AN IMPORTANT EARLY YEMENI TEHAMI MANUSCRIPT OF THE FIRST PART...
AN IMPORTANT EARLY YEMENI TEHAMI MANUSCRIPT OF THE FIRST PART OF AL-GHAZĀLĪ, AL-WASĪṬ FĪ AL-MADHHAB, WITH A SCHOLARLY ISNĀD (CHAIN OF TRANSMISSION), ONE OF GHAZALI’S MAJOR WORKS ON SHAFII JURISPRUDENCE
Dated 670 AH (1272 AD)
Arabic text on Eastern Islamic warm brown toned paper, predating the European widespread watermarked paper, composed of 88 leaves, complete, 27 lines to the page, written in a clear Yemeni Tehami naskh script, in black ink with minimal diacritics, numerous verification marks (ṣaḥ) throughout attest to scholarly use and systematic collation, with its original Islamic blind-tooled leather binding, decorated with a central roundel and multiple intersecting geometric frames, an early example of Yemeni bookbinding; the manuscript is dated ‘Thursday evening during 10 days of Ramadan on 670 Hijri year’, decades earlier than most surviving manuscripts of Al-Wasiṭ, the final certification notes that the reading was completed in Masjid Asar (Yemen) in 672 AH; a complete scholarly isnad linking directly to Al-Ghazali exceptionally scarce in the manuscript tradition, this copy contains an exceptionally rare continuous scholarly isnad (chain of transmission) linking the readings of Al-Wasīṭ directly back to the author through several generations of Yemeni and Persian scholars: Muḥammad Ibn ʿAbd Allah Al-Muqri’; Muḥammad Ibn Abi Bakr Al-Yamani; Umar Ibn Masud Al-Khumayri; Ḍiya’ Al-Din Ismail Al-Ḥaḍrami; Ali Ibn Qasim Al-Ḥakami (Qutb al-Yaman); Muẓaffar Al-Din al-Tabrizi; Yaḥya Ibn Faḍlan; Muḥyi Al-Din; Muḥammad Ibn Yaḥya; Muḥyi Al-Din.
22.8cm x 19cm
An isnad refers to a list of people who passed on a tradition, from the original authority to whom the tradition is attributed to, to the present person reciting or compiling that tradition.
Topics such as Islamic fiqh and details of the rituals of Hajj and Umrah, restrictions of the Sanctuary of Al-Haram as well as rituals of slaughter are also mentioned. It deifferentiates between Al-Ayyam Al-Ma’lumat (the known days, the first ten days of Zou Al-Hajj) and Al-Ayyam Al-Ma’dudat (the outnumbered days, the days of Tashreeq).
Al-Ghazali authored a trilogy of Shafii jurisprudence manuals: Al-Basit (the Extensive), Al-Wasit (the Medium) and Al-Wajiz (the Brief). This manuscript represents a copy of the first volume of Al-Wasit, the text on Islamic jurisprudence (fiqh) according to the Shafii school.
Literature:
Brockelmann, Geschichte der Arabischen Litteratur (GAL, no 52, 424).
Sezgin, Geschichte des Arabischen Schrifttums (GAS).
Al-Shamaḥi, A., Al-Yaman: Al-Insan wa Al-Ḥaḍara (Yemen: Man and Civilization), 1984.
Bloom, J., Paper Before Print: The History and Impact of Paper in the Islamic World, Yale University Press, 2001.
Déroche, F., Islamic Codicology, An Introduction to the Study of Manuscripts, Al-Furqan Islamic Heritage, 2005.
El-Rouayheb, K., Islamic Intellectual History in the Seventeenth Century, Cambridge University Press, 2015.
Hirschler, K., The Written Word in the Medieval Arabic Lands: A Social and Cultural History of Reading Practices, Edinburgh University Press, 2011.
Mawad, A. and Abdelmujud, A., Al-Wajiz Fi Fiqh Al-Imam Al-Shafi'i, Dar Al-Arqam, Beirut, 1997.
For similar examples see:
Egyptian National Library in Cairo, Cairo, Egypt.
The Vatican Library, Vatican.
Provenance:
In the property of a private collector.
Previously in an American private collection.
Estimate
Time, Location
Auction House
AN IMPORTANT EARLY YEMENI TEHAMI MANUSCRIPT OF THE FIRST PART OF AL-GHAZĀLĪ, AL-WASĪṬ FĪ AL-MADHHAB, WITH A SCHOLARLY ISNĀD (CHAIN OF TRANSMISSION), ONE OF GHAZALI’S MAJOR WORKS ON SHAFII JURISPRUDENCE
Dated 670 AH (1272 AD)
Arabic text on Eastern Islamic warm brown toned paper, predating the European widespread watermarked paper, composed of 88 leaves, complete, 27 lines to the page, written in a clear Yemeni Tehami naskh script, in black ink with minimal diacritics, numerous verification marks (ṣaḥ) throughout attest to scholarly use and systematic collation, with its original Islamic blind-tooled leather binding, decorated with a central roundel and multiple intersecting geometric frames, an early example of Yemeni bookbinding; the manuscript is dated ‘Thursday evening during 10 days of Ramadan on 670 Hijri year’, decades earlier than most surviving manuscripts of Al-Wasiṭ, the final certification notes that the reading was completed in Masjid Asar (Yemen) in 672 AH; a complete scholarly isnad linking directly to Al-Ghazali exceptionally scarce in the manuscript tradition, this copy contains an exceptionally rare continuous scholarly isnad (chain of transmission) linking the readings of Al-Wasīṭ directly back to the author through several generations of Yemeni and Persian scholars: Muḥammad Ibn ʿAbd Allah Al-Muqri’; Muḥammad Ibn Abi Bakr Al-Yamani; Umar Ibn Masud Al-Khumayri; Ḍiya’ Al-Din Ismail Al-Ḥaḍrami; Ali Ibn Qasim Al-Ḥakami (Qutb al-Yaman); Muẓaffar Al-Din al-Tabrizi; Yaḥya Ibn Faḍlan; Muḥyi Al-Din; Muḥammad Ibn Yaḥya; Muḥyi Al-Din.
22.8cm x 19cm
An isnad refers to a list of people who passed on a tradition, from the original authority to whom the tradition is attributed to, to the present person reciting or compiling that tradition.
Topics such as Islamic fiqh and details of the rituals of Hajj and Umrah, restrictions of the Sanctuary of Al-Haram as well as rituals of slaughter are also mentioned. It deifferentiates between Al-Ayyam Al-Ma’lumat (the known days, the first ten days of Zou Al-Hajj) and Al-Ayyam Al-Ma’dudat (the outnumbered days, the days of Tashreeq).
Al-Ghazali authored a trilogy of Shafii jurisprudence manuals: Al-Basit (the Extensive), Al-Wasit (the Medium) and Al-Wajiz (the Brief). This manuscript represents a copy of the first volume of Al-Wasit, the text on Islamic jurisprudence (fiqh) according to the Shafii school.
Literature:
Brockelmann, Geschichte der Arabischen Litteratur (GAL, no 52, 424).
Sezgin, Geschichte des Arabischen Schrifttums (GAS).
Al-Shamaḥi, A., Al-Yaman: Al-Insan wa Al-Ḥaḍara (Yemen: Man and Civilization), 1984.
Bloom, J., Paper Before Print: The History and Impact of Paper in the Islamic World, Yale University Press, 2001.
Déroche, F., Islamic Codicology, An Introduction to the Study of Manuscripts, Al-Furqan Islamic Heritage, 2005.
El-Rouayheb, K., Islamic Intellectual History in the Seventeenth Century, Cambridge University Press, 2015.
Hirschler, K., The Written Word in the Medieval Arabic Lands: A Social and Cultural History of Reading Practices, Edinburgh University Press, 2011.
Mawad, A. and Abdelmujud, A., Al-Wajiz Fi Fiqh Al-Imam Al-Shafi'i, Dar Al-Arqam, Beirut, 1997.
For similar examples see:
Egyptian National Library in Cairo, Cairo, Egypt.
The Vatican Library, Vatican.
Provenance:
In the property of a private collector.
Previously in an American private collection.
Estimate
Time, Location
Auction House
