Details

Other Title:

Tawḍīḥ al-alḥān
توضيح الالحان

Subjects:

Music.
Music -- Early works to 1800.
Music theory -- India -- Early works to 1800.
Music theory.
India.

Form/Genre:

Manuscripts, Persian.
Manuscripts, 17th century.
Manuscripts, Digital.
Codices (bound manuscripts)
Diagrams.
Treatises.

Language:

Persian, with final pages in Hindi and using Sanskrit words.

Summary:

Treatise on music or melody, adapted by the Persian scribe Ruhbānī from a treatise written for the Sultan Maḥmūd of the Bahamanids, a Deccani dynasty. The final pages in Hindi use Sanskrit terms and include a discussion of the female personification of music and aspects of Rāgamālās.

Notes:

Ms. codex.
Title from introduction (p. 3).
Pagination: Paper, i + 67 + ii; [1-134], modern pagination in pencil, lower center.
Layout: Written in 9 long lines; text block outlined.
Script: Written in clear nastaʻlīq in black ink; pointed.
Decoration: Diagrams in red ink (p. 8, 10, 21, 23-25, 47, 50, 53, 56-58, 65, 67); later illuminated headpiece and border (p. 1); textblock border-ruled in blue, red, green, gold; rubrications in red.
Binding: Contemporary Safavid silk with a repeating pattern of a female musician, rebacked in morocco; gold and silver painted floral doublure.
Origin: Likely written in Persia, now Iran, in the 17th century.

Local notes:

Lawrence J. Schoenberg & Barbara Brizdle Manuscript Initiative.

Penn Provenance:

Sold at auction at Sotheby's, 18 Oct. 2001, lot 42, to Lawrence J. Schoenberg.
Deposit by Lawrence J. Schoenberg and Barbara Brizdle, 2011.
Gift of Barbara Brizdle Schoenberg, 2016.

Cited in:

Described in Transformation of knowledge: early manuscripts from the collection of Lawrence J. Schoenberg (London: Paul Holberton, 2006), p. 32 (LJS 425).

Cited as:

UPenn LJS 425.

Contributor:

Ruhbānī, scribe.
Maḥmūd, Sult̤ān, associated name.
Schoenberg, Lawrence J., former owner.
Lawrence J. Schoenberg Collection (University of Pennsylvania)
رهبانى، scribe.
محمود، associated name.

OCLC:

122492315

Web link:

The Lawrence J. Schoenberg and Barbara Brizdle Manuscript Initiative Fund Home Page