PAL

Ptolemaeus Arabus et Latinus

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Istanbul, Topkapı Sarayı Müzesi, Ahmet III 3453

[Colour scanned images of the textblock and covers.]
Collection of more than 20 works: Arabic.  Date:

dates of copying between 21 Shaʿbān 663/8 June 1265 (114v) and 20 Rabīʿ l-thānī 678/30 August 1279 (Ptolemaic part, 264v). A large part of the included works also has dated authorial colophons.

Or.:

Baghdad (18 Rabīʿ al-awwal 677/9 August 1278, 288r) and Shirwān (16 Jumādā l-thāniya 677/4 November 1278, 149v); copied by the Ilkhanid vizier ʿAbd al-Kāfī b. ʿAbd al-Majīd b. ʿAbd Allāh al-Tabrīzī for himself (288r). The scribe was previously active in Marāgha and likely joined his teacher al-Kātibī al-Qazwīnī and al-Ṭūsī on their journey to Baghdad in 672/1274 (see Vincenzo:2018, esp. pp. 40–42).

Prov.:

an ownership statement by Fatḥ Allāh al-Tabrīzī/al-Nayrīzī dated to the months of the year 848/1444-5 (1r). A statement of ownership dated Thursday, 26 Muḥarram 867/21 October 1462 (Ir). A hexagonal seal ‘ʿAlī ʿAbd …’ (1r). A pointed oval seal with the tughra of Bāyazīd II (r. 1481–1512) (1r, 289r). A big round waqf seal of Sultan Aḥmet III (r. 1703–1730) (1r). Some verses quoted from Sharḥ Dīwān ʿAlī al-Murtaḍā (compiled 1772) by Müstakimzāde Süleymān (d. 1202/1787) (Ir). Additional shelfmark: ‘hayʾa 5’.

Cod.: oriental paper, I+289+Ia ff. (foliated with Arabic-European numerals in pencil, incorrect numbering from f. 60r onwards crossed out and corrected; catchwords in the hand of the scribe). A neat round naskh hand; almost fully dotted in some sections, sporadic punctuation in other parts (e.g., 182v), shaddas and hamzas mostly provided, and vowel signs occasionally. Book titles bold and in thuluth, chapter and paragraph beginnings rubricated. Chapter beginnings additionally introduced by bold and overlined abjad numerals in black, subsections numbered with red overlined abjad numerals in the margins. Numerous textual dividers in red. Hindu-Arabic and abjad numbers in the main text mostly rubricated and with overlines. Numerous diagrams, tables and a rosette (226r), apparently all complete; diagram lines in black or red and geometrical points in black; tables with red lines, headers in red and black, and abjad notation in black. Dimensions: 170×130 mm, width of written area: 105 mm; 27 lines per page (misṭara imprints). Minor insect and water damage in the margins; corrosion of the ink causing holes especially in the beginning of the codex and affecting the reading; very few restorations with pasted slips of paper in the margins and the folds. Binding becoming loose; the number of folios ‘321’ (289v) suggests a loss of eight quaternions, probably after f. 111 (see below). Black leather covers with fore-edge and envelope flap, decorated with frames and corner pieces, blind-stamped central mandorla (front and back covers) and medallion (flap). Title for the collection on the fore-edge flap Majmūʿa awwal-hā Kitāb Uqlīdis. Type II binding.

Cont.: astronomy, mathematics, and optics. Naṣīr al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī’s recensions of the Elements and the Almagest, together with the ‘Middle Books’ (Taḥrīr al-Mutawassiṭāt), his collection of revised treatises to be studied between the two major works. — Index: table of contents (Iv, by a later hand); Naṣīr al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī, Taḥrīr Uṣūl al-handasa li-Uqlīdis (1v–57v); al-Ṭūsī, Bayān al-muṣādara al-mashhūra li-l-ḥukamāʾ (60r–66v); al-Ṭūsī, Taḥrīr Kitāb al-Muʿṭayāt li-Uqlīdis (67r–74v); al-Ṭūsī, Kitāb al-Ukar li-Thāwdhūsiyūs (75r–85r); al-Ṭūsī, Taḥrīr Kitāb al-Kura al-mutaḥarrika li-Uṭūlūqus (85v–87r); al-Ṭūsī, Taḥrīr Kitāb Mānālāwus fī l-ashkāl al-kuriyya (87v–114v, several folios lost after f. 111); al-Ṭūsī, Taḥrīr Kitāb al-Masākin li-Thāwdhūsiyūs (115r–116v); al-Ṭūsī, Taḥrīr Kitāb al-Manāẓir li-Uqlīdis (117r–121v); al-Ṭūsī, Taḥrīr Kitāb Ẓāhirāt al-falak li-Uqlīdis (122r–128r); al-Ṭūsī, Taḥrīr Kitāb al-Ayyām wa l-layālī li-Thāwdhūsiyūs (128v–134r); al-Ṭūsī, Kitāb Awṭūlūqūs fī l-ṭulūʿ wa l-ghurūb (134v–139r); al-Ṭūsī, [Taḥrīr] Kitāb Ibsiqlāws fī l-maṭālīʿ (139v–140r); unknown, Taḥrīr Kitāb fī Jirmay al-nayyirayn wa l-buʿd bayna-humā li-Arisṭarkhus (140v–144r); al-Ṭūsī’s short response to a risāla by Ibn al-Haytham (144r); al-Ṭūsī, Tāḥrīr Kitāb al-Maʾkhūdhāt li-Arshimīdis (144v–147r); al-Ṭūsī, Taḥrīr Kitāb al-Mafrūḍāt li-Thābit b. Qurra (147v–149v); Banū Mūsā (redacted by al-Ṭūsī), Kitāb Maʿrifa masāḥat al-ashkāl al-basīṭa wa-l-kuriyya (150r–154v); Thābit b. Qurra (ed. al-Ṭūsī), Kitāb al-Kura wa-l-usṭūwāna li-Arshimīdis (156v–182r); Ibn al-Haytham, Maqāla fī Qismat al-khaṭṭ alladhī istaʿmala-hu Arshimīdis fī l-maqāla l-thāniya min kitābi-hi fī l-kura wa l-usṭuwāna (182v); ʿAlī al-Samsāṭī, an extensive gloss on Chapter I.3 of the Almagest (184r); Ptolemaica (184v–264v); a gloss quoting al-Ṭūsī on a mathematical proof concerning the Tadhkira (268r); al-Ṭūsī, al-Tadhkira fī ʿilm al-hayʾa (268v–288r); unidentified excerpt (288v–289r). Blank: ff. 58–59, 155r–156r, 183, 265–267.

Bibl.: KrauseMax Krause, ‘Stambuler Handschriften islamischer Mathematiker’, Quellen und Studien zur Geschichte der Mathematik, Astronomie und Physik, Abteilung B: Studien 3 (1936), pp. 437–532, pp. 498, 499, and 522; Fehmi Edhem Karatay and O. Rešer, Topkapı Saraı Müzesi Kütüphanesi. Arapça yazmalar kataloğu, 4 vols, İstanbul: Topkapı Sarayı Müzesi, 1962–1969, vol. III, p. 735 (no. 7005); F. Jamil Ragep, Naṣīr al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī’s Memoir on Astronomy (al-Tadhkira fī ʿilm al-hayʾa), 2 vols, New York: Springer, 1993, vol. I, pp. 21–23; 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, p. 272.

184v–⁠264v

\184v\ أحمد الله مبداء كلّ مبداء وغاية كلّ غاية، ومفيض كلّ خير ووليّ كلّ هداية، وأرجو حسن توفيقه في كلّ بداية ونهاية، وأصلّي على عباده المخصوصين بالعناية والدراية، سيّما محمّد وآله الموسومين بالنبوّة والولاية، المنقذين من كلّ عماية وغواية، وبعد فقد كنت برهة من الزمان عازمًا على أن أحرّر لنفسي، ولسائر طلبة العلم من الإخوان، كتاب المجسطي المنسوب إلى بطلميوس القلوذي الذي هو الدستور العظيم، لأصحاب صناعة الهيئة والتنجيم، تحريرًا لا تفوته مقاصد ذلك الكتاب النظريّة — \264v\ يا في خاتمة الكتاب قال وإذا تمّمنا جميع ما يقتصر إلى إرشاده من وجود ما يحتاج إلى وجوده وتصحيح ما يحتاج إلى تصحيحه إلّا الشاذّ بحسب ما وصل إليه علميّ ومبلغ رأيي وبقدر ما أعان الزمان عليه ودوّنّا ما هو نافع في هذا العلم من غير أن قصدنا بذلك تكبّرًا وافتخارًا، فلنختم الكتاب. وأقول إذ وفّقني الله تعالى أيضًا لإتمام ما قصدته وإنجاز ما وعدته فلأقطع الكلام حامدًا له على الآية ومصلّيًا على جميع أوليائه خصوصًا على خاتم أنبيائه والبررة من آله وأحبّائه.

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

. — Title: Kitāb Taḥrīr al-Majiṣṭī (1r). — Additional title: Kitāb al-Majiṣṭī (Iv, 1r) — Index: author’s preface, 184v; Book I, 184v–193v; II, 193v–200v; III, 200v–206r; IV, 206r–213r; V, 213r–220r; VI, 220r–226r; VII, 226v–232v; VIII, 232v–239v; IX, 239v–248v; X, 248v–250v; XI, 250v–256r; XII, 256r–259v; XIII, 259v–264v. — Dated scribal colophon and a mention of the authorial base manuscript; no complete authorial colophon (264v). This manuscript includes most of the glosses by al-Ṭūsī himself, in the hand of the scribe and introduced by ‘ḥāshiya’. Other annotations include references to Kitāb Mānālāwūs (e.g., 197r) and a trimmed marginal diagram of Mercury displaying a different version of the diagram on f. 244r as it was found in al-ʿUrḍī’s copy (‘nuskha al-ʿUrḍī’) (the diagram is indeed identical to the one in a copy by al-ʿUrḍī’s son: Cairo, Dār al-kutub, hayʾa Ṭalʿat 51, f. 69v). Minor marginal corrections in the hand of the scribe, mostly indicated by siglum ṣḥ.