Delhi Persian 861 (Oriental Manuscripts, British Library)

Item a.

Untitled Persian translation, conventionally entitled Ṭibb-i Maḥmūd, by Maḥmūd ibn Ilyās, based on an Arabic compendium of theoretical and practical medicine attributed to Ibn Sīnā, itself derived from a work by Aristotle.

The work consists of four maqālah and a total of eighteen bāb.

Contents of work is given on the flyleaf preceding (f. 1Cr), in the same hand at the work itself.

Not dated at end.

Some folios consist of tinted papers.

Item b.

Alchemical treatise on the preparation of compound medicaments by Valī Muḥammad.

The work was apparently completed Saturday, 5 Jumādá I 1169/6 February 1756.

The work consists of three bāb.

Contents of work is given on folio preceding (f.10r), in the same hand at the work itself.

Not dated at end.

Tables and diagrams throughout.

Annotations in margins, cropped, occasionally excess saved and folding in (such as f. 19).

Item c.

Rare fragment from an untitled tabulated genealogy of the Timurid Dynasty based on official regnal chronicles by a certain ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, written at the order issued in regnal year 31 (circa 1203/1789) by the Timurid or Mughal Emperor Shāh ʿĀlam Bahādur (d. 1221/1806).

The work is defective at end, having lost all folios subsequent to the account of Emperor Farrukh Siyar.

The work proceeds with the author’s brief preface and genealogy of Amīr Tīmūr the Ṣāḥib Qirān traced to Ādam via the Prophet Nūḥ (Noah). Subsequent entries are made in tabular form.

This may be the author’s draft, with occasional emendations, transcribed in neat disciplined nastaʿlīq.

Not dated at end

Item d.

Untitled Arabic medical treatise abridging older unidentified sources by an unnamed author.

Lacking a formal title, the work is named Qānūnchah only in the scribe’s colophon.

The work consists of ten discourses or maqālah.

Dated colophon (f. 74v): completed by Gūpāl (Gopal) for use at Mīrat (Meerut), Sunday, (undeciphered text) 1239 (Faṣlī)/9 October 1831 (ʿĪsavī).

Rough nastaʿlīq.

Item e.

Untitled Arabic medical treatise organised into tabular cells by an unnamed author.

Not dated at end.

The tabular grid has been drawn in red ink, with the Arabic text written mostly without nuqṭah diacritics in a neat scribal shikastah āmīz hand, alternating between oblique and horizontal organisation.

Item f.

Lexicographical treatise giving definitions in Persian and occasionally in Hindavī/Urdu of medical and pharmacological terms in Greek, Arabic, Turkī (Chaghatāy), and Persian added in interlinear spaces in red ink and arranged alphabetically.

Dated colophon (f. 131r): completed Sunday, 20 Ramaz̤ān 1182/28 January 1769.

Later repairs added to edges, with seal impressions added on top.

Edges cropped.

Count of 17 folios attested to in a note on folio 131r.

Annotations on remedies for bleeding etcetera at end.

Item g.

Treatise on practical medicine by the poet and general Amān Allāh Khānazād Khān, later entitled Khān Zamān Khān the Fīrūzjang (d. 1046/1636-7), son of the infamous and despised general of the Timurid or Mughal Emperor Jahāngīr, Mahābat Khān, later entitled Khānkhānān with the status of sipāhsālār under Emperor Shāh Jahān I.

The work was completed in 1036/1626-7 and dedicated to Emperor Jahāngīr. The addition of titles accrued under Emperor Shāh Jahān indicates the work underwent further revision subsequently.

The work consists of a muqaddimah, six bāb, and a khātimah.

Colophon not dated (f. 174r): Written for Navvāb Sayyid Muḥammad Mīr Khān Bahādur al-Ḥasanī al-Ḥusaynī al-Qādirī.

Miniscule shikastah āmīz.

Item h.

Incomplete copy of an excerpt from the Arabic alchemical treatise, entitled Durrat al-ghavvāṣṣ [va kanz al-ikhtiṣāṣ fī maʿrifat ʿilm al-khavāṣṣ] by Aydamar ibn ʿAlī al-Jildakī (d. circa 762/1361), dealing with magical healing and the talismanic properties of various animal and mineral substances, here supplied with an interlinear Persian translation by an unnamed translator.

The text terminates abruptly without conclusion.

The work consists of the fourth faṣl of the fifth bāb from the second qism.

Not dated at end.

Minute shikastah āmīz for Persian interlinear text and large naskh for the Arabic.