Persian MS 610 (The John Rylands Research Institute and Library, The University of Manchester)
Persian Manuscripts
Contents
Many sources identify the author of this work as Shaykh ʿAlī Ḥazīn (d.1180/1766-7), but this claim awaits confirmation.
Physical Description
Collation
Condition
In fair condition, with historical paper repairs applied the gutters and fore-edges, moderate insect damage, especially in the gutters of folios 25–31. Extensive adhesive tipped in the gutters when repaired restricts the opening of the folios.
Layout
Single column, with 11 lines per page. Ruled with a misṭarah hand guide.
Hand(s)
Copied in a clear nasta‘līq script in black ink, with verse markers and subheaders marked in red.
Decoration
Illuminated headpiece on folio 1b, rendered in blue, orange, pink, green, and gold. Marginal ruling throughout, with a wide rule painted in pale ochre imitating gold outlined on both sides with a thin black single line on the inside bordered by a thin red line, and thin double lines on the outer side, surrounded by a single blueline. Another single blue line surrounds the perimeters of the pages that appear occasionally trimmed.
Contains numerous paintings of various animals, both real and mythological, throughout.
- Inscription: Right flyleaf (f. ia)
- Notes: Folio 1a bears several notations, with the number ‘79’ at top, followed by the title, Risālah dar Ṣaydīyah, then incorrectly states that it has 72 folios, followed by prices in Indian sīyāq notations.
- Bookplates: The left paste-down, ‘Bibliotheca Lindesiana’ with shelf mark ‘F/6’, and ‘Hamilton MSS No. 527’.
Binding
Sewn on a single flat support in the centre, put down with a cloth hinge onto the pasteboards. Textblock edges spattered in fine powder blue with European-style decorative front-bead endbands worked over a single-cord core with white and silver threads. Covered in a hybrid British-Indian style binding in full, tight backed, red goatskin leather, with squares at the edges, with back-cornered and defined joints. Endpapers of pale yellow, unwatermarked European machine-made wove paper. The stitching of the wove screen evident on the fore-edge of theright flyleaf
Boards decorated with blind stamped silver paper onlays (now darkly tarnished), with a scalloped central mandorla with a quintafoil surrounded by leaves, detached quatrefoil floral pendants, floral scrollwork scalloped corners, and a wide scrolling palmette band framing the perimeters of the boards. Yellow ruled single and double lines criss-cross the central decoration and border the centre, connect the corners, and outline the surrounding border.
235 × 159 × 17 mm.
In good condition.
History
Provenance and Acquisition
Subsequently acquired in India by Colonel George William Hamilton (1807-1868) who served in India from 1823 to 1867, latterly as Commissioner in Delhi. He obtained over a thousand Indian and Persian manuscripts from which the British Museum selected 352 volumes after his death, now held in the British Library.
Alexander Lindsay, 25th Earl of Crawford (1812–1880) purchased the remainder in 1868.
Purchased by Enriqueta Rylands (1843–1908) in 1901 from James Ludovic Lindsay, 26th Earl of Crawford (1847–1913).
Bequeathed by Enriqueta Rylands 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 catalogue by Michael Kerney, circa 1890s and his Bibliotheca Lindesiana, Hand-list of Oriental Manuscripts: Arabic, Persian, Turkish, 1898.
Manuscript description by Jake Benson in 2021 with reference to the volume.
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.
Digital Images
Manchester Digital Collections (full digital facsimile)
Bibliography
Funding of Cataloguing
Iran Heritage Foundation
The John Rylands Research Institute
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