Arts of the Islamic World & India including Fine Rugs and Carpets
Arts of the Islamic World & India including Fine Rugs and Carpets
A LARGE ILLUMINATED QUR’AN, INDIA, SULTANATE, 16TH CENTURY
Auction Closed
October 27, 04:55 PM GMT
Estimate
25,000 - 35,000 GBP
Lot Details
Description
A LARGE ILLUMINATED QUR’AN, INDIA, SULTANATE, 16TH CENTURY
Arabic manuscript on paper, 548 leaves plus 2 fly-leaves, 13 lines to the page, written in Bihari script in black ink, verses separated by segmented gold florets, the word 'Allah' picked out in gold throughout, catchwords, margins ruled in blue and red, illuminated marginal devices throughout in various forms in colours and gold, surah headings in gold against hatched ground panels, the first line of each juz written in gold, ff.1b-2a with an opening double page frontispiece with text in cloud bands within various polychrome borders heightened with gold, Safavid period binding with gilt-stamped boards decorated with interlacing vines and cloud bands, doublures with filigree decoration, with flap
33.5 by 26.6cm.
Pre-Mughal Islamic manuscripts from India are rare, few having survived, mainly due to political instability and unfavourable climatic conditions. The present intact Qur'an represents a good example of the vibrancy of Indian Sultanate period manuscript production.
The earliest known Qur'an of this type is from Gwalior, near Delhi, dated 1398 and now in the Aga Khan Museum collection, Toronto (see S. Canby, Princes, Poets and Paladins: Islamic and Indian Paintings from the Collection of Prince and Princess Sudruddin Aga Khan, London, 1998, pp.106-7, item 76). A further Qur'an is dated 1483 AD, and can be found in the Bijapur Archaeological Museum (MS.912, see M. Brand and G. Lowry, Akbar's India: Art from the Mughal City of Victory, catalogue of an exhibition at the Asia Society, New York, 1985, cat. no.71).
Other Qur'ans of a similar style to the present manuscript exist in the Nasser D. Khalili Collection of Islamic Art (acc.no.QUR237, see D. James, After Timur, London, 1992, p.104-7, no.28) and the Tareq Rajab Museum (see N. Safwat, The Harmony of Letters: Islamic Calligraphy from the Tareq Rajab Museum, National Heritage Board, Singapore, 1997, p.88). Another example comparable in both script and illumination is in the British Library (Add MS 5551). A fifteenth-century Sultanate period Qur'an in Bihari script was sold in these rooms 25 April 1991, lot 237, whilst further comparable examples (the first dated 919 AH/1513 AD), were sold in these rooms 6 October 2010, lot 16 and 9 October 2013, lot 212.