Texts, scribes and transmission : : manuscript cultures of the Ismaili communities and beyond / / Wafi A. Momin, editor.

• TeilnehmendeR: Momin, Wafi A.,
• Place / Publishing House: London : : Bloomsbury Academic, I.B. Tauris,, 2022.
• Year of Publication: 2022
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (xv, 481 pages) :; illustrations

The past few decades have seen a burgeoning interest in the manuscript cultures of the Muslim world. The study of manuscripts has brought to light new perspectives on the transmission of texts and larger questions of cultural practices passed down within the learned circles of premodern Muslim societies. The intellectual and literary heritage of Ismaili communities, who form a branch of Shi'i Islam, has until recently been preserved in private and largely inaccessible libraries. This open access volume brings together studies offering insights on different aspects of the manuscript cultures nurtured by Ismaili communities until well after the widespread dissemination of printed books. The range of materials transmitted via these manuscripts in Arabic, Persian and Indic languages also reflects the doctrinal and literary preoccupations of Muslims at large and of other groups from the societies in which Ismailis lived. Hence, the manuscripts bear the imprint of their respective cultural contexts, namely a number of regions from the Near East to Central and South Asia. In addition to engaging with multifaceted problems surrounding the processes of textual transmission, the chapters in this book deal with other connected aspects like codicology, scribal and reading practices, educational and social history, authorship, communal script, religious identity and interactions of ideas across ideological denominations. With contributions from specialists and early-career scholars, the volume will be of interest to those working on textual scholarship, manuscript and literary cultures and Islamic studies. The eBook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on bloomsburycollections.com. Open access was funded by Islamic Publications Ltd.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements -- Note on Contributors -- Transliteration, Dates, and Abbreviations -- Introduction, Wafi A. Momin, Institute of Ismaili Studies, UK -- Section I: THE SHAPING OF A NEW FIELD -- 1. Ismaili Manuscripts and Modern Scholarship in Ismaili Studies, Farhad Daftary, Institute of Ismaili Studies, UK -- 2. Husain Hamdani, Paul Kraus, and a Suitcase Full of Manuscripts, François de Blois, University of Cambridge, UK -- Section II: RASA'IL IKHWAN AL-SAFA', KITAB AL-ZINA, AND THEIR MANUSCRIPT TRADITION -- 3. The Ikhwan al-Safa's Epistles on Logic in Some Manuscripts of the IIS Arabic Collection, Carmela Baffioni, The Institute of Ismaili Studies, UK -- 4. The Missing Link? MS 1040: An Important Copy of the Rasa'il Ikhwan al-Safa' , Omar Ali-de-Unzaga, The Institute of Ismaili Studies, UK -- 5. The Manuscript Copies of Abu Hatim al-Razi's Kitab al-Zina at the Institute of Ismaili Studies, Cornelius Berthold, University of Hamburg, Germany -- Section III: EXPLORING TWO EARLY TAYYIBI WORKS AND THEIR TRANSMISSION -- 6. The Majmu' al-tarbiya between Text and Paratext: Exploring the Social History of a Community's Reading Culture, Delia Cortese, The Institute of Ismaili Studies, UK -- 7. Textual, Orthographic Variations and Scribes' Annotations: A Possible Tool for the Transmission Analysis of the Text?, Monica Scotti, University of Naples "L'Orientale", Italy -- Section IV: REVISITING NIZARI HISTORY OF ALAMUT TIMES -- 8. Alamut and Badakshan: Newly identified Sargudhasht-i Sayyidna Manuscripts and their Background, Miklos Sarközy, The Institute of Ismaili Studies, UK -- 9. 'Ahd-i Sayyidna, a Newly Discovered Treatise on the Consolidation of the Nizari Da'wa in Alamut, Karim Javan, The Institute of Ismaili Studies, UK -- 10. The Discovery, Description and Publication of the Manuscripts of Two Major Niazari Ismaili Texts from the Alamut Period: The Haft Bab and the Diwan-i Qa'imiyyat of Hasan-i Mahmud-i Katib, S. J. Badakhchani, The Institute of Ismaili Studies, UK -- SECTION V: COMMUNAL SCRIPT, SCRIBAL ELITE, AND SATPANTH MANUSCRIPT CULTURE -- 11. Khwajah Sindhi (Khojki): Its Name, Manuscripts and Origin, Shafique N. Virani, University of Toronto, Canada -- 12. A Forgotten Voice: The Agency of Scribal and Literate Elite and the Satpanth Manuscript Culture, Wafi A. Momin, The Institute of Ismaili Studies, UK SETION VI: IDENTITY, CULTURAL INTERACTIONS, AND ESOTERIC INTERPREATION AMONG CENTRAL ASIAN ISMAILI COMMUNITIES -- 13. Ismaili-Sufi Relationships in the Light of the Ni'mat Allahi Manuscripts in the Holdings of the Institute of Ismaili Studies, Orkhan Mir-Kasimov, The Institute of Ismaili Studies, UK -- 14. Poems of Allegiance: Shah Diya-i-i Shughnani's Salam-nama, Nourmamadcho Nourmamadchoev, The Institute of Ismaili Studies, UK -- 15. The Sahifat al-nazirin: Reflections on Authorship and Confessional Identity in a 15th-Century Central Asian Text, Daniel Beben, The Institute of Ismaili Studies, UK -- 16. The Seven Pillars of the Shari'a and the Question of Authority in the Central Asian Ismaili Manuscripts: An Ismaili Esoteric Discourse, Yahia Baiza, The Institute of Ismaili Studies, UK -- SECTION VII: APPROACHING TEXTUAL TRANSMISSION THROUGH QUR'ANIC MANUSCRIPTS AND HOLOGRAPH AUTOGRAPH COPIES -- 17. Writing the Qur'an between the Lines: Preliminary Remarks on Marginalia in the Qur'an Manuscripts held by The Institute of Ismaili Studies, Asma Hilali, The Institute of Ismaili Studies, UK -- 18. The Making of a Holograph: Authorial Arabic Manuscripts in the Special Collections of the Institute of Ismaili Studies, Walid Ghali, The Institute of Ismaili Studies, UK -- List of illustrations -- Index.