Introduction to Islamicate Manuscripts

Course Description

Length: 10 hours Format: Online This course is for students who have not yet had the opportunity to study Islamicate manuscripts. It is an introductory course and will take a broad view of the manuscript arts from the origins of Islam in the seventh century through the early modern period (eighteenth and nineteenth centuries), encompassing Arab, Persian, Turkish, and Indian cultures. The course will focus primarily on materials (binding and paper), layout, scripts, and decoration and will be taught through the rich collection of Islamic manuscripts that make up the Manuscripts of the Muslim World project. Students may expect to do some small group or individual work on their own in preparation for each synchronous class session.  In their application statements, students should briefly describe the extent of their general background in manuscript studies and give their reasons for wishing to take this course. No previous knowledge of Islamic history or culture is required. N.B. All readings on the list are optional. They will give you some background if you feel you need it before we begin the class. Click here to view the course description for the in-person version of this course.

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Advance Reading List

General Cultural Orientation

Bloom, Jonathan and Sheila Blair. Islam: A Thousand Years of Faith and Power. New York: TV Books, 2000.

Cook, Michael. The Koran: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000.

Lapidus, Ira M. A History of Islamic Societies. 3rd ed. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014. Just read what you need. 

Robinson, Neal. Islam: A Concise Introduction. Richmond, UK: Curzon Press, 1999.

Wright, Elaine. Islam: Faith, Art, Culture. London: Scala Publishers, 2009.

Islamic Book Culture

Atiyeh, George N., ed., The Book in the Islamic World: The Written Word and Communication in the Middle East. Albany: SUNY Press, 1995. See especially Franz Rosenthal, “‘Of Making Many Books There is no End’: The Classical Muslim View,” 33–55.

Bloom, Jonathan and Sheila Blair. Islamic Arts. London; New York: Phaidon Press, 1997. Chapters 2, 6, and 10.

“Islamic art. III. Arts of the book.” Dictionary of Art 16 (2009): 271–359.  

Divided into specific sections for calligraphy, painted decoration, painted illustration, &c. Sections are also reprinted in alphabetical order in The Grove Encyclopedia of Islamic Art and Architecture, Jonathan M. Bloom and Sheila S. Blair, eds. 3 vols. See: “Book, arts of the” and “Bookbinding.”  

Gruber, Christine J., ed. The Islamic Manuscript Tradition: Ten Centuries of Book Arts in Indiana University Collections. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 2010. Chapter 1.

Hirschler, Konrad. The Written Word in the Medieval Arabic Lands: A Social and Cultural 

History of Reading Practices. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2012. Chapter 1 and Conclusion especially.

Roper, Geoffrey. “The History of the Book in the Muslim World,” in Oxford Companion to the Book, edited by Michael Suarez and H.R. Woudhuysen, Section 38. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010. Reprinted in The Book: A Global History, edited by Michael Suarez and H.R. Woudhuysen. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013.

Islamic Manuscripts: Codicology, Materials and Techniques

Bloom, Jonathan. Paper Before Print: The History and Impact of Paper in the Islamic World. New York: Yale University Press, 2001. 

Bosch, Gulnar, John Carswell, and Guy Petherbridge. Islamic Bindings and Bookmaking. Chicago: Oriental Institute, 1981. See pages 1–84 for an overview of manuscript production. Download here: https://oi.uchicago.edu/research/publications/islamic-studies

Deroche, François, ed. Islamic Codicology: An Introduction to the Study of Manuscripts in Arabic Script. London: Al-Furqan Islamic Heritage Foundation, 2006.

Ekhtiar, Maryam D. How to Read Islamic Calligraphy. New York: The MET, 2018.

Gacek, Adam. Arabic Manuscripts: A Vademecum for Readers. Leiden: Brill, 2009. Useful guide to own.

Online Resources

Manuscripts of the Muslim World project:

Islamicate Manuscripts in the Free Library of Philadelphia, the University of Pennsylvania, Columbia University and other Philadelphia area repositories, cataloged and digitized. http://openn.library.upenn.edu/html/muslimworld_contents.html

Islamic Manuscript Basics:
Site using the MMW collection to introduce Islamic manuscript studies. https://kislakcenter.github.io/islamicmss/

Mouse and Manuscript:

University of Leiden micro-lessons on specific qualities of Islamicate manuscripts.
https://mouse.digitalscholarship.nl/

Glossary Terms for Islamic Manuscripts:
A useful guide to terminology for talking about Islamicate manuscripts, especially binding and materials.
https://www.islamicmanuscriptconservation.org/terminology.html

Digital Ottoman Studies
Site that collections digital resources for working on Ottoman Studies.
https://www.digitalottomanstudies.com/

University of Michigan Library Research Guides: Islamic Manuscript Studies 

An invaluable resource, including listings of collections of Islamic manuscripts around the world, collections and catalogues online, and bibliography.
http://guides.lib.umich.edu/islamicmsstudies

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Course Evaluations

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Course History