Master Scribes

The Nasser D. Khalili Collection contains the largest range of Qur'anic material in private hands and includes examples from centres as far apart as Spain and India. The second of four volumes dedicated to the Qur'ans in the collection, this work covers the period from AD 1000 to AD 1400. The Khalili Collection is the greatest collection of Islamic art in private hands; it is continuing to grow and improve. It contains a large and comprehensive range of Qur'anic material, covering the entire history of Qur'an production from the seventh to the twentieth century, including examples from centres as far apart as Spain and India. This is the second of four volumes cataloguing the Qur'ans in the Khalili Collection. Notable among the manuscripts in this volume is a Qur'an by the greatest calligrapher of the Middle Ages, Yaqut al-Musta simi, which is exceptional in that it retains its original illumination. Other masterpieces include a Qur'an written in gold from twelfth-century Iraq; the only twelfth-century Qur'an from Valencia still in private hands; and a manuscript that is possibly the earliest Qur'an to survive from India. The lavish presentation of this catalogue is combined with detailed scholarship that not only encompasses the history of the subject, but also presents in accompanying essays new findings that have been made in the course of cataloguing. This book is intended for art historians, Islamicists, collectors and curators of Islamic art.