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Catalogue: Natural History

al-Maqāmah al-yāqūtīyah (MS A 35, item 8): (The Ruby Maqāmah); المقامه الياقوتيه; by Jalāl al-Dīn al-Suyūṭī (d. 1505/911); جلال الدين السيوطى

The National Library of Medicine has a volume containing two short essays and ten maqāmahs by the 15th-century encyclopedist and scholar Jalāl al-Dīn al-Suyūṭī, a maqāmah being a type of rhymed prose. The manuscript at NLM (MS A 35) containing the essays and maqāmahs by al-Suyūṭī is closely related to the Berlin MS We. 193, copied about 1800, which contains copies in precisely the same order. Other Berlin manuscripts contain additional copies of a few of the maqāmahs represented in the NLM manuscript. Specific references to other copies for each item will be given as they are catalogued individually.

Amongst the essays and maqāmahs in this volume is a maqāmah on rubies and gems.

The essay has not been published in a modern translation or edition.

Three other copies of this specific essay are found in Berlin, Staatsbibliothek, MS We. 193, fols. 16b-20a; MS Pet. 296, fols. 47a-54b; and MS We. 189, fols. 54a-58b (see Ahlwardt, Berlin, entries 8563, 8556, and 8555).

Illustrations

Folio 18b from MS A 35 which begins Jalāl al-Dīn al-Suyūṭī's al-Maqāmah al-yāqūtīyah (The Ruby Maqāmah). The biscuit, glossy paper has horizontal laid lines, single chain lines, and watermarks. The paper is waterstained. The text is written in a medium-small naskh script showing some North African influence using black ink with headings red. There is also red shading of some words; there are red teardrop text stops and catchwords. The text area is frame-ruled.

MS A 35, fol. 18b

The opening of a maqāmah, an essay in rhymed prose, concerned with rubies and gems, written by al-Suyūṭī (d. 1505/911). The copyist Muḥammad ibn Ibrāhīm al-Ḥalwānī al-Shāfi‘ī completed the copy on 16 Ramadan 1001 (= 16 June 1593).

Physical Description

Arabic. 5 leaves (fols. 18a, line 11, to 22b, line 21). Dimensions 20.4 x 14.6 (text area 15.5 x 9.5) cm; 23 lines per page. The title is given on folio 18a and the essay begins on fol. 18b. The title occurs on the title page for the volume (fol. 1a). The author's name is given at the end of the second item (fol. 4a lines 12-14) as Jalāl al-Dīn al-Suyūṭī, but on the title page (fol. 1a) and in the other individual items as: Jalal al-Suyūṭī. The title of the volume is given as Majmu‘at maqamat al-Suyūṭī (A Collection of maqāmahs by al-Suyūṭī) in a recent owner's penciled label on the front endpapers.

The first twelve items in this volume appear to have been copied by the same scribe. In the colophon to the ninth item, it is stated that copyist Muḥammad ibn Ibrāhīm al-Ḥalwānī al-Shāfi‘ī completed the copy on 16 Ramadan 1001 [= 16 June 1593]

The text is written in a medium-small naskh script showing some North African influence using black ink with headings red. There is also red shading of some words; there are red teardrop text stops and catchwords. The text area is frame-ruled.

The biscuit, glossy paper has horizontal laid lines, single chain lines, and watermarks (initials). Fol. 43 is dyed yellow. The paper is waterstained, especially at the top of the volume, and it is soiled with thumbing. The edges have been trimmed from their original size.

The volume consists of 51 leaves and 1 end leaf. Fol. 1a is the title page for the entire volume. It contains three short essays and ten maqamahs (a type of rhymed prose), all by al-Suyūṭī. Item 1 (fols. 1b-2a) is Muṣannaf fī al-ghāliyah (MS A 35, item 1); item 2 (fols. 2a-4a) Nathl al-kattān fī al-kushknān (MS A 35, item 2); item 3 (fols. 4a-6a) al-Maqāmah al-fustuqīyah (MS A 35, item 3); item 4 (fols. 6a-8b) Naḍrah fī aḥādīth al-mā’ wa-al-riyāḍ (MS A 35, item 4); item 5 (fols. 8b-11b) al-Dhararī fī abnā al-sarāarī (MS A 35, item 5); item 6 (fols. 11b-14b) Maqāmah fī waṣf rawdah misr tasammá Bulbul al-rawḍah (MS A 35, item 6); item 7 (fols. 14b-18a) al-Maqāmah al-zumurrudīyah (MS A 35, item 7); item 8 (fols. 18a-22b) al-Maqāmah al-yāqūtīyah is here catalogued; item 9 (fols. 22b-30a) Manhal fī al-kunāfah wa-al-qaṭā'if (MS A 35, item 9); item 10 (fols. 30a-37a) Maqāmah al-rayāḥīn tasammá al-Maqāmah al-wardīyah (MS A 35, item 10); item 11 (fols. 37a-42a) al-Maqāmah al-miskīyah (MS A 35, item 11); item 12 (fols. 42a-50b) al-Maqāmah al-tuffā (MS A 35, item 12); and item 13 (fols. 51a-51b) Risālah fī al-khitān by al-Simillāwī (MS A 35, item 13). Fol. [1] at the end of the volume is blank but for small pious invocations; its paper is of later date.

Binding

The volume is bound in a red leather modern library binding. There are modern paper pastedowns and endpapers.

Provenance

Various owner's signatures are on the title page (fol. 1a), including one by Ismā‘īl ibn Abī Bakr al-Kharrāṭ al-Ḥanafī al-Dimashqī dated 1054 (1644-45) and Muḥammad ibn Sulayman al-Kanāfī (undated).

The volume was purchased in 1941 by the Army Medical Library from A. S. Yahuda (ELS 5043).

References

Schullian/Sommer, Cat. of incun. & MSS., entry A35, p. 309 (the specific items are not itemized)

NLM Microfilm Reel: FILM 48-119 no. 2