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Islamic Calligraphy
Islamic Calligraphy; Calligraphy has a very special place in Islam,
because it's strongly bound-up with the Quranic revelation in two ways.
Firstly, God's word in the form of the Quran represents unique evidence
of divine revelation, which was actually conveyed orally to Muhammad,
but was then recorded in writing by his companions and circulated.
Secondly, this revelation is described in the Quran as an "elegantly
proportioned script," which is preserved with God on "spotless sheets of
paper," and which is "beautiful" & "unsurpassable."
Generally it's accepted that the Arabic script descended from the
Aramaic through the Nabataean and the neo-Sinaitic alphabets. After the
Latin script, Arabic script is the most widely used form of alphabetic
writing in the modern world. The Arab conquests of the 7th and 8th
centuries AD brought the language and the script to the vast expanse of
territory extending from India to the Atlantic Ocean. Nabataean as a
dialect was used in northern Arabia and what is now Jordan thousand of
years prior to the start of the Islamic era. It seems apparent that
Syriac also had some influence on the Arabic script developments. The
earliest inscription that has been found that is identifiably Arabic is
one in Sinai that dates from about A.D. 300. Another Semitic script
which was in use at about
the same time and which is found on inscriptions in southern Arabia is
the origin of the alphabet now used for Amharic, the official language
of Ethiopia.
Arabic & Islamic calligraphy exists in all sizes and in all modes of
artistic expression, most important are the works written from the 7th
century onwards, on paper using a basic quill pen. It was necessary to
practice for years to master this art, many masterpieces of calligraphy
were collected, protected, high valued and traded at collectors prices.
The Arabic alphabet has twenty-eight letters (additional letters have
been added to serve the needs of non-Arabic languages that use the
Arabic script, such as those of Iran and Pakistan), and each of the
letters may have up to four different forms. All of the letters are
strictly speaking consonants, and not like the Roman alphabet used for
English and most European languages Arabic writing goes from right to
left.
The Arabic script has been used much more extensively for decoration and
as a means of artistic expression. This is not to say that the Roman
alphabet (also like Chinese and Japanese) are not just as decorative and
have not been used just as imaginatively. Since the invention of
printing from type, however, calligraphy (which means, literally
"beautiful writing") has come to be used in English and the other
European languages only for special documents and on special occasions
and has declined to the status of a relatively minor art. During the 7th
century, Kufic developed as a Quranic script; an angular script with
exceedingly clear contours which appears monumental also in small
format; with its impressive symmetry its expresses the self assurance
with which Islam in its classical period disseminated its holy
scripture.
The Kufic script spread over the whole Islamic world, from Spain in the
west to beyond Iran in the east, a universal civilization. In
established calligraphy studios, copies of the Quran were written on
parchment in oblong format, and inscription were designed which were
later chiseled into stone for buildings, or woven or embroidered into
materials as ornamentation. The script had quickly became an art form
that could be used everywhere, especially on buildings, for decorations.
Within Kufic appeared new styles such as the slanting "Persian" script
or the style used in Spain and northwest Africa, from which emerged the
later "Maghrabi" script. The Introduction of paper, which came into the
Islamic world from China via Central Asia in the 8th century, was
particularly important for the development of calligraphy. To be sure,
one continued to write Quran on parchment, since it kept better and was
more prestigious - likewise also holding true on documents..
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