Historical / contextual reference

A source-selected manuscript page; no complete-book coverage claimed.

Credit: Ibrahim Sultan / The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Gift of Alexander Smith Cochran, 1913
Rights: Public domain; Met Open Access

Open original image record ↗ · Read image licence ↗

This Qur’an manuscript joins the visual discipline of naskh calligraphy with ink, colour, gold, and a leather binding. Its calligrapher, Ibrahim Sultan, was also the governor of Shiraz and a grandson of Timur. The Metropolitan Museum identifies the manuscript as signed and dated to 1427, making the ruler a practitioner of a demanding art rather than only its patron. The selection should preserve the book’s religious identity as well as its appearance. To reduce the pages to attractive patterns would erase the words, reading practices, and reverence that shaped their making. The manuscript also reminds future viewers that authority, devotion, and sustained manual skill could meet in the same person.

Why preserve it: Curatorial interpretation: Patronage and personal artistic labour can overlap, while sacred writing requires preservation of meaning as well as visual form.

Keep in mind: This is Met 13.228.1, not another Qur’an associated with Ibrahim Sultan. Shiraz is probable rather than certain. A public-domain image does not remove the need for respectful handling of sacred text.