Or 16190 (Oriental Manuscripts, British Library)

The celebrated prose commentary on Gulshan-i rāz, the great Sufi metaphysical poem of Maḥmūd Shabistarī (d. ca. 720/1320). By Shams al-Dīn Muḥammad Asīrī Lāhījī (d. ca. 912/1506).

On these authors and their works, see J.T.P. de Bruijn, ‘Maḥmūd b. ‘Abd al-Karīm b. Yaḥyà Shabistarī’, EI2, VI, pp. 72-3; A.H. Zarrinkoob, ‘Lāhīdjī’, EI2, V, pp. 603-4.

The importance of the present manuscript lies in the fact that according to the colophon, it was copied directly from the author's autograph.

Begins: ‘Basmalah... Bismik al-Aʿẓam al-shāmil fayz̤uh al-muqaddas li-kull... al-munavvir ẓulumāt al-ʿadam bi-anvār al-vujūd. Ay Maḥmūd ba-har lisān (?) va Maʿbūd ba-har makān...’

Ends: ‘Ba-nām-i khvīsh kardam khatm pāyān / Ilāhī ʿāqibat maḥmūd gardān, Yaʿnī Badānīd kih nām-i valī niʿmat chih būdah ast khatm-i īn kitāb ba-nām-i khvud kardam... Va nām-i shaykh-i buzurgvār nāẓim Mawlānā Sadīd al-Dīn Maḥmūd-i Shabistarī būdah. Shabistar mawz̤iʿīst dar hasht farsangī-'i shahr-i Tabrīz va madfan va mawlad-i īshān hamān'jāst qaddas Allāh sirrah al-ʿazīz’

Colophon, f. 226v. Copied from the autograph (‘ʿan nuskhat al-marqūma (sic) bi-khaṭṭ al-muṣannif’) by Zayn al-ʿĀbidīn known as Zaynā al-Shīrāzī. 1016/1607.

Fine naskhī hand. 30 lines in central text panel; 28 short diagonal lines in outer panel. 226 folios. 17 x 9 cm. Maroon leather binding, later (Indian?) with raised bands.

This manuscript, formerly MS.314 in the collection of the British Turcologist C.S. Mundy, had earlier belonged to Sir Denison Ross.

Purchased from A. Leverton