Balfour, [Isaac] Bayley.MareMagnum
Dhakhirah-i Khwarazm-Shahi. [Probably Anatolia, ca. 1490 / late 15th century CE].
Arabic manuscript on paper with somewhat wavy laid lines only (335 x 239 mm; text area 263 x 176 mm), 544 ff., written in a tidy nasta'liq, 35 lines to the page, text frame of red and blue rules, important words and phrases in red or in larger naskhi; chapter headings repeated in margins in a bold calligraphic script, several marginal annotations in various contemporary and later hands. Early 20th century brown roan preserving covers of contemporary morocco binding blind-stamped with a single tool to form a central motif of three interlocking lozenges, smaller lozenges above and below, blind-stamped corner-pieces. Very rare Arabic translation of Al-Jurjani's important medical compendium, the first major medical text written in the Persian language. - Al-Jurjani (d. 1136) "went to live in Khwarizm in 504/1110 and became attached to the Khwarizmshahs Kutb al-Din Muhammad, to whom he dedicated his 'Dhakirah', and Atsiz b. Muhammad [...] His 'Dhakirah Khwarizmshahi', probably the first medical Encyclopaedia written in Persian and containing about 450,000 words, is one of the most important works of its kind; it also exists in an Arabic version, and was translated into Turkish and (in an abbreviated form) into Hebrew" (Encyclopaedia of Islam). - Modelled on the Qanun of Ibn Sina (Avicenna), the "Dhakirah" is divided into ten books, covering: definition and utility of medicine, and the structure and powers of the human body; health and disease, in general, including causes and symptoms of disease, and accidents of the body; the preservation of health; diagnosis, crisis and prognosis; fevers and their treatment; local diseases and their treatment; tumours, ulcers and so forth; the care of the external parts of the body (hair, skin, nails, and so on); poisons and antidotes; and simple and compound drugs. - Binding stained and rubbed. Various seal impressions (some erased) on first and second leaves and at end of text. Paper shows some splashes, soiling and staining, first leaf re-attached and with loss of one or two words on verso (sense recoverable), margins of last few leaves strengthened, but generally in good, sound condition. Provenance: Abdul-Malik bin Mahmud al-Mausuli al-tabib ("the physician"), with his ownership inscription dated 5 Rajab 913 AH (10 Nov. 1507) at the Mu'ayiddi hospital in Mosul; the distinguished German ophthalmologist and Arabist Max Meyerhof (1874-1945), with his bookplate on the front pastedown. GAL I, 487 & S I, 889. Cf. Keshavarz, A descriptive and analytical catalogue of Persian manuscripts in the library of the Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine, pp. 52-54 & p. 149. Fihrist records no copies of the Arabic translation.
Inlibris · Autriche65 000,00 €
