Folio from the so-called Blue Qur'an (sura 30:28-32), Fatimid artwork

submitted by Innerworld to archaeology 5 points | 0 comments > The Blue Quran is an early Quranic manuscript, distinguished by its use of gold Kufic script on indigo-dyed parchment. The exact origin of the Blue Quran is unknown. Scholars have proposed that the manuscript was created under the Abbasid, Fatimid, or Umayyad caliphates, or the Aghlabid or Kalbid dynasties; this would mean it was produced between the 8th and 10th centuries, likely in either the Islamic West (Maghreb or Al-Andalus) or the central Islamic lands of the Middle East. The Blue Quran’s script is characterized by sharp angles and the absence of vowel markings. Each page contains 15 lines, which is untraditional for the period, while its more common features include the perceptible column of letters on the right side of each folio and the splitting of unconnected letters between lines. The manuscript’s approximately 600 folios were separated and dispersed during the Ottoman Empire, though most of the folios remained in Kairouan, Tunisia, until the 1950s. This folio of the Blue Quran, in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, bears the text of verses 28 to 32 of ar-Rum (surah 30). Author: unknown Photographer: Marie-Lan Nguyen CC BY 2.5