New English Paperback. 4to. (28 x 24 cm). In English, Turkish, and Arabic. 198 p., color ills. "The Holy Message Exhibition of Qur'anic Manuscripts" will be open to visits throughout the month of Ramadan, when the Prophet received the first verses of the Qur'an and assumed his post as the holy messenger. In the exibition, where also the sanjak (flag) mushafs will be exhibited along with the large-sized Mushaf al-Sherifs, more than 70 manuscripts will be displayed. The manuscripts will also be elucidated for the visitors by information boards mounted along their display where, apart from their historical and artistic value, also the pigments used in their illumination and ornamentation, covering techniques, and details on their prior reparations which cannot be immediately recognized by an untrained eye. In the exhibition, alongside the Korans, all of which are masterpieces prepared by Ottoman calligraphers (hattat) and painters (nakkas), the Mushafs with Kufic strips from different periods such as: Abbasids, Seljuks, Ilkhanids, Gaznavids, Safavids, and Mamluks; as well as from different regions such as India and the Maghreb that has never been exhibited before will be put to display. The notable artefacts of the exhibit are the Mushaf al-Sherif donated by Mehmed the Conqueror, the Mushaf al-Sherif written down with gold ink for Özbeg Khan, and particularly the 12 centuries old ancient Mushaf al-Sherif registred in the Nuruosmaniye Mosque inventory, which was written with a Kufic gold-inscribed calligraphy on a parchement at a time when paper was not commonly used in the Islamic World.
