OTTOMAN TURKEY, MID 16TH CENTURY

Details

QUR'AN
OTTOMAN TURKEY, MID 16TH CENTURY
Arabic manuscript on burnished paper, 258ff. with six flyleaves, each folio with 13ll. of black naskh within gold and black rules, with gold rosette verse markers, gold script in margins marking 'ashr, sura headings in gold, opening bifolio with blue and gold illumination framing 5ll. of text, in contemporaneous black leather binding with tooled medallion and spandrels and traces of gilding, doublures covered with gold speckled yellow paper
Text panel 9 1/8 x 6in. (23.2 x 15.2cm.); folio 13 3/4 x 10 1/8in. x (34.5 x 25.5cm.)

Provenance

Michel Abemayor (1912-1975), New York

Special notice

No VAT on hammer price or buyer's premium.

Brought to you by

Behnaz Atighi Moghaddam Head of Sale

batighi@christies.com +44 20 7389 2509

Lot Essay

The layout and use of an elegant bichrome palette of gold and rich lapis lazuli for the opening illumination of our Qur'an is typical of 16th and early 17th century Ottoman manuscripts and tughra decorations. See for example the tughra of Sultan Suleyman the Magnificent in the British Museum (inv. no.1949,0409,0.86). An Ottoman Qur’an, with a similarly decorated polychrome illuminated bifolio dated to the early 17th century was sold at Sotheby's, London 25 May 2005 lot 209.

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