Catalogue: Adab Literature
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Kitāb Ādāb mā yatakarraru fī al-yawm wa-al-laylah min al-akl wa-al-shurb wa-al-du‘ā’ wa-al-nawm (MS A 1) - (Proper conduct in Eating, Drinking, Praying, and Sleeping, which repeat day and night)
- كتاب آداب ما يتكرر فى اليوم واليله من الاكل والشرب والدعاء والنوم
- by Aḥmad ibn ‘Imād al-Dīn ibn Muḥammad al-Aqfahsī (d. 1405/808)
- احمد ابن عماد الدين ابن مجمد الاقفهسى
Al-Aqfahsī was an Egyptian authority on jurisprudence of the Shafi'i school. A large number of his writings, which include considerable poetry, are preserved today. Among these is a poem of 340 verses (basit meter) on the proper conduct in eating, drinking, praying, and sleeping, and a separate commentary which he prepared on this same poem. NLM has a copy of his commentary on this poem.
The author is not named in the NLM copy of the commentary on his own poem, but comparison with a copy now in Princeton, where the author is specified, confirms the identification (see P.K. Hitti, Descriptive Catalog of the Garrett Collection of Arabic Manscripts, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1938, p. 36 entry no. 92).
The poem itself, Manzumah fi al-adab al-akl wa-al-shurb wa-al-nawm wa-al-yaqazah wa-al-du‘a' (Didactic poem on proper conduct in eating, drinking, sleeping, waking, and praying), on which the commentary is based, is preserved in a number of manuscripts. See Ahlwardt, Berlin, entry 5466; and GAL, vol. 2, pp. 93-4 (114-5) no. 22.
Kitāb Ādāb mā yatakarraru fī al-yawm wa-al-laylah min al-akl wa-al-shurb wa-al-du‘ā’ wa-al-nawm (MS A 1)
Illustrations
Sample folios from a treatise titled Kitāb Ādāb mā yatakarraru fī al-yawm wa-al-laylah min al-akl wa-al-shurb wa-al-du‘ā’ wa-al-nawm (Proper conduct in Eating, Drinking, Praying, and Sleeping, which repeat day and night) by al-Aqfahsī (d. 1405/808). The copy is undated, but this portion of the manuscript appears to have been copied in the 15th or 16th century.
Physical Description
Arabic. 42 leaves (fols. 1b-42a). Dimensions 19.7 x 14.7 (text area 15.5 x 10.7) cm; 17 lines per page. The title Kitāb Ādāb mā yatakarraru fī al-yawm wa-al-laylah min al-akl wa-al-shurb wa-al-du‘ā’ wa-al-nawm is taken from colophon (fol. 42a); the title page (fol. 1a), gives the title as Hadha kitāb Ādāb al-akl gharib (This is a curious book on correct conduct in eating). Schullian/Sommer, Cat. of incun. & MSS., p. 297, gives title as Adab al-akl wa-al-sharb (Proper conduct of eating and drinking). The author is not named in manuscript, but the text corresponds to that in Princeton, Garrett MS 921, where the author is identified.
The copy is undated and unsigned. The appearance of the paper, script, and ink of the older portion of the copy (fols. 11-40) suggests a date of the 15th-16th century, while the replacement section (fols. 1-10 and 41-42) may have been made in the 17th or 18th century.
The text in the older part of the volume (fols. 11-40) is written in a medium-small naskh script with some vocalization, using red ink wth some green ink for the poem itself and black ink with headings in red for the commentary. There are verse stops at the end of lines in the form of green circles with a dot in the middle. The text area has been frame-ruled. There are catchwords. The text in the replacement section (fols. 1-10 and 41-42) is written in a medium-small to medium-large naskh, 17 lines per page, and is written entirely in black ink with headings in red (no green headings and no overlinings). The text area is the same size and is frame-ruled, as the older portion.
There are some marginalia and corrections
Folios 11-40 are a glossy beige paper, possibly of the 15th or 16th century. It has laid lines with very indistinct chain lines (possibly in groups of 2's alternating with 3's). It is waterstained and stained with grime. The edges have been trimmed from their original size, with some marginalia now cut off.
Fols. 1-10 and 41-42 are of more recent (17th or 18th century?), thinner, paper having an unusual form of laid line (every fourth line being much heavier), single chain lines, and watermarks (including a large initial 'C'). It is lightly waterstained, and the edges of some folios have been repaired.
The volume consists of 42 leaves. Fol. 1a (part of the replacement leaves) is a title page with later owners' notes, mostly obliterated, an incomplete talismanic square, and some miscellaneous doodles. Fol. 42b has seven lines of pious invocations.
Provenance
On the title page, fol. 1a, there are a number of owners' notes, mostly obliterated. One (undated) is for Sayyid ‘Abd Allāh al-Marādī ibn al-Sayyid Ṭāhir al-Marādī ibn al-Sayyid ‘Abd Allāh al-Marādī ibn al-Sayyid Muṣṭafá al-Marādī ibn al-Sayyid Marād Efendi.
The volume was purchased in 1941 by the Army Medical Library from A. S. Yahuda, who acquired it from a dealer in Cairo (ELS No. 1728; Med. 29).
References
Schullian/Sommer, Cat. of incun. & MSS., entry A 1, p. 297, where no distinction is made between the poem and the commentary on the poem.
NLM Microfilm Reel: FILM 48-100 no. 1
