Delhi Persian 1245 (Oriental Manuscripts, British Library)

India Office Library

Inshirāḥ-i Sharafnāmah-ʼi Sikandarī by Amān Allāh Amānī

Summary of Contents: A Persian commentary on the Sharafnāmah, the first part of the Iskandarnāmah, by Niẓāmī Ganjavī, (d. 1202-03) composed by one Amānī whom Storey identifies with Amān Allāh Amānī, entitled Khānahzād Khān Fīrūz Jang. The work begins with a preface in verse before interpreting the Iskandarnāmah in conventional prose. In the preface, the author states that the work was commissioned by the Mughal emperor Jahangir (r.1605-27), and gives the date of composition with the abjad chronogram "āghāz-i vay" equating to 1025/1616.

Author: Amān Allāh Khān Zamān Fīrūz Jang Amānī امان الله خان زمان فیروز جنگ امانی

Title: Inshirāḥ-i Sharafnāmah-ʼi Sikandarī

Title: انشراح شرفنامۀ سکندری

Incipit: بنام خداوند مشکل‌گشای / بتاریکی لفظ معنی‌نمای

Explicit: بجلباب دانش و بینش خود پوشند

Colophon: (f. 85r) Completed on 7 Zu ʼl-Ḥijjah 1258 AH (9 January 1843).

The title and the author's name appear in the scribe's colophon and not in the work itself.

Language(s): Persian

Physical Description

Form: codex

Extent: ff. i+86. The text ends on 85r.

Dimensions (leaf): 232 × 163 mm.

Dimensions (written): 160 × 93 mm.

Foliation:

Foliation in pencil.

Collation

Catchwords on the bottom-left corners of the verso.

Condition

Paper in relatively good condition. Stichings broken or loose; the binding and cover damaged.

Layout

17 lines per page. Poetry in two columns.

Hand(s)

Indian nastaʻlīq, Arabic in naskh; copied in black ink, with titles and underlinings in red.

Additions:

(f. 86r) A series of recipes for different sorts of ink, including invisible or luminescent types of ink.

Marginalia.

Binding

19th-century three-quarter leather with marbled boards.

Seal(s):

Black Government of India Delhi MSS oval stamp (ff. 1r, 85r).

History

Origin: 7 Zu al-Hijjah 1258 AH (9 January 1843) ; India

Provenance and Acquisition

Purchased by the Government of India at sale organised by Delhi Prize Agents, 1859.

Acquired by the India Office Library as an administrative deposit in 1876.

Record Sources

Based on C.A. Storey's description in Drafts for Catalogue of Persian Manuscripts in the India Office Library, vol. III, Mss Eur E207/15, ff. 35-38. Revised by Ali Shapouran.

Availability

Entry to read in the Library is permitted only on presentation of a valid reader's card for admissions procedures contact British Library, Registering for a Reader Pass. For information on catalogues and ordering manuscripts see Finding and ordering Persian manuscripts in the British Library.

Union Catalogue of Manuscripts from the Islamicate World