Blue Qu'ran

I previously posted a Kufic folio at auction by Christie’s.  In researching Kufic script as part of an Islamic Art and Architecture course I came across the ‘Blue Qur’an’ (mid-9th-10th Century) or the Kairouan Koran as it is sometimes referred to.  Believed to have originated in Qairawan (Kairouan), Tunisia but disputed as possibly being from Cordoba, Spain instead and produced under the Umayyad rule.

The Blue Qur’an was produced on indigo dyed vellum, possibly inspired from the tradition of purple parchment vellum used for Byzantine imperial manuscripts. The script is of painted gold and silver from grinding the metal and suspending in solution. 

Kufic script, the oldest style of Islamic calligraphy, with strong and weighty elongated strokes and unlike later Qur’an folios which are illuminated and far more complex in artistic nature, with a geometrical balance in the symmetrical borders, layout and embellishment, the Kufic folios rely instead on balance across the size of the page from the exaggeration of the strokes so that the verses are evenly distributed and form their own frameless boundary.

Below an image of the blue Qu'ran from the met, more images available on the page 

Above a Kufic folio late 9th–early 10th century probably Syria, also from the Met