SIGNED HAFIZ AHMED EFENDI, CONSTANTINOPLE, OTTOMAN TURKEY, CIRCA 1700

Ahmed Muharrem Efendi, better known as Hafiz Ahmed after memorising the whole Qur’an, lived in the quarter of Kasimpasa, in the the Beyoglu district, Istanbul, He was the student of Hafiz Halil Efendi and was particularly celebrated for his mastery of thuluth and naskh. In this manuscript, our scribe displays his calligraphic mastery through the use of three different scripts: muhaqqaq, naskh and thuluth.

Manuscripts produced in alternating scripts were commonly found within Safavid Iran, but the format is much rarer within an Ottoman context. The most well-known example was a monumental Qur’an written by the renowned calligrapher Ahmed Karahisari in the Topkapi Palace Library (inv.no.H.S.5). It was written in muhaqqaq, rayhani, naskh, thuluth and tawqi, and Derman notes that the scribe was successful in “putting an end to Yaqut’s style and bringing three of the six scripts – [thuluth, naskh and riqa’] – closer to the Ottoman taste, (M. Ugur Derman, Letters in Gold: Ottoman Calligraphy from the Sakip Sabanci Collection, Istanbul, New York, 1998, p.56). It is likely that our scribe was following in the footsteps of this master experimenting with a format and calligraphic style that was not typical of the period.

A further Qur’an copied by our scribe, written solely in naskh, was sold at Sotheby’s, London, 9 April 2014, lot 64.