MANUSCRIPT IN ARABIC. - Lot 269

MANUSCRIPT IN ARABIC. A manual for secretaries and administrators, followed by a short text on marriage and repudiation. [sl. s.d. - after 16th c.], 39 ff. or 78 pp. (22 x 15 cm), 25-line text in Maghribi script, black and red ink on laid paper, advertisements and marginal notes (mainly corrections). Presence of numbering. The manuscript is acephalous, judging by the numbering indications on the first folios, 4 to 5 folios are missing. Numbering present on the first 23 pages. The acephalous manuscript includes a first text (folio 1-34v) whose chapter titles (abwāb) written in red, and contents, suggest that it is a manual for administrators and secretaries comprising 13 chapters (the first is missing). Among the topics covered: how to write to kings and viziers, how to write letters of reproach, on prayers, on titles, etc. The text could have been composed in the Hafsid period (1229-1574), giving us a text representative of this scholarly culture: a theme, references to poetry, then a return to the theme, with references to jurists or great historical figures (in the manuscript, the Mamluk sultan Baybars writing to the governor of Mecca is quoted). The Malikite jurists mentioned in the text do not post-date this period. A second, short text (folio 34v-39) comprises a section of a legal text on marriage and repudiation. This text is of obvious historical interest, but has not yet been published.