[IO Islamic 174] Niżâmî's Mathnawîs

• Niżâmî's Mathnawîs.
• This manuscript is now IO Islamic 986 in the India Office collections.
• [metadata: Hermann Ethé, Catalogue of Persian Manuscripts in the Library of the India Office, 2 vols. (Oxford: India Office, 1903): volume 1, number 174 here with notations and hyperlinks].

986

Another set of three mathnawîs by Niżâmî.

This copy contains:

1.Makhzan-alasrâr, on fol. 1^b. 2. Lailâ u Majnûn on fol. 30^b. 3.Khusrau u Shîrîn, on fol. 80^b; this last mathnawî is by mistake headed كتاب خسرو و شيرين امير خسرو, but that it is Niżâmî’s, and not Amîr Khusrau’s poem of the same name, we learn from the beginning:

خداوند درى ( در read) توفيق بگشاى

نظامى را ره توفيق بنماى

Copied A.H. 976, the first mathnawî in the month Dhû-alḥijjah (A.D. 1569, May-June), the second in the month Dhû-alḳa’dah (A.D. 1569, April-May), the third in the month Rabî’-althânî (A.D. 1568, September-October), by Muḥammad bin ‘Alâ-aldîn.

No. 174, ff. 149, 4 coll., each ll. 21; small, but distinct Nasta’lîḳ; most headings left blank; an illuminated frontispiece at the beginning of each mathnawî; the first two pages most splendidly adorned; size, 11^3/8 in. by 7 in.