Details

Subject(s)

• Qurʼan—Criticism, interpretation, etc [Browse]

Reader

• Isbahānī, Tāj al-Dīn Ḥasan [Browse]

Related name

• اسبهاني، تاج الدين حسن [Browse]

Former owner

• Camac, William, 1829-1900 [Browse]

Summary note

Commentary on the Qurʼān in two volumes, copied in the same hand. Marginal additions in the same and later hands. A table on contents was added to the front flyleaves in nastʻaliq by a later hand.

Notes

• Binding: Both volumes bound in dark brownish-red leather with blind-stamped, gilded and painted central mandorla, two pendants on the vertical axis, and gold tooled frame. A flap was once present on Volume 1, but has now been lost and the front cover is loose. Volume 2 retains the flap and foredge cover, though it and the front cover are both loose. Each volume has a label written on the bottom edge: Volume 1: al-Awwal min al-Bayḍāwī; Volume 2: al-Thānī min al-Bayḍāwī. Inside covers are brown leather with gilt rulings around the edges.
• Decoration: Textblock border-ruled in gold and black; the first opening of the first volume has gold rules dividing the textblock into five sections with only the middle one used for text (f. 1v-2r) and the first page of the second volume has a gold floriated pattern above the textblock (f. 318v), though this may be a later addition. The text of the Qurʼān is in red with gold overlines. Each volume has gilt stamped floral patterns on the edges.
• Foliation: Foliated continuously across both volumes in Hindu-Arabic numerals in black ink (volume 1: f. 1-317; volume 2: f. 318-673), upper left recto, with catchwords on every verso, lower left; some numbers and catchwords were cut off when the text was rebound.
• Layout: 25 long lines with border-rules.
• Origin: The copy is not dated, but a note places it before 1664 (f. 673r). It was likely copied in the last half of the 16th or early 17th century in Iran.
• Script: Written in naskh in black ink; pointed, partially vocalized.
• Title from introduction (f. 2v).
• Waqf Masjid al-Aqṣá is written into both volumes of the manuscript in numerous places, but no official statement of donation is found anywhere in the copy. Three stamps are also present at the end of the second volume (f. 673r, 673v). Readers' notes, several signed by Tāj al-Dīn Ḥasan al-Isbahānī, are also present at the end of both volumes (f. 317v, 673r, 673v).

Location of originals

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

Language note

Arabic.

Provenance

Formerly owned by William Camac; bequeathed to the University of Pennsylvania in the Camac Memorial Collection. Accessioned in 1914.

Publications about

Simsar, Muhammed, "A Rare Copy of Bayḍāwī's Commentary," Library Chronicle 5, numbers 4 (1937), pp. 65-68.

Cite as

UPenn Ms. Codex 45.

OCLC

86167203

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