“The past is never dead. It's not even past.” ― William Faulkner

I wish I could go back in time and inform medieval copyists that the work created by their hands will become some of the rarest, prized, and celebrated possessions of academic institutions worldwide. I would specifically go back to medieval Arabia because that is the area of my specialty, and ask copyists to record and creatively (maybe even deceptively) incorporate their family names or biographical snippets within their work.

A major issue with studying Medieval Arabic literature is that while the content comes with a detailed historical account of its quality, the copyists who are spending time with authors of poetry, philosophy, and epistle literature are unannounced. This erasure becomes problematic because artistic features of the work such as images, font, layout and even binding decisions are entrusted by authors to their copyists. Furthermore, since the nature of the work requires copyists to listen while they copy, the speed of the author’s narration is an important aspect of what gets copied and what does not. I don’t mean to say that copyists skip lines or sections of text, but that case endings (specific to Arabic) disappear or are altered due to misinterpretation. Mistaking the case ending of a word in Arabic has immediate consequences as it changes the meaning of the specific word. Also, other misspellings and grammatical mistakes make translation and interpretation of manuscripts difficult. Therefore, a thorough account of the copyists’ intellectual level and educational history would highlight their ability to engage with the material they are working with and better copy/convey ideas.

To provide you with an example I will discuss an Aljamiado manuscript. Please refer to my previous post on Aljamiado for context, or here is a brief history!

The T235 manuscript a trilingual copy of the Qur’an founded in 1878 by Eduardo Saavedra is the only one of its kind in existence. This manuscript is especially fascinating not because of its aljamiado Qur’anic transcription, but because of its expert use of aljamiado, Spanish, and Arabic in creating detailed marginalia. In other words, the Qur’an is transcribed entirely in Spanish and aljamiado, and the marginalia is written alternating between three languages. Both the colophons and the lengthy marginalia and notations are written interchangeably in the aforementioned languages, “…and so intimately entwined are the three languages that a word may begin in one alphabet and continue in another” (López-Morillas). The T235 manuscript was completed in 1606 (just one year!), and is believed to be one of the last manuscripts copied before the indefinite expulsion of the Morisos at the hands of the Christians.


T235 highlights copyist’s style and prominence as a scribe who is fluent in three languages and trusted by aristocrats to take on such a challenging project. This manuscript is reflective of the fear that the community has for their contracts and literatures to be found and so transcribing it in Spanish can potentially fool an army-man into thinking that it is a Bible belonging to a Christian convert and the marginalia are his notations.

However, after all this, I’m sad to say that there is no account of the copyist’s name, family, ethnicity, or even who he is working so efficiently for. These priceless and beautifully orchestrated manuscripts become valuable pieces of history but pay no tribute to the skilled workers who have dedicated their lives to this art.