This item has been added to the Database within the Explore Islamic Art Collections project. Information is available in: English, Arabic.

Name of Object:

Double page from a manuscript of the Qur’an (37:13-23; 73-86)

Location:

Los Angeles, United States of America

Holding Museum:

Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA)

About Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), Los Angeles

Date of Object:

Hegira 8th century / AD 14th century

Museum Inventory Number:

M.2002.1.4

Material(s) / Technique(s):

Ink, opaque watercolour, and gold on paper

Dimensions:

Bifolio, overall: 55.9 x 36.8cm;
Text block: 24.1 x 16.5cm

Period / Dynasty:

Mamluk

Provenance:

Egypt or Syria

Description:

The wealth and piety of late medieval Egypt and Syria saw the endowment of numerous religious complexes, especially mosques, tombs and religious schools (madrasas). The ruling elite’s enthusiasm for building was paralleled by the commissioning of a set of Qur’ans for each institution. In the 8th/14th century, single-volume, two-volume and thirty-volume Qur’ans became the standard formats. The marginal ornament on this bifolium designates a rub‘, or one-quarter of a thirtieth of the Qur’an.

How date and origin were established:

The Rayhani script, five lines per page, written in black ink with additional marks in red, compares with a fourteenth-century thirty-volume Qur’an donated to a mosque in Cairo by the Mamluk Sultan, Faraj ibn Barquq (Hegira 801-815 / AD 1399-1412), part nine kept in the British Library, London.

How Object was obtained:

Collection of Maan Z. Madina (1926-2013), New York, until 2002 (sold to); LACMA, The Madina Collection of Islamic Art, gift of Camilla Chandler Frost.

How provenance was established:

The style of the Rayhani script, written five lines per page, relate this bifolium to manuscripts of the Qur’an produced in Mamluk Egypt and Syria.

Selected bibliography:

Komaroff, Linda, Lo Terrenal y lo divino: Arte islámico siglos VII al XIX Colección del Museo de Arte del Condado de Los Angeles, Santiago, Chile: Centro Cultural La Moneda, 2015: 20.

Citation of this web page:

LACMA Staff "Double page from a manuscript of the Qur’an (37:13-23; 73-86)" in Explore Islamic Art Collections. Museum With No Frontiers, 2024. https://islamicart.museumwnf.org/database_item.php?id=object;EPM;us;Mus21;22;en

Prepared by: LACMA Staff

MWNF Working Number: US1 22