Art · Corner

Mushaf-ı Sharif — where calligraphy meets illumination.

From Shaykh Hamdullah to Hāmid Aytaç, the canonical Mushaf-ı Sharif copies of the Ottoman world — each one the hand of a calligrapher, the gold of an illuminator, the memory commissioned by a palace patron.

13 copies · five centuries

Mushaf calligraphy is bound, within the six pens of the aklām al-sitta, to the naskh script in particular. The bodied architecture of thuluth appears in chapter headings, muḥaqqaq and rayḥānī in certain palace volumes; but the carrier of the verse body itself is naskh — the pen that, with Shaykh Hamdullah, settled wholly into the Ottoman page. The mushaf, as the longest text where this pen is patiently applied, constitutes the most exacting discipline of the calligraphic art.

The page does not arrive as paper. A mushaf page is first illuminated, then written. The double serlevha, the chapter headings, the vocalisation marks, the hizib roses, the markers of every ten verses — all come from the hand of the illuminator. The calligrapher steps into the space the illuminator has left, and writes. In palace ateliers these two hands often worked on the same street, sometimes in the same room; the mushaf is the page where calligraphy and illumination meet on a single plane.

The tradition of patronage carries the bones of mushaf art. Bayezid II held Shaykh Hamdullah, Süleyman the Magnificent held Karahisârî, Mustafa II and Ahmed III held Hāfız Osman, Mahmud II held Mustafa Râkım, Abdülhamid II held Sâmi Efendi — and even the last copies before the Republic were nourished by the same old patronage vein that reached as far as King Fuʼād of Egypt. The mushaf is written between the reed of the calligrapher and the signature of the patron.

The discipline of berʼ-i tashīḥ gives these works their ethic. The master finishes the mushaf, carries it to his teacher, has each folio read aloud; errors are marked on a sheet above; only after correction does the volume earn the name mushaf-ı sharīf. When lithography and then the press arrived in the nineteenth century, even the first printed mushafs took these corrected manuscript copies as their archetype. The widely-read printed Hāfız Osman type that you find today is the last link in this hand-written chain.

— Plate 01 —

Mushaf of Shaykh Hamdullah

1494 (899 AH) · Early classical Ottoman · under Bayezid II

Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts · TIEM 402

Şeyh Hamdullah
Written in naskh with the classical serlevha illumination — the foundational page of the Shaykh manner.
One of the founding copies of the classical Ottoman naskh mushaf tradition. With these mushafs Shaykh Hamdullah translated Yāqūt’s line into an Ottoman idiom — the so-called Shaykh manner — and the master who copied more than forty mushafs left this TIEM volume as one of his most familiar.
— Wikimedia Commons · TIEM
— Plate 02 —

Bayezid Mushaf · Topkapı A. 5

1503 – 1504 (909 AH) · Palace commission · for Sultan Bayezid II

Topkapı Palace Library · A. 5

Şeyh Hamdullah
Double illuminated serlevha · gold-ruled · thuluth chapter headings over a naskh body.
The palace mushaf that Shaykh Hamdullah copied himself for Sultan Bayezid II. Its opening double-serlevha stands among the cleanest examples of the classical Ottoman illumination idiom; the Fātiḥa–Baqara opening still rests today in the Topkapı collection.
— Wikimedia Commons · Topkapı Palace
— Plate 03 —

Shaykh Hamdullah Mushaf · Aga Khan Museum

XV. yüzyıl sonu · Early classical Ottoman

Aga Khan Museum · Toronto · AKM 00262

Şeyh Hamdullah
Opening folios filled with clouds of gold; naskh script, classical illumination without an illuminator’s signature.
Among the best-known Hamdullah mushafs held outside Turkey. Its opening double-page is exhibited today at the Aga Khan Museum in Toronto — one of the dozens of his mushafs that travelled westward.
— Wikimedia Commons · Aga Khan Museum
— Plate 04 —

Mushaf of Ahmed Karahisârî

c. 1550 – 1560 · Age of Süleyman the Magnificent · the height of illumination

Khalili Collection of Islamic Art · QUR 420

Ahmed Karahisârî
Muḥaqqaq, thuluth and naskh side by side — a polygraphic mushaf. A mature moment of the saz-style illumination.
A single-volume mushaf by Karahisârî — the master who, outside the Shaykh school, carried on Yāqūt’s line. His signature technique of combining several of the six pens on one page meets here the saz-style moment of Ottoman illumination; the volume is now in the Khalili Collection.
— Wikimedia Commons · Khalili Collection
— Plate 05 —

Karahisârî Early Mushaf · 1526

1526 (933 AH) · Early reign of Süleyman

Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts · Istanbul

Ahmed Karahisârî
A classical thuluth-naskh layout; the firmness of the master’s middle-age reed still leads the illumination.
One of Karahisârî’s earlier mushafs, copied in the year 933 AH. Held in the collection of the Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts, it preserves the classical firmness of the master’s reed before the saz-style maturity took hold.
— Wikimedia Commons · TIEM
— Plate 06 —

Mushaf of Hāfız Osman · 1686

1686 (1097 AH) · Ottoman golden age

Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts · Istanbul

Hâfız Osman
Naskh written under the discipline of ber-i tashīḥ, carrying Hāfız Osman’s sense of proportion.
No one knows how many mushafs Hāfız Osman copied across his seventy years — even what survives makes him almost a symbol of istinsākh itself. This 1097 AH copy is a saturated witness of his middle-age reed: the six pens corrected and settled into the classical naskh page.
— Wikimedia Commons · TIEM
— Plate 07 —
﷽ work image unavailable

Mushaf of Yedikuleli Seyyid Abdullah

c. 1720 · Tulip Era · late classical aklām al-sitta

Multiple collections · many surviving copies

Yedikuleli Seyyid Abdullah
The mature Tulip-Era variation of the Hāfız Osman line — the peak of mushaf calligraphy at the opening of the eighteenth century.
The most accomplished successor of Hāfız Osman, also known by the epithet Hāshimīzāde. He carried mushaf calligraphy to its peak at the opening of the eighteenth century, leaving the Tulip-Era aesthetic settled into the page. Much of his work is not yet publicly digitised — this line stands as a page of silence held open in its name.
— Plate 08 —

Mushaf of Şekerzâde Mehmed Efendi · 1728

1728 (1141 AH) · End of the Tulip Era · on the eve of Patrona Halil

Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts · Istanbul

Şekerzâde Seyyid Mehmed Efendi
A copy made in Medina that even later printed mushafs took as their archetype.
Şekerzâde Seyyid Mehmed, the Medina-born master who inherited the Hāfız Osman school by way of Yedikuleli Seyyid Abdullah. This copy, made in Medina in 1141 AH, would later serve as the template for many printed mushafs — a page drawn at the last breath of the Tulip Era.
— Wikimedia Commons · TIEM
— Plate 09 —

Mushaf of Mahmud Celâleddin Efendi

c. 1811 · Reign of Mahmud II · contemporary of Râkım

Khalili Collection of Islamic Art · QUR 1076

Mahmud Celâleddin Efendi
Double-page illuminated serlevha · palace illumination atelier · the last classical page-layout before the Râkım reform.
The great contemporary of Râkım — and the other towering master of the reign of Mahmud II — Mahmud Celâleddin Efendi gave this single-volume mushaf its illuminated double frontispiece. Its serlevha is the last word of the classical page-layout before the Râkım reform; the volume is preserved today in the Khalili Collection as QUR 1076.
— Wikimedia Commons · Khalili Collection
— Plate 10 —

Mushaf of Abdullah Zühdī

1848 – 1849 (1265 AH) · Mid-Tanzimat · reign of Abdülmecid

Sadberk Hanım Museum · Istanbul

Abdullah Zühdî Efendi
Late classical naskh · post-Râkım page-layout · ruled in gold along every line.
A middle-age mushaf by Abdullah Zühdī Efendi — the teacher of Sâmi Efendi, and the calligrapher of the inscriptions of the Prophet’s Mosque in Medina. Its page-layout carries the quiet reflection of the Râkım reform onto the mushaf page; the Sadberk Hanım Museum’s copy stands among the best-preserved witnesses of the mid-nineteenth century.
— Wikimedia Commons · Sadberk Hanım Museum
— Plate 11 —
﷽ work image unavailable

Mushaf of Hasan Rıza Efendi

c. 1900 · Final Ottoman · the last great hand of the mushaf

Various collections · thirty-three mushafs

Hasan Rıza Efendi
Classical naskh · the disciplined istinsākh tradition that earned him the epithet "the mushaf-keeper".
The last great master, who copied thirty-three mushafs across his life. In the very age of the Çanakkale defence he carried the transmission of classical naskh into the twentieth century on his own shoulders; his mushafs remain reference copies of the Turkish Diyanet today. A freely-licensed digital image is not yet openly available.
— Plate 12 —
﷽ work image unavailable

Mushaf of Aziz Efendi

1934 (1352 AH) · Reaching into the Republic · written in Cairo exile

Turkish Diyanet Foundation · the "Aziz Mushaf" copy

Mehmed Aziz Rifâî Efendi
A late representative of the Râkım school — a palace scribe in training who completed his mushaf in Egypt.
Trained under both Sâmi Efendi and Hasan Rıza; after the alphabet reform he left Istanbul and copied his mushaf in Cairo under the patronage of King Fuʼād. Completed in 1934 and later returned to Turkey, the so-called "Aziz Mushaf" stands as a quiet reparation in the first decade of the Republic. A freely-licensed digital image is not yet available.
— Plate 13 —
﷽ work image unavailable

Mushaf of Hāmid Aytaç

XX. yüzyıl ortası · Bridge to the Republic · the hidden atelier

Various private collections

Hâmid Aytaç
The "Hāmidiyya" mushaf — from the hand of the last licensing chain that reaches from classical naskh to jalī thuluth.
The last great master to carry Ottoman calligraphy into Republican Turkey. He held this art — banished by the alphabet reform — alive in a hidden atelier; every chain of licensure (icāzet) in the discipline today traces back to him. His mushaf is not openly licensed in digital form; this page is left open in his name.

— Page —

Yā Hū. The mushaf is the page where the calligrapher sits, the illuminator pauses, and the patron signs.