As Ibn Ṭūlūn wrote several hundred works and did so almost five hundred years ago by now, it stands to reason that the corresponding manuscripts might have changed hands several times over since their creation. Moreover, later readers, owners, and book traders were instrumental in the survival and recognition of those manuscripts as Ibn Ṭūlūn’s. This post explores one of those people whose personal collections included such manuscripts. Continue reading “An owner of Ibn Ṭūlūn manuscripts: ʿAbd al-Salām al-Shaṭṭī”
New Publication on the transmission of Ibn Tulun manuscripts
The Journal of Islamic Manuscripts has just published its newest iteration, a special issue on manuscript notes. The editor Boris Liebrenz is well-known as an authority on this “marginal” topic. My contribution looks in particular at four manuscripts today held at the Chester Beatty Library, Dublin, and traces their historical trajectories from Ibn Ṭūlūn’s original book endowment until their acquisition by Chester Beatty. Continue reading “New Publication on the transmission of Ibn Tulun manuscripts”
The history of MS Tarikh Taymur 631: vol. 1 of al-Ghuraf al-ʿaliyya
Still these Cairene manuscripts. Among others, they have one volume of Ibn Ṭūlūn’s biographical dictionary, al-Ghuraf al-ʿaliyya fī tarājim mutaʾakhkhirī al-ḥanafiyya. The British Library holds the second volume of the work. I have spoken about this work before here and here. Also, Guy Burak made use of an Istanbuli copy of it in his dissertation, “The Abū Ḥanīfah of his time? Islamic Law, Jurisprudential Authority and Empire in the Ottoman Domains (16th-17th Centuries)”.
As can be seen from the collections where they are held nowadays, the different volumes of the Ghuraf were separated from each other at one point. The Cairo manuscript (MS Tarikh Taymur 631) contains the first part of this three-volume work on 386 pages, covering the introduction as well as biographies in alphabetical order until the letter ẓāʾ. The last biography is dedicated to Ẓuhayr b. Ḥasan al-Qurashī al-Makkī (745-819). Continue reading “The history of MS Tarikh Taymur 631: vol. 1 of al-Ghuraf al-ʿaliyya”