Persian MS 857 (The John Rylands Research Institute and Library, The University of Manchester)
Persian Manuscripts
Contents
For another completed copy of this work held in the Rylands, see Persian MS 222.
Physical Description
Collation
Condition
Layout
Primarily written in 2 columns with 15 lines per page. Ruled with a misṭarah hand guide.
Hand(s)
Written in clear black nasta‘līq.
Decoration
Illumination: Folio 1b bears a scalloped domed headpiece with gilt palmette foliate scrollwork on an ultramarine ground and an inscribed central cartouche undeneath:
‘قصاید نظیری’
88 × 68 mm.
Folio 126b also bears a scalloped domed headpiece with gilt palmette foliate scrollwork on an ultramarine ground and an inscribed central cartouche undeneath:
‘غزلیات نظیری’
84 × 68 mm.
Ruling: Folios 2b onward ruled in gold outlined with single internal and double external thin black lines, with comparatively bold, dark blue single lines on either side.
Marginalia: Many notes in the margins throughout, possibly in the hands of the scribe Ḥasan bin Muḥammad bin Mas‘ūd and other former owners.
Inscriptions: Folio 1a:
- Top:Unidentified poems in the hand of an unidentified prior owner.
- Middle: Left, above seal no. 2, a partly obliterated acquisition statement by Mīr Naṣr al-Dīn ibn Muḥammad Raẓī dated 1169 AH (1755–1756 CE).
- Centre, above seal no. 3, a transfer statement dated Rabī‘I 1148 (Jul–Aug. 1148).
- Bottom: Undated acquisition statement by Rajab ‘Alī Shīrāzī, whose seal impressions also appears elsewhere in the manuscript, below the number ‘bīst’ (twenty), probably the price paid.
Binding
Possibly rebound for a former owner in an amateur European manner, possibly Edward Galley (ca. 1750–1804), possibly in either Bandar-i Būshahr (Bushire) or Surat.
Single-flexible resewing on three raised cords, laced into pasteboards. Edges trimmed and front-bead European-style decorative endbands sewn in tan and white threads at head and tail. Covered in full medium brown goatskin leather, tight-backed with three raised bands.
Spine bears a small printed paper label with the title in Persian, while the left board bears a handwritten label noting the first two parts.
216 × 135 × 46 mm.
1: Folio 1a, top left, bear a small legible, nearly complete octagonal seal impression on a repaired portion of the page, with the name of Aflāṭūn (Plato) in two stacked nasta‘līq lines, double-ruled, read from right to left and bottom upwards:
‘افلاطون’
10 × 13 mm.
2: Folio 1a, middle-left, bears an illegible seal impression, possibly that of Mīr Naṣr al-Dīn ibn Muḥammad Raẓī, who signed the adjacent statement in three stacked lines, double-ruled:
11 × 14 mm.
3: Folios 1a, mid-centre, bears an oval obliterated but legible seal impression in two stacked nasta‘līq lines, double-ruled, read from
bottom upwards, with the name a former owner or associate Ḥalīm dated 1081 AH (1670–1671 CE):
‘والله عنی حلیم ۱۰۷۱’
11 × 20 mm.
4: Folios 1b, top, 126b, top, and 319b and 319b, bottom, impressed with a rectangular seal impression, in two stacked nasta‘līq lines, double-ruled, with the name of former owner Rajab ‘Alī Shīrāzī, who also signed folio 1a, bottom:
‘رجبعلی عفی عنه’
9 × 12 mm.
5: Page 2a, top, impressed with a rectangular Anglo-Persian seal impression, in two stacked nasta‘līq lines, double-ruled, with the name of former owner Edward Galley, possibly dated 1802:
‘ادورد گلی’
11 × 13 mm.
History
Provenance and Acquisition
Subsequently acquired or transferred among several individuals, including Ḥalīm as per his seal impression on 1a dated 1081 AH (1670–1671 CE), transferred to an an unidentified individual in Rabī‘I 1148 (Jul–Aug. 1148), then acquired by Mīr Naṣr al-Dīn ibn Muḥammad Raẓī in 1169 AH (1755–1756 CE), and Rajab ‘Alī Shīrāzī as per his signature on folio 1a, bottom, and seal impressions, as well as one Aflāṭūn (Plato) as per his seal impression on folio 1a, top.
Evidently obtains by Edward Galley (ca. 1750–1804), East India Company Resident at Bandar-i Būshahr (Bushehr) in 1786. Ultimately Lieutentant-Governor of Surat where he passed away, after his death, Galley's family sold a portion of his library in Surat including volumes obtained by David Price (see Robinson, p. 209). However, they evidently returned to Britain and subsequently sold the remainder through the London firm of Samuel Leigh Sotheby on 30 June 1837, lot 205.
Probably acquired at Galley's sale by London bookseller Henry George Bohn (1796–1884), who then offered it for sale in his 1841 catalogue, no. 13628, described as:
‘The Poetical Works of Nazeery, 8vo. Persian MS
beautifully written on 624 pages, ruled with purple
green, and gold, the first page illuminated, a ver[y] rare
collection of poems, native binding, 2l 2s.’
Probably purchased from Bohn by King's College Professor of Oriental Languages Duncan Forbes (1798–1868), who also evidently purchased Persian MS 843 and others listed in the same catalogue. Forbes later described the volume in his 1866 catalogue (p. 24, no. 68), valued at £3 11s 6d, before he sold his manuscript collection to his publisher W. H. Allen & Co. in exchange for an annuity. Subsequently sold by that firm to Alexander Lindsay, 25th Earl of Crawford (1812–1880) in 1866for his 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 by Jake Benson in 2024with reference to the manuscript 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
Funding of Cataloguing
Iran Heritage Foundation
The John Rylands Research Institute
The Persian Heritage Foundation
Please fill out your details.