, illuminated roundel in margin of verso marking a juz' division (the start of the 5^{th juz')}

Formerly in the Sevadjian Collection
Collection Sevadjian, Hotel Drouot, Paris, 21 March 1961, lot 102
(The Sevadjian Collection, formed in France in the early 20th century and full of Islamic and Indian Treasures, was dispersed at auction in Paris 1927, 1960 and 1961)
With Charles Ratton, Paris, 1961
Acquired by Stuart Cary Welch from Charles Ratton, circa 1962

In generally good overall condition, slight marginal staining to right hand leaf edge, gold bright, leaf edges untrimmed, a few areas of minor creasing but vellum generally clean and fresh, as viewed.
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This is a magnificent, very rare example from one of only two known Qur'ans in Maghribi script in which the entire text is written in gold script original to the manuscript. The other is a manuscript in the John Rylands Library, Manchester University (Ms. 18, Lings 1976, no.96). The present example employs a relatively large script, with only nine lines per page, in which the loops and curves of relevant letters are rather emphatic. The size of the script and the number of lines per page indicates that it would originally have been bound in multiple volumes, perhaps as many as sixty – one for each hizb. It has been suggested that this Qur'an was made for a king of Granada or Morocco (James 1992a, p.214), and the grandeur and luxury of the manuscript would certainly have been appropriate for a patron of that rank. The sheer expenditure on parchment and gold ink must have been enormous, and it is certainly difficult to imagine that it was commissioned by anyone other than a high-ranking aristocrat, prince or monarch.

There appear to have been three principal types of Maghribi script used on Qur'ans of the medieval period. The classic Maghribi script is a large-scale, emphatically looped script applied with a wide nib and often used with only five, seven or nine lines to the page. The present folio is a good example of this type, although exceptional for its use of gold ink. The second type is a very small, neat script applied with a thin nib, often with twenty or more lines to each page. This script is often known as "Andalusi" script and is associated with several small-format single-volume Qur'an manuscripts made at Valencia and elsewhere in the late twelfth and early thirteenth century. Thirdly, there is a medium-sized script which is employed on larger-format single volume Qur'ans, which is really an enlarged version of the small-scale Andalusi script and is known from only two principal manuscripts, a Qur'an exhibited in the Museum für Islamische Kunst, Berlin in 2006 (see Fraser and Kwiatowski 2006, no.21), and a Qur'an sold in these rooms, 26 April 1995, lot 20.

Over the years scripts from the Muslim West have been given names based on their geographical origin – "Andalusi" for the very small, neat script, and "Maghribi" (meaning North-West African as opposed to Iberian) for the larger, looping script - but there are no firm grounds for this convention since both scripts were certainly used in both North West Africa and Islamic Spain (see Fraser and Kwiatowski 2006, p.75). The choice of single or multi-volume format, and thus the size and style of script used to write the text, was related to the function and context of each Qur'an manuscript. It seems likely that the small, single-volume Qur'ans which employ the small, tightly-spaced "Andalusi" script, being easily transportable, were designed for personal use, perhaps as portable Qur'ans for travelling, or for the private homes of the wealthy and aristocratic, while the multi-volume manuscripts employing the large, looped, widely-spaced script, which often ran to thirty or more volumes, would have been cumbersome and more difficult to transport, and they were probably designed for mosques, madrasas and palace libraries – institutions where they were held on a permanent basis and where the need to read the text aloud from a clear, well-spaced script was of greater importance.

Sections or fragments from the present manuscript are in the following collections: The Chester Beatty Library, Dublin Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, Eton College Library, Windsor, Topkapi Saray Library, Istanbul, The Keir Collection, Ham, Surrey.
Single folios or bifolia from this manuscript are in the following collections: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; the Los Angeles County Museum of Art;The National Library, Cairo; The Aga Khan Museum Collection (formerly in the Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan Collection); The Khalili Collection, London.

Folios from this Qur'an appear extremely rarely on the market. Only two have appeared at auction in the last several decades; both sold in these rooms 29 April 1998, lot 15 and 26 April 2005, lot 14.

Further discussion and references are as follows: Fraser and Kwiatowski 2006, no.19; Lings 2005, nos.161-3; Sotheby's, London, 29 April 1998, lot 15; New York 1992, no.84, p.315; James 1992a, no.53, pp.214-6; Déroche 1985, no.304, pl.III; Welch and Welch 1982, no.2, pp.22-23; James 1980, no.91; Lings 1976, no.95, pp.205-6; Robinson 1976, no.VII.7, p.288, pl.140; Arberry 1967, no.119, pl.43.