The text is laid out in the format that was to become standard for complete Quran texts, with chapter divisions indicated by linear decoration, and verse endings by intertextual clustered dots. The leaves are folio size (343 mm by 258 mm at the widest point), and are written on both sides in a generously-scaled and legible script. The parts of Surahs 18-20 it leaves preserve Īre written in ink on parchment, using an Arabic Hijazi script and are still clearly legible. The Birmingham Quran manuscript parchment of two leaves (cataloged as Mingana 1572a) has been radiocarbon dated to between 568 and 645 CE with a confidence of 97.2%, indicating the animal from which the parchment was made lived during that time. The Birmingham folia cover part of the lacuna (gap) in the Paris portion, with parts of the text of suras 18, 19 and 20.Ĭlose up of part of folio 2 recto of Birmingham Quran manuscript The 16 folia in Paris contain the text of chapter 10:35 to 11:95 and of 20:99 to 23:11.
īnF Arabe 328(c) was part of the lot of pages from the store of Quranic manuscripts at the Mosque of Amr ibn al-As in Fustat bought by French Orientalist Jean-Louis Asselin de Cherville (1772–1822) when he served as vice-consul in Cairo during 1806–1816. 1605/1) and in the Khalili Collection of Islamic Art.īnF Arabe 328(c), formerly bound with BnF Arabe 328(ab), has 16 leaves, with two additional leaves discovered in Birmingham in 2015 (Mingana 1572a, bound with an unrelated Quranic manuscript). Forty-six leaves are held at the National Library of Russia and one each in the Vatican Library ( Vat. Most surviving leaves represent a Quran that is preserved in various fragments, the largest part of which are kept in the Bibliothèque nationale de France, as BNF Arabe 328(ab). The so-called Codex Parisino-petropolitanus formerly conserved portions of two of the oldest extant Quranic manuscripts. Main article: Codex Parisino-petropolitanus Selected manuscripts from the first four centuries after the death of Muhammad (632-1032 CE) are listed below.
Radiocarbon analysis to determine the age of the manuscript revealed that this manuscript could be traced back to between 6th or 7th century. However, in 2015, experts from the University of Birmingham discovered the Birmingham Quran manuscript, which is possibly the oldest manuscript of the Quran in the world. More than 60 fragments including more than 2000 folios (4000 pages) are so far known as the textual witnesses ( manuscripts) of the Qur’an before 800 CE (within 168 years after the death of Muhammad), according to Corpus Coranicum, a research organisation funded by the Government of Germany.
John Wansbrough) have questioned this, suggesting the Quran was canonized at a later date, based on the fact that the classical Islamic narratives were written generations-150 to 200 years-after the death of Muhammad, and on variants from the standard Quran found in early manuscripts and fragments. 644–656 CE) so that the standard codex edition of the Quran or Muṣḥaf was completed around 650 CE, according to Muslim scholars. These revelations were then compiled by first caliph Abu Bakr and codified during the reign of the third caliph Uthman (r. Muhammad’s revelations were said to have been recorded orally, through Muhammad and his followers up until his death in 632 CE. In Muslim tradition the Quran is a final revelation from God, Islam’s divine text, delivered to the Islamic prophet Muhammad through the angel Jibril (Gabriel). Sura al-Baqarah, verses 282-286, from an early Quranic manuscript written on vellum (mid-late 7th century CE)