Persian MS 361 (The John Rylands Research Institute and Library, The University of Manchester)
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Persian Manuscripts
Contents
Summary of Contents: The second of three volumes of extracts of various Persian poems, together with Persian MS 360 and 362, neatly copied by British painter, orientalist, and poet, Charles Fox (1749–1809). This volume contains poems of Asafi and Hafiz, including at least one dedicated to Fox's friend, Methodist minister Rev. Adam Clarke, which indicates that he wrote these volumes as a gift.Author: Various AuthorsScribe: Fox, Charles 1749–1809Title: Persian MiscellaniesLanguage(s): PersianPhysical Description
Form: codexSupport: Various laid and wove papers handmade in Britain.Extent: 71 folios, 6 flyleaves (ff. iii + 71 + iii)Dimensions (leaf): 160 × 96 cm.Written dimensions vary.Foliation: Partly foliated in Arabic numerals, from left to right on the upper-right corners of the b sides of every ten leaves, opposite to the text direction.Collation
Variant quires and singletons await analysis.Layout
Written in 1 column with variant numbers of lines. Hand-ruled by Charles Fox in various formats.
Folios 18 to 32 bound in upside-down.Hand(s)
Written in clear, neat taḥrīrī-nasta‘līq by Charles Fox.
Decoration
Margins: Double-ruled in red throughout by Charles Fox.Additions:
Inscriptions: Folio 1a numbered:
‘286
2’
corresponding with Jospeh Butterworth Bulmer Clarke's 1835 catalogue entry.
Folio 41b dated Feb. 1800 dedicated to Rev. Adam Clarke Bookplates: The Left pastedown bears the ‘Bibliotheca Lindesiana’ bookplate with shelfmark ‘2/K’, and ‘Bland MSS No. 581’ with the name and number crossed out and ‘Persian’ and ‘361’ written aside.Binding
Probably uniformly rebound as a deluxe set for former owners Rev. Adam Clarke or his son Jospeh Butterworth Bulmer Clarke, whose 1835 catalogue describes them as ‘bound in Morocco’.
Evidently oversewn on 4 raised cords laced into pasteboards. Made endpapers of predominantly green 'Spanish' waved-patterned marbled endpapers adhered to added at Edges trimmed then finely sprinkled with red earth and polished. Prefabricated headbands of rolled black cloth adhered to head and tail. Covered in full dark hunter green coloured goatskin leather.
167 × 105 × 19 mm.
Binding in good condition, with slight abrasion in the joints by the bands, headcaps and lower corners.
History
Provenance and Acquisition
Apparently given by Fox to Methodist minister Rev. Adam Clarke (1762–1832) after whose death, his son Jospeh Butterworth Bulmer Clarke (d. 1855) inherited the volumes and describes them in a catalogue published in 1835.
The next year on 20 June 1836, Clarke's son auctioned his father's collection through the London firm of Sotheby & Son where bookseller William Straker (fl. 1831–1856) purchased it for £7 1 shilling.
Probably sold by Straker to scholar Nathaniel Bland (1803–1865), after whose death, London bookseller Bernard Quaritch (1819–1899) sold his oriental manuscripts in 1866 to Alexander Lindsay, 25th Earl of Crawford (1812–1880).
Purchased by Enriqueta Rylands (1843–1908) in 1901 from James Ludovic Lindsay, 26th Earl of Crawford (1847–1913).
Bequeathed by Enriqueta Rylands (1843–1908) in 1908 to the John Rylands Library.
Record Sources
Bibliographical description based on an index created by Reza Navabpour circa 1993, derived from a manuscript handlist by Michael Kerney, circa 1890s and his Bibliotheca Lindesiana, Hand-list of Oriental Manuscripts: Arabic, Persian, Turkish, 1898.
Manuscript description by Jake Benson in 2023 with reference to the volume in hand.
Availability
To book an in-person or online appointment to consult the manuscript, visit Using the Special Collections Reading Rooms. For any other enquiries please email uml.special-collections@manchester.ac.uk.
Bibliography
W. P. Courteney and P. Carter, 'Charles Fox 1740?–1809' Oxford National Dictionary of Bibliography 24 May 2007). Accessed: 19 Apr. 2023.J. B. B. Clarke, A Historical and Descriptive Catalogue of the European and Asiatic Manuscripts in the Library of the late Dr. Adam Clarke, F.S.A., M.R.I.A. (London: J. Murrary, 1835), p. 211, no. 186.Paul Kaufman, ‘Charles Fox: An Early Interpreter of Persian Poetry’ Comparative Literature Studies, Vol. 2, No. 1 (1835), pp. 79-86.Sotheby and Son, Catalogue of the Highly Interesting and Valuable Collection of European and Asiatic Manuscripts of the late Dr. Adam Clarke, F.S.A., M.R.I.A. (London: [Printed by Compton and Richie], 1836), p. 12, no. 88.Funding of Cataloguing
Iran Heritage Foundation
The John Rylands Research Institute
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