Details

Subject(s)

• Four elements (Philosophy)—Early works to 1800 [Browse]
• Islamic cosmology—Early works to 1800 [Browse]
• Islamic philosophy—Early works to 1800 [Browse]
• Physics—Early works to 1800 [Browse]

Attributed name

• Māshāʾallāh, 730?-815? [Browse]
• ما شاء الله، 730؟-815؟، [Browse]

Former owner

• Schoenberg, Lawrence J. [Browse]

Biographical/​Historical note

Student of Isaac Israeli, Jewish physician and philosopher in the Fatimid court (Taro Mimura).

Summary note

One of two known manuscripts of the Arabic original of the Book on the configuration of the orb, otherwise known through its use by Maimonides and through Latin translations, which are often attributed to the Abbasid court astrologer Māshāʼallāh. 14th-century copy of a 10th-century cosmological treatise with discussion of the theory of the four elements, meteorology, geology, and astronomy, with the material on natural philosophy presented from an Aristotelian perspective. Manuscript is incomplete (25 chapters and parts of 4 additional chapters out of 39 in the complete work) and misbound; the correct order of pages is: pages 21-23, 1-2, 27-30, 23-26, 35-48, 11-12, 9-10, 13-14, 17-19, 7-8, 3-6, 15-16, 19-20, 31-34, and 49-50 (Taro Mimura).

Notes

• Binding: Modern morocco with earlier blind-tooled morocco covers laid on new covers; manuscript has holes affecting small areas of text and has been extensively repaired.
• Decoration: Cosmological diagrams (pages 1, 5-6, 14-15, 18, 22, 35, 37, 39, 41-42, 46) and diagrams of lunar phases and eclipses (pages 10, 12, 16-17) in ink.
• Layout: Written in 21 long lines.
• Ms. codex.
• Origin: Likely copied in Andalusia, possibly in Seville, in the 14th century.
• Pagination: Paper, i (modern paper) + 25 + i (modern paper) leaves; [1-50]; modern pagination in pencil, upper outer corners. Also modern foliation in pencil, upper left recto. References in this record are to modern pagination.
• Script: Written in neat, Andalusian maghribi in brown ink; pointed, partially vocalized.
• Title and author identified by Taro Mimura, University of Manchester.

Location of originals

• Original Columbia, Rare Book and Manuscript Library.
• OPenn University of Pennsylvania Libraries.

Language note

Arabic.

Provenance

• Deposit by Lawrence J. Schoenberg and Barbara Brizdle, 2011.
• Gift of Barbara Brizdle Schoenberg, 2016.
• Sold by Sam Fogg Limited (London) to Lawrence J. Schoenberg, October 2002.

References

Described in Transformation of knowledge: early manuscripts from the collection of Lawrence J. Schoenberg (London: Paul Holberton, 2006), pages 15-16 (LJS 439).

Cite as

UPenn LJS 439.

OCLC

793011033

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