[IO Islamic 2875] مثنوی معنوی

Mathnawî-i-Ma’nawî.

This manuscript is now IO Islamic 1063 in the India Office collections.

[metadata: Hermann Ethé, Catalogue of Persian Manuscripts in the Library of the India Office, 2 vols. (Oxford: India Office, 1903): volume 1, number 2875 here with notations and hyperlinks].

1063

The same.

This copy contains:

A general prose-introduction, intermixed with mathnawî-baits, on the purport of the mathnawî, beginning, on fol. 1b:

عشق جز نائى و ما جز نى نئيم

وى دمى بى ما و ما بى وى نئيم

Daftar I, on fol. 9b (without the prose-preface): بشنو از نى الخ.

Preface of Daftar II, on fol. 84a: در بيان بعضى از حكمت تأخير اين مجلّد دوم الخ.

Daftar II, on fol. 84b: مدّتى اين مثنوى الخ.

Preface of Daftar III, on fol. 151a: الحكم جنود الله فى الارض الخ.

Daftar III, on fol. 151b: اى ضياء الحق الخ.

Preface of Daftar IV, on fol. 238a: الظعن الرابع الخ.

Daftar IV, on fol. 238b: اى ضياء الحق حسام الدين الخ.

Preface of Daftar VI (which, as a note on the top remarks, is by mistake inserted here), on fol. 309a: از دفترهاى مثنوئ مولوى الخ (so deliberately changed from the correct ششم) مجلّد پنجم.

Daftar V, on fol. 309b: شه حسام الدين كه نور الخ.

Preface of Daftar V (here wrongly inserted instead of the sixth), on fol. 389a: بدانيد و آگاه باشيد كه شریعت الخ.

Daftar VI, on fol. 389b: اى حيوت دل حسام الخ.

The copy ends on fol. 474b, and dated 16th of Sha’bân, A.H. 1005 (A.D. 1597, April 4). A later note states, that it was bought at Burhânpûr, in Rajab, A.H. 1018 (A.D. 1609, October), and the purchaser appears to have added the prose-prefaces, since at the end of the preface of Daftar VI (before the beginning of Daftar V) the date A.H. 1019, 24th of Dhû-alḳa’dah (A.D. 1611, February 7), is given, and at the end of the preface of Daftar V (before Daftar VI), A.H. 1021 (A.D. 1612, 1613). On fol. 475 about two pages of the end of Daftar VI, which are greatly injured, are repeated, probably by the same purchaser, with the same two dates 1005 and 1018. Collated and annotated throughout.

Bibliotheca Leydeniana.

No. 2875, ff. 475, 2 centre-coll, each ll. 15, and a third on the margin, ll. 30; small Nasta’lîḳ; size, 75/8 in. by 41/2 in.