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Lot Essay
On the last folio of the manuscript is the horoscope of a birth recorded on the 12th of Dhu al-Hijja AH 943/31st of May 1537 AD, corresponding approximately to the month of Mordad in year 459 of the Malikshahi (i.e. Jalali) calendar.
Al-Qanun fi al-tibb (‘The Canon of Medicine’) is the celebrated and highly influential medical encyclopaedia of Ibn Sina (also known as Avicenna, 980-1037). It comprises five books which deal with 1.general anatomy and health, 2. medicines, 3. general ailments and pathology, 4. symptoms and diagnostics and 5. pharmacopoeia.
Drawing on earlier work of Galen, Hippocrates and Aristotle, it contains many original contributions in the fields of anatomy, gynaecology, and contagion, among others. The second book of the Canon describes 760 drugs and was the most complete materia medica of its day. The Canon was transmitted to the West in the Latin translation of Gerard of Cremona (c. 1114-1187) and others, and continued to be a standard text until the mid 17th century.
Complete manuscript of the Canon are extremely rare to come by as the work was commonly split into five separate volumes. The finely illuminated frontispiece displays features that are reminiscent of Ottoman illumination, possibly indicating that this manuscript was copied in north-west Iran in a city such as Tabriz, the Safavid capital between 1501 and 1555.
Al-Qanun fi al-tibb (‘The Canon of Medicine’) is the celebrated and highly influential medical encyclopaedia of Ibn Sina (also known as Avicenna, 980-1037). It comprises five books which deal with 1.general anatomy and health, 2. medicines, 3. general ailments and pathology, 4. symptoms and diagnostics and 5. pharmacopoeia.
Drawing on earlier work of Galen, Hippocrates and Aristotle, it contains many original contributions in the fields of anatomy, gynaecology, and contagion, among others. The second book of the Canon describes 760 drugs and was the most complete materia medica of its day. The Canon was transmitted to the West in the Latin translation of Gerard of Cremona (c. 1114-1187) and others, and continued to be a standard text until the mid 17th century.
Complete manuscript of the Canon are extremely rare to come by as the work was commonly split into five separate volumes. The finely illuminated frontispiece displays features that are reminiscent of Ottoman illumination, possibly indicating that this manuscript was copied in north-west Iran in a city such as Tabriz, the Safavid capital between 1501 and 1555.