Catalogue: Prophetic Medicine

Risālah fī al-khitān   (MS A 35, item 13)

(Essay on Circumcision)

رساله فى الختان

by ‘Abd al-Mu‘ṭī ibn Sālim ibn ‘Umar al-Shiblī al-Simillāwī (fl. 1698/1110)

عبد المعطى ابن سالم ابن عمر الشبلى السملاوي

This is a hitherto unrecorded essay on the Prophetic traditions as they pertain to circumcision composed by a late-seventeenth century Egyptian-Syrian writer on religious law. A number of treatises by al-Simillāwī are preserved. This copy at NLM of his treatise on Prophetic traditions regarding circumcision, however, appears to be unique.

No other copy is recorded.

Physical Description

Arabic. 1 leaf (fols. 51a-51b). Dimensions 20.4 x 14.6 (text area ca. 15.5 x 12.5); 27 and 15 lines per page. The title is given as Risālah fī al-khitān in the text (fol. 51a line 5). The title written on the title page of the volume (fol. 1a) is Ihsan al-mannan bi-ma yata‘allaqu bi-al-khitān (The Procedures Approved by the Benefactor [i.e., God] as they relate to Circumcision).

This item was added in a slightly later hand after the previous 12 items in the volume were copied. This must have been after 1593/1001 when the earlier items were transcribed. It is likely that this item was added not too long after the others were completed.

The text is written in small, casual, crowded naskh script using black ink.

The paper is the same as in the rest of the volume. The biscuit, glossy paper has horizontal laid lines, single chain lines, and watermarks (initials). Fol. 43 is dyed yellow. The paper is waterstained, especially at the top of the volume, and it is soiled with thumbing. The edges have been trimmed from their original size.

The volume consists of 51 leaves and 1 end leaf. Fol. 1a is the title page for the entire volume. It contains three short essays and ten maqamahs (a type of rhymed prose), all by al-Suyūṭī. Item 1 (fols. 1b-2a) is Muṣannaf fī al-ghāliyah (MS A 35, item 1); item 2 (fols. 2a-4a) Nathl al-kattān fī al-kushknān (MS A 35, item 2); item 3 (fols. 4a-6a) al-Maqāmah al-fustuqīyah (MS A 35, item 3); item 4 (fols. 6a-8b) Naḍrah fī aḥādīth al-mā’ wa-al-riyāḍ (MS A 35, item 4); item 5 (fols. 8b-11b) al-Dhararī fī abnā al-sarāarī (MS A 35, item 5); item 6 (fols. 11b-14b) Maqāmah fī waṣf rawdah misr tasammá Bulbul al-rawḍah (MS A 35, item 6); item 7 (fols. 14b-18a) al-Maqāmah al-zumurrudīyah (MS A 35, item 7); item 8 (fols. 18a-22b) al-Maqāmah al-yāqūtīyah (MS A 35, item 8); item 9 (fols. 22b-30a) Manhal fī al-kunāfah wa-al-qaṭā'if (MS A 35, item 9); item 10 (fols. 30a-37a) Maqāmah al-rayāḥīn tasammá al-Maqāmah al-wardīyah (MS A 35, item 10); item 11 (fols. 37a-42a) al-Maqāmah al-miskīyah (MS A 35, item 11); item 12 (fols. 42a-50b) al-Maqāmah al-tuffā (MS A 35, item 12); and item 13 (fols. 51a-51b) Risālah fī al-khitān by is here catlogued. Fol. [1] at the end of the volume is blank but for small pious invocations; its paper is of later date.

Binding

The volume is bound in a red leather modern library binding. There are modern paper pastedowns and endpapers.

Provenance

Various owners' signatures are on the title page (fol. 1a), including one by Ismā‘īl ibn Abī Bakr al-Kharrāṭ al-Ḥanafī al-Dimashqī dated 1054 (= 1644-45) and Muḥammad ibn Sulayman al-Kanāfī (undated).

The volume was purchased in 1941 by the Army Medical Library from A. S. Yahuda (ELS 5043).

References

Schullian/Sommer, Cat. of incun. & MSS., entry A35, p. 309. This item is not mentioned.

NLM Microfilm Reel: FILM 48-119 no. 2