A collection of fourteen treatises on music theory in Arabic and Persian [‎iii-v] (551/556)

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A collection of fourteen treatises on music theory in Arabic and Persian, copied for Shāh Qubād ibn ‘Abd al-Jalīl al-Ḥārithī al-Badakhshī (شاه قباد بن عبد الجليل الحارثي البدخشي, d. Delhi, 1083/1672-3) who by the time of the volume's compilation held the title Dīyānat Khān (ديانتخان).

Dīyānat Khān, a courtier and provincial administrator under the sixth Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb (reg. 1658-1707), himself collated most of the contents and may have been responsible for adding the diagrams. A number of extant musical texts also copied for Dīyānat Khān testify to his interest in the subject (e.g. Oxford, Bodleian Library, Ouseley 130, 385, 158).

The majority of texts within the volume are provided with colophons testifying to the process of its creation and collation which took place between Shāhjahānābād (Delhi), Ambala, Lahore and Kashmir during the years 1662-65 (to 1668 including the collation; see Norton-Wright, Jenny, 'A Mughal Musical Miscellany: The journey of Or. 2361', British Library Asia and African studies blog [31 July 2020] https://blogs.bl.uk/asian-and-african/2020/07/a-mughal-musical-miscellany-the-journey-of-or-2361-1.html [accessed 13 August 2021]).

The colophons also provide the names of two scribes, one of whom, Sayyid Abū Muḥammad ibn Sayyid Fatḥ Muḥammad Samānī (سيد أبو محمد بن سيد فتح محمد سماني) worked exclusively on Arabic texts, while the other, Muḥammad Amīn al-Akbarābādī (محمد أمين الأكبرآبادي), copied only Persian texts.

After Dīyānat Khān’s death, this volume came into the possession of his grandson, Mirzā Muḥammad ibn Rustam Mu‘tamad Khān (ميرزا محمد ابن رستم معتمد خان, b. 1687), whose ownership inscription appears on folios 2r, 18r, 33r, and 247r alongside a seal dated 1120/1708-09.

Rustam Muʻtamad Khān, Diyānat Khān's son and the father of Mirzā Muḥammad, was also a proficient scholar who translated a treatise on sundials from Latin into Arabic (see London, British Library IO Islamic 1308), and Mirzā Muhammad himself was a historian who recorded his family's biographies in his Tārīkh-i Muḥammadī (see London, British Library Or 1824).

Provenance notes on f. 2r record changes of ownership into the 19th century, when the Kashmiri-style illuminations as well as the frames on each page and the gold-tooled blue leather binding appear to have been added.

A contents list of alternative Persian titles, added later, appears on f. 1r.

Contents:

• (1) Riz̤avī, Muḥammad ibn Jalāl (رضوي، محمد ابن جلال), Risālah dar jamʿ-i maqālāt-i fuquhāʾ dar bāb shanīdan-i alḥān (رساله در جمع مقالات فقهاء در باب شنيدن الحان; ff. 2r-15r);
• (2) Ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, ʿAbd al-Jalīl (ابن عبد الرحمن، عبد الجليل), Risālah masīḥī dar kayfīyat va haqīqat samāʿ va abāḥatān (رساله مسيحي در كيفيت و حقيقت سماع و اباحتان; ff. 15r-17v);
• (3) al-Urmawī, Ṣafī al-Dīn ʿAbd al-Muʾmin ibn Yūsuf (الأرموي، صفي الدين عبد المؤمن بن يوسف), al-Risālah al-mismāh bi-al-adwār fī al-mūsīqī (الرسالة المسماة بالأدوار في الموسيقي; ff. 18r-32r);
• (4) Anonymous, Sharḥ lil-adwār (شرح للأدوار; ff. 33r-68r);
• (5) Anonymous, Risālah sharḥ Mubārak Shāh bar adwār (رسالة شرح مبارك شاه بر ادوار; ff. 68v-153r);
• (6) ʿAṭṭārī,ʿAbd al-Munʿim Muḥammad (عطاري، عبد المنعم محمد), Hāshīyah ʿalá Risālah fī nisbat al-taʾlīf (حاشية على رسالة في نسبة التأليف; ff. 153v-156r);
• (7) Avicenna (ابن سينا), Mūsīqī-yi ḥikmat-i ʿAlāʾ ī (موسيقي حكمت علائي; ff. 157r-164r);
• (8) al-Kindī, Ya‘qūb ibn Isḥāq (الكندي، يعقوب بن إسحاق), Risālah fī khubr taʾlīf al-alḥā n (رسالة في خبر تأليف الألحان; ff. 165r-168r);
• (9) al-Shirwānī, Fatḥ Allāh (الشرواني، فتح الله), Risālah fī ʿilm al-mūsīqī (رسالة في علم الموسيقي; ff. 168v-219v);
• (10) Ibn Zaylah, al-Ḥusayn ibn Muḥammad (ابن زيلة، الحسين بن محمد), Kitāb al-kāfī fī al-mūsīqī (كتاب الكافي في الموسيقي; ff. 220r-236v);
• (11) Ibn al-Munajjim, Yaḥya ibn ʿAlī (ابن المنجّم، يحيى بن علي), Risālah fī al-mūsīqī (رسالة في الموسيقي; ff. 236v-238v);
• (12) al-Fārābī, Abū Naṣr Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad ibn Tarkhān (الفارابي، أبو نصرمحمد بن محمد بن ترخان), Min Kitāb al-madkhal fī al-mūsīqī (من كتاب المدخل في الموسيقي; ff. 238v-240r);
• (13) al-Bukhārī, Qāsim ibn Dūst ʻAlī (بخاري، قاسم ابن دوست علي), Kashf al-awtār (كشف الأوتار; ff. 240v-246r);
• (14) Anonymous, Risālah kanz al-tuḥaf dar mūsīqī (رسالة كنز التحف در موسيقي; ff. 247r-269v).

Extent and format

Codex A collection of pages, usually gathered into quires, and bound between covers. ; ff. i+269+iv

Physical characteristics

Material: Eastern laid paper

Dimensions: Folios trimmed to 245 x 134 mm (see f. 269v); 178 x 84 mm written.

Foliation: British Museum foliation in pencil; Eastern Arabic foliation from f. 2 until f. 219 (end of the ninth treatise in the volume)

Ruling: Misṭarah ; 25 lines per page; vertical spacing 14 lines per 10 cm

Script: Naskh and nastaʿlīq ; the scribes are Sayyid Abū Muḥammad ibn Sayyid Fatḥ Muḥammad Samānī (سيد أبو محمد بن سيد فتح محمد سماني) who wrote in Arabic and names himself in the colophons to the third, fifth and twelfth treatises (ff. 68r, 153r, and 240r) and Muḥammad Amīn al-Akbarābādī (محمد أمين الأكبرآبادي) who wrote in Persian and names himself in the colophons to the second, thirteenth and fourteenth treatises (ff. 17v, 246r, and 269v).

Ink: Black ink, with rubricated headings and overlinings, key words and diagrams in red. Some use of green ink (f. 133v-135r)

Decoration: Pages are bordered in blue with text areas framed in blue, gold and red, added later (see f. 252v). The margins of ff. 2v-3r are illuminated with gold floral designs, and the headings of each treatise except the second (f. 15r), eighth (f. 165r) and twelfth (f. 238v) are illuminated in a later Kashmiri style with gold, blue, red, green and white. The heading of the ninth treatise (f. 236v) is illuminated in gold only.

Binding: Navy blue leather binding with gold-tooled double border and central motif; blue marbled paper doublures.

Condition: Wormholes throughout, especially at the front and back of the volume; minor paper repairs.

Marginalia: Some notes and corrections throughout; especially to the third and fifth treatises. Many of the colophons are written outside of the present trimmed page dimensions, and retained on folded tail edge tabs.

Seals: Defaced square ownership seal (f. 2r), Ownership seals (ff. 2r, 18r, 33r and 247r [the last defaced]), British Museum stamp (ff. 2r and 269r)

Written in

Arabic, Persian and Farsi in Arabic script

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