Muhammad Sharif ibn Shams al-Din Kashif al-Shirazi, Suraj al-munir, a collection of moral anecdotes written in shikasteh script, copied by Muhammad Husain, Qajar Persia, dated 15th Rabi' I 1230/15th February 1815, with later additions

Persian manuscript on paper, 88 leaves, between eight and eleven lines to the page written horizontally and diagonally in shikasteh script in black ink, significant words in red, interlinear rules in gold, inner margins ruled in gold, blue and red, one late 19th Century double-page illuminated frontispiece in colours and gold, several pages ruled but left blank at end, five later illustrations in Safavid and earlier styles, accession note written by Prince Farhad Mirza, floral lacquer binding, doublures with floral sprays, cracked, rebacked
151 x 97 mm.

Provenance
Formerly in the library of Prince Farhad Mirza (1817-1888), a brother of Muhammad Shah Qajar, and uncle of Nasr al-Din Shah.

The text, Suraj al-munir, was composed towards the end of Rabi' I 1032/late January 1632: this date is given at the end of the main text, a few pages before the colophon. The scribe, Muhammad Husain, is unidentified.

The front flyleaf has a note written by the Qajar Prince Farhad Mirza that the manuscript entered his library on Rabi' I 1299/January-February 1882. The later illustrations are copied probably from a manuscript of Nizami's Khamsa and are unrelated to the text. The illumination, other than a part of the heading on the opening page, are late 19th century.

According to C. Rieu, 'The author describes in a fanciful prologue, evidently imitated from Sa'di's Gulistan, an enchanted garden in which he culled these flowers for his friends. The work is written in ornate prose, interspersed with verses, and is divided into twenty sections called Lam'ah. The subjects are good manners, modesty, meekness, justice, liberality and other virtues, passions or vices, each of which is illustrated by the precepts of the Prophet Muhammad and by anecdotes, chiefly relating to prophets and saints.'

A copy of this work, dated AH 1079/AD 1668?69 (Add. 26,293), is in the British Library, London: see C. Rieu, Catalogue of the Persian Manuscripts in the British Museum, Part II, London 1966, pp. 861?62.