Folio from a Qur’an

Folio from a Qur’an. Arab, North Africa, or Near East. Abbasid. c. eighth to ninth century C.E. Ink, color, and gold on parchment.

• The Qur'an is the sacred text of Islam, consisting of the divine revelation to the Prophet Muhammad in Arabic.
• However, the word Qur'an, which means “recitation,” suggests that manuscripts were of secondary importance to oral tradition.
• The art of producing a mushaf began well before a pen was ever dipped into ink. The dimensions of each page were calculated before the parchment was cut, and the text was carefully situated relative to the edges of the pages.
• These materials suggest both the dignity of the sacred text and the wealth of its patron, who was probably a member of the aristocratic elite.
• In addition to the high quality and large quantity of materials used, the deliberate geometric planning of the page conveys the importance of the text that it contains. 
• Scribes also had some freedom in composing a page. They could emphasize individual words and balance the widths of lines of different length by elongating certain letters horizontally (a technique known as mashq). They could also adjust spacing between words and letters, and even split words between two lines, in order to balance positive and negative space across the page.