Author
Kamāl al-Dīn Muḥammad ibn Mūsá al-Dīrī
Publication Date
Rabīʿ II 841 (AH, Hijri)
Publication Place
Aleppo, Syria -
Type
Book
Language
Arabic
Digital
Yes
Manuscript
Yes
Pages Count
1
Physical Dimensions
272 x 170 mm
Library
Qatar Digital Library
Library Asset ID
Or 6493
Record ID
vdc_100088052934.0x000001
Library Location
British Library: Oriental Manuscripts
Date
Rabīʿ II 841 (AH, Hijri)
Notes
A zoological encyclopaedia by Kamal al-Din Muhammad ibn Musa al-Damīrī (Kamal al-Din Muhammad ibn Musa al-Damīrī, d. 1405). The work, completed in draft in 773/1371-2 and arranged in alphabetical order, deals not only with strictly zoological material, but also with legal considerations about animals, their medical uses and appearances in proverbs, hadith and dream interpretation.
The present copy was completed at the beginning of Rabīʿ II 841/October 1437 at the Madrasah al-Sharafīyah in Aleppo, Syria, by Muhammad ibn Ibrahim ibn Muhammad ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn Yūsuf al-Sallāmī (Muhammad ibn Ibrahim ibn Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-'I ibn Yusuf al-Salamy;
colophon
Section at the end of a manuscript text.
, f. 357v, line 15, transcribed below).
Reading notes of Ibrahim ibn Aḥmad ibn al-Mullā Muhammad, many dated Ṣafar 1014/June-July 1605, are found on ff. 4R, 75R, 122V, 174R, 180V and 357V
colophon
Section at the end of a manuscript text.
).
A marginal note on f. 6v records the endowment of the volume by al-Ḥājj Sulaymān ibn Ḥājj Ismaʿīl ibn Farhād (al-Ḥājj Sulaymān ibn Haj Ismā’il ibn Farhād) to the ‘the madrasa he built in the mosque known as the congregational mosque of al-Ḥājj al-Ḥusayn, which is located in the citadel (?) of Kirkūk [Iraq]’ (the school located in the famous mosque with al-Hajj al-Hussein mosque in the fortress [?] of Kirkuk), in 1226/1
Begins (f. 4v, lines 2-7):
Sheikh Imam al-Alama said the pilgrimage of literature and the Arabic language, the collection of proofs
Abu al-Baqa'a Muhammad Kamal al-Din ibn Musa ibn 'Isa al-Damiri
Al-Shafi'i: Allah's feet are safe and He makes Paradise perfect
Praise be to Allah, Who has honored the smallest kind of man with the smallest heart and tongue
Sair al-Hywan is the blindness of logic and expression and is attracted to the mind that weighs judgment
Size in the best scale.
Ends (f. 357v, lines 9-12):
...This is what they are to the instinct
But he achieves satisfaction in this night and ends with the king of the cattle who brought Allah out of the play of candles
And the honey and made one of them shine and the last healing came to the king of the beast who is brave
تقتفي وحسبنا الله تعالى وكفي آخر كتاب حياة الحيوان
Colophon
Section at the end of a manuscript text.
(f. 357v, lines 13-17):
فرغ من كتابته يوم الأربعاء مستل شهر ربيع الآخر سنة إحدى وأربعين وثمانمائة
By the honorable school in Aleppo, the poor man, may Allah forgive him
Muhammad ibn Ibrahim ibn Muhammad ibn Abdullah ibn Yusuf al-Salam
Praise be to Allah, the One, and peace be upon our Prophet Muhammad, his family and his Companions
And we reckon with Allah and we are the intercessors
Erişim Koşulları
Unrestricted
Bulma Yardımcıları
Ellis, A.G. and Edward Edwards,
A Descriptive List of the Arabic Manuscripts Acquired by the Trustees of the British Museum since 1894
(London: British Museum, 1912), p. 47.
Edinme Kaynağı
Purchased from Ibrahim Elias Gejou, 7 April 1903
Köken
Many ownership inscriptions on ff. 2r-6v, including:
al-Ḥājj Sulaymān ibn Ḥājj Ismaʿīl ibn Farhād (الحاج سليمان ابن حاج إسمعيل بن فرهاد): his endowment statement, with date Sunday 10 Jumādá I 1226/2 June1811 recording the endowment of the manuscript to the ‘the madrasa he built in the mosque known as the congregational mosque of al-Ḥājj al-Ḥusayn, which is located in the citadel (?) of Kirkūk [Iraq]’ (المدرسة التي بناها في الجامع الشهير بجامع الحاج الحسين الواقعة بقلعة [؟] كركوك), and his seal with date 1226/1811-2 (f. 6v);
Muḥammad Ḥasbī Zādah (?) ([محمد حسبي زاده [؟): his inscription with date 1178/1764-5 recording his purchase of the manuscript from the bookdealer (or bookbinder) al-Sayyid ʿAṭ[āʾ] Allāh (السيد عط الله الصحاف, f. 1r);
Muḥammad ibn al-Ḥājj (محمد ابن الحاج): his inscription with date 1075/1664-5 (f. 4r);
Ibrahīm ibn Aḥmad ibn al-Mullā Muḥammad, known as Ibn al-Mullā (إبرهيم بن أحمد بن الملا محمد الشهير بابن الملا): his ownership inscription with date early Ṣafar 1014/ June 1605 (f. 357v).
Seçilmiş kaynakça
Editions of large recension:
Damīrī, Muḥammad ibn Mūsá, Ḥayāt al-ḥayawān al-kubrā
, ed. by Muḥammad Quṭṭāh al-ʻAdawī, 2 vols (al-Qāhirah: Bulāq, 1868)
Damīrī, Muḥammad ibn Mūsá, Ḥayāt al-ḥayawān al-kubrā
, ed. by Aḥmad Ḥasan Basaj (Bayrūt: Dār al-Kutub al-ʻilmīyah, 1994)
Damīrī, Muḥammad ibn Mūsá, Ḥayāt al-ḥayawān al-kubrá
, ed. by Muḥammad ʻAbd al-Qādir al-Fāḍilī, 2 vols (Bayrūt: al-Maktabah al-ʻAṣrīyah, 2005)
Translation of large recension:
Damīrī, Muḥammad ibn Mūsá,
A̲d-Damîrî's Ḥayât al-ḥayawân, a zoological lexicon
, trans. by A.S.G. Jayakar, 2 vols (London: Luzac, 1906-08)
Studies:
Kamāladdīn Muḥammad ibn Mūsā ad-Damīrī (d. 808/1405) and his Kitāb Ḥayāt al-ḥayawān : Texts and Studies
, ed. by Fuat Sezgin et al., (Frankfurt am Main: Institute for the History of Arabic-Islamic Science at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University, 2001)
Somogyi, Joseph de, 'Index des sources de la Ḥayât al-ḥayawân de ad-Damîrî',
Journal asiatique
133 (1928), pp. 5-128
Somogyi, Josef, 'Ad-Damīrī's Ḥayāt al-ḥayawān: An Arabic Zoological Lexicon',
Osiris
9 (1950), pp. 33-43
Ullmann, Manfred,
Die Natur- und Geheimwissenschaften im Islam
(Leiden: Brill, 1972), pp. 39-40
