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Selections of Arabic, Persian, and Ottoman Calligraphy

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Arabic and Persian excerpts

AUTHOR/CREATOR
Calligrapher: Fayaz 'Ali Vasi'i

CREATED/PUBLISHED
18th-19th centuries

NOTES
Dimensions of Written Surface: 14.2 (w) x 23.5 (h) cm

Script: tahriri

This calligraphic fragment includes a number of textual excerpts in Arabic and Persian. The top three lines include an invocation to God and a saying in Arabic about the necessity to trust in Him. The next few horizontal lines include a saying in Persian about God's will. The diagonal lines of text in the lower half of the fragment quote the famous Persian poet Shaykh Sa'di Shirazi (d. 691/1292) beginning with the note "from the words of Sa'di Shirazi" (min kalam-i Sa'di Shirazi). The text taken from Sa'di is translated from Persian to Arabic in this fragment and gives advice to be aware of what one says.

The text is written in black tahriri script. Some orthographic marks and vowels are picked out in red ink, and all lines of text are separated visually by red strokes. The ends of certain sections or phrases also are marked by pyramids consisting of three red dots. The paper is thin and brown, and damaged at the bottom.

In the lower right corner, the calligrapher Fayaz 'Ali Vasi'i states that he wrote (raqamahu) this fragment, and in the lower left corner he has dedicated (baraya khatir-i) his piece to a certain Mamki Nahali. He has written vertically in the top right margin that he wrote his piece on a Thursday (ruz-i panjshamba), although he does not specify the year.

As Nahali is a language spoken in Madhya Pradesh, the name of the patron suggests a north central Indian provenance for this calligraphy. The script -- a fluid tahriri found in 18th and 19th-century calligraphies from India -- also suggests an Indian provence.

SUBJECT
Islamic calligraphy
Arabic calligraphy
Islamic manuscripts
Arabic script calligraphy
Tahriri
Illuminated Islamic manuscripts

MEDIUM
23.3 (w) x 31.1 (h) cm

CALL NUMBER
1-88-154.58

REPOSITORY
Library of Congress, African and Middle Eastern Division, Washington, D.C. 20540

DIGITAL ID
ascs 216
http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.amed/ascs.216

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