Article Series
A summary of the sixth of Shaykh Salih al-Azhari's courses in manuscript studies, on the rules and clues for identifying a manuscript's copyist and date of copying. The course shows where this information appears in a manuscript, the dating patterns copyists used and the difficulties of reading them, and how to tell a copying colophon from an authorial one, with methodical steps for checking what such notes state.
Series parts
The opening lecture of the sixth course, in which Shaykh Salih al-Azhari explains why the copyist's name and the copying date form a manuscript's identity, where they are found in a copy, and the four main ways copyists dated their work.
In the second lecture of the sixth course, Shaykh Salih al-Azhari offers a critical analysis of copying notes (colophons): what they contain, how to tell the copyist's words from the author's, the verbal, numerical and abjad patterns of dating, and where such notes may be found.
In the third lecture of the sixth course, Shaykh Salih al-Azhari explains the abjad reckoning and dating by fractions as ways copyists recorded dates, and argues that editors should concentrate on the common verbal and numerical patterns.
In the closing lecture of the sixth course, Shaykh Salih al-Azhari explains how to distinguish the author's completion note from the copyist's colophon, the pitfalls of transferred dates and mismatched paper and script, and the methodical steps for handling copying notes.