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Or 16184

Record Id:

032-003616269

Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:

032-003616269

MDARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100101872397.0x000001

LARK:

SLARK:

Format:

ISAD(G)

Reference (shelfmark):

Or 16184

Title:

[Divan-i Nava’i] – [ديوان نوائي]

Scope & Content:

This volume contains the Divan of Ali Shir Nava’i (844-906 AH/1441-1501 CE). As well as being a prominent statesman of considerable wealth, Nava’i (meaning ‘melody maker’) was a great poet and patron of the arts.

Nava’i was a master of Chagatai and his poetry in the language brought him great renown. One of Nava’i's most important works of poetry is the Khazaʼin al-ma‘ani (‘Treasuries of poetic meanings’), the final edition of four of Nava’i's divans which he arranged shortly before his death. These are entitled Gharaʼib al-sighar (‘The curiosities of childhood’), Navadir al-shabab (‘The marvels of youth’), Badaʼi‘ al-vasat (‘The wonders of middle age’), and Fava’id al-kibar (‘The advantages of old age’). Although they are said to correspond to the four stages of Navai’s life, the contents of each divan are not restricted to a particular period (For more see Subtelny, ‘ʿAlī Shīr Navāʾī’).

The present manuscript has a lacuna of some 22 folios between ff 2-3, according to the original foliation. The main interest of this copy lies in the stylistically unusual ornamentation of the first two pages of text. There is an ornate illuminated headpiece with basmala on f 1v. ff 1v-2r feature large-scale roundels and floral sprays in the margins, and simple arabesque scrolls on blue ground between the text columns.

Begins: Ashraqat min ‘aks shams al-ka’s anvar al-hudaYar ‘aksın may-da gördib jamdin chıqdı sada

The volume contains numerous additions and corrections by the copyist throughout. Prayers, invocations, and religious verses mainly in Persian are on f 358r. Verse, mainly in Chagatai, are on ff 358v-361v. The work is from Central Asia, and perhaps Bukhara. It is dated on f 356r to Saturday 25 (no month given) 1313 AH/1895-6 CE.

Collection Area:

Oriental Manuscripts

Hierarchy Tree:

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Hierarchy Record Ids:

032-003616269

Is part of:

not applicable

Hierarchy:

032-003616269

Container:

not applicable

Record Type (Level):

Fonds

Extent:

1 text, 361 ff

Digitised Content:

Languages:

Chagatai
Persian

Scripts:

Arabic (nastaliq Variant)

Start Date:

1895

End Date:

1896

Date Range:

1313

Calendar:

Hijri qamari

Era:

Place of Origin:

Central Asia

Access:

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User Conditions:

Physical Characteristics:

Material: Beige paper, rather brittle and damaged along some ruled lines. Endpapers of bright block-printed cloth

Foliation: European, 361 ff

Dimensions: 287 x 182 mm; text area 170 x 84 mm

Pricking and Ruling: 19 lines in double columns. Text frames and columns: black, sparse pale gold, light blue, medium blue; the green of the outer margin ruling on ff 1-11 is probably verdigris, and here and along some of the inner rulings the paper has split. The outer ruling in the remainder of the manuscript is red

Script: Nasta‘liq

Binding: Original brown leather binding with lightly impressed ornament comprising two-tone arabesque central medallions and cornerpieces, very worn, rebacked and repaired

Custodial History:

On 1r is a seal impression of Muhammad ‘Abid. The front flyleaf has an inscription dated 1319 AH/1901 CE

Source of Acquisition:

Purchased from John Randall on 21/12/2005.

Publications:

The Divan was published in four volumes in Cyrillic between 1959-60 CE in Tashkent by the Academy of Sciences of Uzbekistan. For a Persian edition see Alisher Navoiĭ, Dīvān-i Amīr Niẓām al-Dīn ʿAlī-Shīr Navāʾī Fānī / bi-saʿy va ihtimām-i Rukn al-Dīn Humāyūnʹfarrukh (Tehran: Kitābkhānah-i Ibn Sīnā, 1342 [1963]). Another Divan of Navaʾi has been published at Dīvān of the Aq Qoyunlu admirers (1471), edited by Aftandil Erkinov (Tokyo: Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies ILCAA, 2015).

Material Type:

Archives and Manuscripts

Legal Status:

Not Public Record(s)

Names:

Navoii, Alisher, 1441-1501,
see also http://isni.org/isni/000000010878029X,
see also http://viaf.org/viaf/22198747

Subjects:

Chagatai Poetry

Related Material:

For full or partial copies of Nava’i’s Divan held by the British Library, see Add MS 7910, Add MS 7911, Add MS 7912, Add MS 7913 (ff 56v-184v), Or 401, Or 1158, Or 1374, Or 1375, Or 3492, Or 3493, Or 5330, Or 5346, Or 7177, Or 7178, Or 11249, Or 13061, Or 14382, Or 16045 (ff 114v-119v), IO Islamic 53, IO Islamic 4861, and Delhi Persian 1401.

On Nava’i, see Maria E. Subtelny, ‘ʿAlī Shīr Navāʾī,’ in EI3 (https://doi.org/10.1163/1573-3912_ei3_COM_23837) and Günay Kut, ‘Ali Şîr Nevâî,’ TDVIA 2:449-453, and the bibliographies cited therein. See also J. Eckmann, ‘Die tschaghataische Literatur’ in Philologiae Turcicae Fundamenta, II:329-57 and the bibliography on 352-7; Babur, Babur-nama, edited by N. Ilminskii (Kazan: Kazanskii Universitet, 1857); and Belin, ‘Moralistes Orientaux. Caractères, maximes et pensées de Mir Ali Chir Névâiï,’ Journal Asiatique, 5:17 (1866),175-238.

The British Library holds a significant collection of works by Nava’i. For his Chagatai adaptation of Nafahat al-üns see Or 402. For his Khamsa, either in part or whole, see Add MS 7908, Add MS 7909, Or 400, Or 16183, and IO Islamic 4863. For his Majalis al-nafa’is, see Add MS 7875, Or 403, and Or 15655. For his Lisan al-tayr, see Or 16041 and for his Farhad va Shirin see IO Islamic 4862. Add MS 7914 and Or 1712 also contain extracts of his work. Two copies of his work have been digitised as part of the British Library Endangered Archives Programme. See EAP910/1/5/23 and EAP910/1/5/17. Lists of Nava’i’s works can be found in Mirza Mehdi Khan’s Chagatai-Persian dictionary Sanglakh (Or 2892).