Folio from a Qur'an Manuscript

Folio from a Qur'an


The main text is from the Qur'an, 6.111-part of 113, written in the khatt-i bihari or bihari script described as "a slow moving and stately script, accentuating both horizontal and vertical elements while markedly restraining linear curves."[4] This script emerged in India in the fourteenth century and appears to have a very localized appeal. In the well-spaced letters, wide, heavy and extended horizontal lines contrast with the thin, delicate verticals. The leaf has twelve lines of script with the first line twice the length of the others. An attractive color format provides a pleasing resplendence to the page. The twelve lines are in alternating lines of gold, black and blue script. The surah heading and teardrop shaped marginal decoration is in orange, blue, black, green, and gold.

In addition to the main text, the margin has sixteen lines of diagonal script with the relevant translation in Persian.

As evident from this and the following examples, a divesity of styles was used to write the Qur'an from the twelfth century onwards. Different regions adapted to their preferred nuanced scripts.

[Rahim 1996]

Footnotes:

Welch, A. Calligraphy in the Arts of the Muslim World, 1979, p. 178.

Inscription: Recto: 6:111–113 (middle); Verso: 6:113 (middle)–116 (middle) [M. Sardar 3/12]

[ Terence McInerney Fine Arts Ltd., New York, until 1992; sold to MMA]

Hempstead, NY. Emily Lowe Gallery. "Inscription as Art in the World of Islam," April 14, 1996–May 24, 1996, no. 4.

Rahim, Habibeh. "at the Emily Lowe Gallery." In Inscription as Art in the World of Islam - Unity in Diversity. Hempstead, NY: Hofstra Museum, Hofstra University, 1996. p. 16, ill. fig. 4 (b/w).