PAL

Ptolemaeus Arabus et Latinus

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Berlin, Staatsbibliothek Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Sprenger 1838

[Colour scanned images of the textblock and covers.]
Collection of a main work and two short appendices: Arabic.  Date:

undated, before 1 February 1848 (Ir); c. 1215/1800 (Ahlwardt).

Or.:

Persian; unknown scribe. The present manuscript conveys in a different hand and in not very good Arabic what seems the scribal colophon of the manuscript on which this copy is based, which reads ‘qad kutiba fī nuskha al-manqūl ʿan-hu bi-nisbati hadhihi l-nuskha: wa-ittafaqa l-farāgh min kitāba yawm al-arbiʿāʾ wa-l-thānī wa-l-ʿishrūn min shahr Allāh al-mubārak Ramaḍān sana ? li-Maḥmūd al-Khaṭīb bi-madīnat Marāgha, ʿammara-hā Allāh’ (152r); this colophon seems to point to the base manuscript being copied for (li-) a Maḥmūd who was preacher in Maragha, rather than the present copy being done by (the normal expression is ʿalā yad) Maḥmūd al-Khaṭīb in Maragha, as Ahlwardt suggests in his catalogue.

Prov.:

ex-libris ‘Ex Biblioth. Regia Berolinensi.’ in red (IIr).

Cod.: yellow paper, II+158+IIa ff. (foliated with black Hindu-Arabic numerals in pen, centered above the text body on rectos, up to f. 153r; this foliation is continued at the top left of rectos with Hindu-Arabic numerals in pencil, while the earlier foliation starts anew with ‘1’ on f. 153v and ‘2’ on f. 154r; additional foliation with Arabic-European numerals in pencil at the top left of scattered rectos, running entirely parallel to the main foliation; catchwords in black or red). A single neat, formal, and fully dotted nastaʿlīq hand in black; no shaddas, substantial hamzas except on initial alifs, no vowels. The size of the hand and boldness of the stroke varies along the text. Book and chapter headings in the same main hand and size in red; chapter headings introduced by abjad numerals in bold black overlined in red; sections indicated with red overlines and sometimes introduced by formulaic qāla or aqūlu in red or in black overwritten in red. Undotted abjad numerals mostly in black and less often in red; Hindu-Arabic numerals in red. Substantial diagrams with lines mostly in red and geometrical points in black, although there are few diagrams in black with points in red; diagram labels in black and red; some unfinished diagrams (23v–24r) and few spaces for diagrams left blank (particularly on ff. 13r–29r); some diagrams in the margins and some pasted diagrams (e.g., on ff. 14r, 14v, 16r, 16v, 22v, 41r, 122v, and 124r). Substantial tables with lines in red, headings in red and black, and abjad notation in red and black; one table left blank (17v). Codex in very good condition; no moisture stains, occasionally worm-eaten, two major inkblots (20r, 119r), few smudges, some wear on the covers. Dimensions: 30×17½ cm, written area: 19×10 cm; 23 lines per page. Rebound; purple cloth cover on pasteboard; wooden-like marbled pasteboard on top of the cloth cover except spine and corners. Type III binding.

Cont.: astronomy. — Index: two astronomical diagrams, one pasted, with Persian text and a reference to al-Birjandī (IIr); Ptolemaica (1v–152r); Ptolemaica (153v–156r); Ptolemaica (156r–158r). Blank: Iv, IIv–1r, 152v–153r, 158v–IIav.

Bibl.: Wilhelm Ahlwardt, Verzeichniss der arabischen Handschriften der Königlichen Bibliothek zu Berlin, vol. V, Berlin: Asher, 1893, pp. 143–144 (no. 5655) and p. 161 (no. 5680); Paul Kunitzsch, Claudius Ptolemäus. Der Sternkatalog des Almagest. Die arabisch-mittelalterliche Tradition, 3 vols, Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1986–1991, vol. III, pp. 9–10; ParraMª José Parra, ‘A List of Arabic Manuscripts of Naṣīr al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī’s Taḥrīr al-Majisṭī’, Suhayl 16–17 (2018–2019), pp. 251–322, pp. 259–260 (no. 15). Qalamos: https://www.qalamos.net/receive/DE1Book_manuscript_00014160.

1v–⁠152r

\1v\ أحمد الله مبداء كلّ مبداء وغاية كلّ غاية ومفيض كلّ خير ووليّ كلّ هداية. وأرجو حسن توفيقه في كلّ بداية ونهاية — \151v\ فلنختم الكتاب. وأقول: وإذ وقفني الله تعالى أيضا لإتمام ما قصدته وإنحاء ما وعدته، فلأقطع الكلام حامدًا له على الآية ومصليا على جميع أوليائه، خصوصا على خاتم أنبيائه، والبردة من آله وأحبابه. ووقع الفراغ من نسخة في خامس شوال سنة أربع وأربعون وستمائة. تمت.

= Naṣīr al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī, Taḥrīr al-Majisṭī (C.1.18)

. — Title: Aṣl al-Majisṭī (IIr). — Index: author’s preface, 1v–2r; Book I, 2r–19r; II, 19r–33v; III, 33v–43v; IV, 43v–57r; V, 57r–72r; VI, 72r–85r; VII, 85r–97v; VIII, 97v–111v; IX, 111v–125v; X, 125v–129v; XI, 129v–138r; XII, 138r–143r; XIII, 143v–152r. — Dated authorial colophon (152r); instead of a scribal colophon, the colophon by the scribe of the base manuscript is provided (152r). Marginal collations indicated with siglum ‘12’ in Hindu-Arabic numerals in the scribe’s hand, probably copied from the base manuscript; minor marginal corrections indicated by siglum ; glosses collating the copy (nuskha) of Thābit indicated with siglum ‘12’ in Hindu-Arabic numerals (2r) or with sigla hh (57r); marginal glosses collating variants from a copy in the hand of Abū Rayḥān (al-Bīrūnī?), who is said to quote a translation from the Greek (22r, 46r, 112v); no marginalia in a hand different from the main scribe.

153v–⁠156r

\153v\ نريد أن نثبت اختلافات وقوع الخطوط في الأشكال التي يعرف منها أوضاع مراكز أفلاك عطارد في مسيراتها — \153v\ ويكون الأشكال بحسب مسير المركز الحركة الوسطى مبتديا من الأوج إلى التوالي هكذا. [diagrams] \155r\ [tables]

156r–⁠158r

\156r\ [title] ليكن ابجد الحامل على مركز ز وقطر اب وح عليه نقطة خارجة عن المركز وجحد، دحه زاويتان عليها فإن كانتا متساويتين كانت قوس ده الأوحيّة — \158r\ فقد تبيّن بالاستقراء ولم يلج لي طريق برهانيّ بعد إلى ذلك. والله الموفق. تم تم تم.

= Muqaddima nāfiʿa fī maʿrifat al-ikhtilāfāt (C.1.18b)

. — Title: Muqaddima nāfiʿa fī maʿrifat al-ikhtilāfāt allatī yaḥduthu bi-sabab al-khurūj ʿan al-markaz. — No glosses.