Union Catalogue of Manuscripts from the Islamicate World

Persian MS 735 (The John Rylands Research Institute and Library, The University of Manchester)

Persian Manuscripts

Contents

Summary of Contents: This anonymous work entitled Bāznāmah (Book of Falcons) contains the first maqālah (article) in eighty-four chapters, but lacks the second one with another twenty-one. A panegyric praising Prince Shīr Singh (b. 1807, r. 1841–1843), who would subsequently become the Fourth Maharajah of the Sikh Empire indicates that the anonymous author likely completed it there in the second quarter of the nineteenth century. A scribe named Qāz̤ī Muḥammad ‘Alī Jābirī Anṣārī copied this manuscript by order of taḥsīldār (tax collector) Bahā Muṣhaḥib Bhāy Ḥukum Singh in Rawalpindi on behalf of then-Deputy Commissioner Captain George William Hamilton (d. 1868), which he finished on 27 Dec. 1850 . Many blank spaces suggest that it was intended for illustration, but never finished.
Dedicatee and Honoree: Shīr Singh, b. 1807, r. 1841–1843
Associated name and Organizer: Bahā Muṣhaḥib Bhāy Ḥukum Singh;
بہا مصاحب بہای حکم سنگہ
Patron and Collector: Hamilton, George William, 1807–1868;
جارج ولیم هملٹین
Title: Bāznāmah
Title: بازنامه
Incipit: (basmalla) برگ ۱پ (folio 1b): افتتاح ابواب سخن بنام مبدع حقیقی سزاست که انس و جان از نور معرفتش مرهون و توفیق جویا و وحوش و طیور در عالم احسالش ممنون و حمد گویا شاهباز تیز پرواز نگاه علوی خرام جويندگان
Explicit: برگ ۲۲۷پ (folio 227b):
Colophon: برگ ۲۲۷پ (folio 227b): تمام شد بازنامه مِن دست خط فقیر قاضی محمد علی جابری انصاری برای پاسخاطر کپتان جارج ولیم هملٹین صاحب بهادر ڈبٹی کمشنر در موضع جٹال چودهری نُصّه واله علاقه کڑوڑهه پرگنه و ضلع پندی روال فی التاریخ ۲۷ ماه دسمبر سنه ۱۸۵۰ عیسوی تحریر یافت بموجب فرمایش بہا مصاحب بہای حکم سنگہ تحصیلدار ضلع مذکور. اللهم اجعله مقبولاً و منطوراً.
Colophon: Completed by Qāz̤ī Muḥammad ‘Alī Jābirī Anṣārī in ‘Pindī Rawāl’ (Rawalpindi), as ordered by local tax collector named Bahā Muṣāḥib Bhay Ḥukum Singh on behalf of then-Deputy Commissioner Captain George William Hamilton (d. 1868).
Language(s): Persian

Note that in his handlist, Micheal Kerney previously misidentified this class mark as Persian MS 734 and describes it as Persian MS 730, which contains three different works on falconry; however, it actually contains only one. For another copy of this work held in the Punjab University Library, see Naushahi's catalogue.

Physical Description

Form: codex
Support: Textblock of two types of thin-weight, cross-grained, unsized and unpolished, ivory-coloured wove letter paper with the blind embossed stamp of paper sellers ‘S. Baurie & Fils, Bordeaux’, agents for Laroche Frères du Martinet, then owned and operated by Jean-Edmond Laroche-Joubert (1820–1884) and his brother Jean. Another similar, thin-weight, European-made blue letter paper bears an unidentified blind enbossed stamp of a stationer or papermill.
Extent: 290 folios, 4 flyleaves (ff. ii + 290 + ii).
Dimensions (leaf): 228 × 170 mm.
Dimensions (written): 161 × 103 mm.
Foliation: Incomplete pencilled Arabic numerals added to the upper-left corners of the first 11 a sides which include the initial blank folios, then every 10 thereafter until 292a, hence over by two.

Collation

Undetermined. Catchwords throughout most of the lower-left corners of the b sides.

Condition

In fair condition, with moderate water and insect damage and historical repairs throughout.

Layout

Written in 1 column with 13 lines per page. Ruled with a misṭarah hand guide.

Hand(s)

Written in clear black nasta‘līq with red subheaders.

Additions:
Inscription: The second right flyleaf (f. iia) describes the volume, with name of its patron Colonel George William Hamilton underneath, likely in the hand of his assistant Muhīn Dās.
Bookplates: Left pastedown: Bibliotheca Lindesiana with pencilled shelfmark 1/F, and Hamilton MSS No. 622 with the name and number crossed out and Persian and 705 written aside.

Binding

Probably bound in a hybrid British-Indian style in Multan for Colonel George William Hamilton, given how the style matches his other volumes rebound there.

Sewn on two stations, unsupported. Endpapers of comparatively rough cross-grained paper added to the beginning and end. Edges trimmed chevron endbands of red and green threads twined at head and tail. Covered in full reddish-brown goatskin leather, tight-backed, with defined joints and squares along the edges (Type III binding per Déroche). Internal doublures of the same leather, with their excess widths adhered to the first and last flyleaves as hinges to connect the cover to the textblock, covered by vertical strips of paper, serrated along one edge, to disguise the joins.

Spine bears an octagonal paper label with the title in nasta‘līq script.

238 × 182 × 30 mm.

Binding in good condition with minor white salts (spew) on the interior doublures resulting from prolonged exposure to moisture.

Seal(s):
Two relief-cut blind embossed stamps appear on the white and blue folios respectively.

1: A rectangular stamp of ‘S. Baurie Fils, Bordeaux’:
17 × 12 mm.

2: An unidentified armorial stamp features a fortress with four towers, with griffin or lion above, surrounded by decorative scrollwork and surmounted by a crown:
17 × 13 mm.

History

Origin: Completed by Qāz̤ī Muḥammad ‘Alī Jābirī Anṣārī on order of a local tax collector named Bahā Muṣāḥib Bhay Ḥukum Singh of then-Deputy Commisioner for Captain George William Hamilton in Rawalpindi; . 27 Dec. 1850 CE.

Provenance and Acquisition

Hamilton acquired over a thousand Indian and Persian manuscripts, which he brought to Britain after his retirement in 1867. After his death the following year, the British Museum purchased 352 volumes from his widow, Charlotte Logie Hamilton (1817–1893), now held in the British Library.

Alexander Lindsay, 25th Earl of Crawford (1812–1880), purchased the remainder in 1868 for Bibliotheca Lindesiana at Haigh Hall, Wigan.

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, Manchester.

Record Sources

Bibliographical description based on an index created by Reza Navabpour circa 1993, derived from a manuscript catalogue by Michael Kerney, circa 1890s, concisely published as Bibliotheca Lindesiana, Hand-list of Oriental Manuscripts: Arabic, Persian, Turkish, 1898.

Manuscript description and corrections by Jake Benson in 2024 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

    Hūšang Aʿlam, ‘Bāz’, Encyclopædia Iranica, Vol. IV, Fasc. 1 (1990): pp. 17-20 Hūšang Aʿlam, ‘Bāzdārī’, Encyclopædia Iranica, Vol. IV, Fasc. 1 (1990): pp. 53-58.
    Moḥammad-Taqī Dānešpažūh, ‘Bāz-nāma’, Encyclopædia Iranica, Vol. IV, Fasc. 1 (1990): pp. 65-66
    Khiz̤r ʻAbbāsī Nawshāhī, Fihrist-i Nuskhahʹhā-yi Khaṭṭī-i Fārsī-i Kitābkhānah-i Dānishgāh-i Punjāb, Lāhūr: Ganjīnah-ʼi Āẕar (Islamabad: Markaz-i Taḥqīqāt-i Fārsī-i Īrān va Pākistān, 1406 AH [1986 CE]) p. 26 [Aẕar no. 8115/6].

Funding of Cataloguing

Iran Heritage Foundation

The John Rylands Research Institute

The Soudavar Memorial Foundation

Subjects


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