Around the 10th century, Qur’anic manuscripts went through a radical transformation: while for centuries copies of the Qur’an had quite consistently displayed angular scripts, commonly referred to as Kufic, starting from the 10th century, manuscripts of the Qur’an began to be written in round scripts. Of course, this shift did not go unnoticed and scholars have tried to determine the reason for the change.
Tag: inscription
A minaret Byron forgot to mention: the minaret of Damghan
… … … It is not clear when Byron actually visited the Minaret of Damghan or anyway when he took the photos of the minaret. Most probably he visited this minaret while visiting the Tarikh Khana, the Gunbad-i Chihil Dukhtaran and the Pir-i Alamdar (all recorded in his travelogue on the date of 13th of…
The Shrine of the Twelve Imams
The Shrine of the Twelve Imams, for example, has a frieze of Kufic On the 20th of March 1934, Robert Byron visited, together with the Friday Mosque of Yazd and the Vaqt-i Sa’at, the Shrine of the Twelve Imams, located in the same city. Byron’s mention of the monument is very brief: “The Shrine of the…
The hidden decoration of the Vaqt-i Sa’at
The most elaborate of them Robert Byron is impressed by the beauty of the monuments of Yazd. In the entry dated 20th March 1934 of his travelogue, he writes down how unexpected it was for him to encounter such beauty. An extraordinary series of simple, egg-domed mausoleums now lured us across the town—extraordinary in that, being…
The Musalla of Mashhad and inscription authorship.
a ruined arch In the entry dated 24th of December 1933 Byron mentions a number of monuments of Mashhad, that he missed during his first visit to the city: the Imamzada Khvajah Rabi’, the Masjid-i Shah, and the Musalla of the city. It is not the first time Byron mentions a musalla: roughly one month before,…
Blaming the murderer: an inscription of the Ziyarat-i ‘Abd Allah Ansari
Everyone goes to Gazar Gah After his visit to the citadel of Herat, where he fancied for a second about becoming a spy for His Majesty the King of England, on the 24th of November 1933, Byron took a cab that drove him to what he calls “the shrine of Gazar Gah”. In fact, the…
Actual visit or narrative device: Byron at the Qal’a Ikhtiyar al-Din
It was interesting to discover, from personal experience, how spies find their vocation “Herat citadel has a long and stormy story”, Nancy Hatch Dupree wrote in 1977 in her Historical Guide to Afghanistan. And in fact, the story of the Qal’a Ikhtiyar al-Din is strictly connected with the turbulent history of Herat itself. Alexander the Great…
The Minaret of Semnan
I heard of an old minaret, which I found before the police found me. We cannot say that Robert Byron visited the Friday Mosque of Semnan. It is more correct to say that he passed by and took a photo, at least as long as we trust what’s written in his travelogue. Also, he does not…
A divergence to the standard formula: an alabaster gravestone from Nishapur, Iran
It is quite a long time that I do not read and post an inscription. Well, not that long: let’s say one month or so… but I missed it. Today I woke up and said: ‘Today I have to read a gravestone’: and here we are. Alabaster gravestones from 10th century Nishapur are not that…
A Buyid inscription in Persepolis (344/955) – reading the past in the past
I like the Buyids: a small dynasty originally from Iranian plateau that ruled Iran and Iraq, or at least parts of the territory, between the 10th and the 11th century. They produced finely made metalwork and beautiful silks, among other things. In their art as well as in their ruling style, they pursued the Iranian…
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