Catalogue: Pharmaceutics

Qarābādīn-i Qādirī   (MS P 14.1)

(The Qādirī Formulary)

قرابادين قادري

by Muḥammad Akbar ibn Mīr Ḥajjī Muḥammad Muqīm, known as Muḥammad Arzānī (d. 1722/1134)

محمد اكبر ابن مير حاجى محمد مقيم عرف بمحمد ارزانى

This is a treatise on compound remedies composed for the use of the Qādirī order of Sufis of which the author was a member. The Persian treatise was written between 1714 and 1718.

For other copies, see Storey PL II,2, pp. 268-71 no. 465, and Keshavarz, "Wellcome", pp. 291-294.

Qarābādīn-i Qādirī   (MS P 14.1)

Physical Description

Persian. 298 leaves (fols. 1b-298b). Dimensions 29.8 x 17.2 (text area 23.5 x 11.5); 23 lines per page. The title is taken from the colophon on fol. 298b, line 1, where the author's name is also given as Muḥammad Akbar known as (‘urifa) Arzānī. At the beginning of the text (fol. 1b, line 17) the name is given as Muḥammad Akbar known as (‘urifa) Muḥammad Arzānī. The title Qarābādīn-i Qādirī has also been written in a later hand at the top of fol. 1b.

The copy is dated in the colophon (fol. 298 line 5) 1886. It is uncertain what era is intended, but it is assumed to be A.D., though other calendric interpretations are possible, such as the Vikrama Era that would equate with AD 1829. The paper, script, ink, and owner's notes indicate that it was produced in India in the 19th century.

The text is written in a medium-large, professional, ta‘liq script using a dense black ink. The headings are in red ink. The text area has been frame-ruled. There are catchwords.

There are marginal corrections and notes, some in the hand of the owner Rāja Rāma. The folios have been numbered in later Arabic numerals on the back of each leaf. There is a recent foliation in Western numerals.

The brown, lightly glossed, fibrous paper has horizontal laid lines with chain lines irregularly spaced in groups of 2's. The edges have been trimmed from their original size, and there are repairs to many of the edges. The paper is soiled near the edges and there is some foxing.

The volume consists of 300 leaves. Folio 1a is blank. Folios 299 and 300 (of slightly different paper) have casually written recipes in Persian and notes and arithmetical calculations in Devanagari script. There are also five front endpapers of very different coarse paper that have some Devanagari notes on them.

Binding

The manuscript is bound with a lithographed text titled ‘Ilaj al-ghuraba' (The Treatment of Rare Things) by Ḥakīm Ghulām Imām and printed at Delhi by the Muhammadi Press in 1281 (= 1864-5).

The volume is bound in maroon leather over pasteboards. The covers have double frames of blind-tooled calyxes. The spine and edges are replacements in lighter red leather. The pastedowns and endpapers are a brown, coarse laid paper.

Provenance

Fol. 1b has the owner's note: malik in kitāb-i Rāja Rāma (the owner of this book is Rāja Rāma). He was also the scribe of NLM MS P 1.1, which he copied in 1851.

The volume was purchased 4 November 1948 by the Army Medical Library from H.P. Kraus. It was received on 4 January 1949.

References

Unpublished. Not in Schullian/Sommer.

NLM Microfilm Reel: FILM 56-40 no. 2