al-Mukhtār lil-fatwá, [803, i.e. 1400].

Fine (though acephalous) copy of Abū al-Faḍl ʻAbd Allāh ibn Maḥmūd ibn Mawdūd al-Mawṣilī al-Buldajī’s (d.1284) compendium of Ḥanafī legal decisions. See Isl. Ms. 542 and Isl. Ms. 78 for other ms. copies of this work.Origin: As appears in colophon on p.287, copied by Mūsá ibn Ḥājjī with transcription completed 15 [?] Rabīʻ I 803 [November 1400].Accompanying materials: Inventory cataloguing slip in hand of Winifred Smeaton Thomas.Former shelfmark: From interior of upper cover "IL 325" and spine label (likely supplied by Yahuda).Binding: Pasteboards covered in laid paper with dark red-brown leather over spine, foreedge flap, and edges/turn-ins (framed binding) ; Type II binding (with flap) ; board linings in untinted laid paper ; upper and lower covers carry blind-tooled central ornament (effect of diamond with pendants) built up of four-pointed stars ; sewn in cream thread, two stations ; worked chevron endbands in slate blue and light yellow, fairly good condition (tail especially) ; overall in poor condition with significant abrasion, lifting and losses of paper and leather (especially at spine), delamination of boards, pest damage, cover detaching at spine (spine lining is well affixed to cover but detaching from textblock), etc. ; ill-fitting and likely not made to measure to this textblock (perhaps to fit a range of sizes, note overlapping leather flanges on spine) ; housed in box for protection.Support: non-European (lkely Arab) laid paper with 8 laid lines per cm. (vertical) and chain lines grouped in threes with 8-10 mm. between chains and 47-50 between groups (horizontal), see pp.52-53 ; well-burnished, fairly smooth, thick and sturdy though fairly crisp, dark cream in color ; staining, tide lines, tears, and some pest damage.Decoration: Keywords, section headings and abbreviation symbols rubricated ;Script: Naskh ; fine Turkish or 'Syrian' hand in a medium line ; virtually serifless with slight effect of tilt to the left, some elongation and exaggerated thickness of horizontal strokes, many open counters, pointing in strokes rather than distinct dots, kāf mashqūqah preferred though occasionally represented by partial ascender with seated hamzah (especially in rubricated headings see p.217, etc.) ; colophon in a script approaching tawqīʻ, highly ligatured.Layout: Written in 11 lines per page ; frame-ruled.Collation: IV-2 (6), 16 IV(134), IV-1 (141) ; almost exclusively quaternions ; catchwords present though nearly cut off ; pagination in pencil, Western numerals, supplied during digitization (mistakenly skips ahead ten pages following p.268 with p.279).Colophon: "Scribal," rectangular, reads "تم بعون الله وحسن توفيقه وصلى الله على سيدنا محمد واله وصحبه اجمعين وقع الفراغ من كتابة الكتاب الشريف في ليلة الخمسة العشرة في شهر الله المبارك ربيع الاول سنة ثلث وثمانمائة على يد العبد الضعيف المحتاج الى رحمة ربه [؟] اللطيف موسى بن حاجى غفر الله له ولوالديه واحسن اليهما واليه ولجميع المسلمين والمسلمات اجمعين آمين يا رب العالمين وصلى الله على سيدنا محمد واله الطيبين الطاهرين"Explicit: "كان لم يكن ثم اقسم الباقي على سهام الباقين"Incipit: "الفقهاء واشهر وشاع بينهم ذكره وانتشر طلب مني بعض اولاد بني اخي النجباء ان ارمزه رموزا يعدف بها مذاهب بقية الفقهاء ... كتاب الطهارة فمن اراد الصلوة وهو محدث فليتوضأ"Title from inscription on interior of upper cover.Ms. codex.Ḥājjī Khalīfah. Kashf al-ẓunūn,Brockelmann, C. GAL,Fine (though acephalous) copy of Abū al-Faḍl ʻAbd Allāh ibn Maḥmūd ibn Mawdūd al-Mawṣilī al-Buldajī’s (d.1284) compendium of Ḥanafī legal decisions. See Isl. Ms. 542 and Isl. Ms. 78 for other ms. copies of this work.Mode of access: Internet.Acquired in 1926 from the bookseller Isaac Benjamin S.E. Yahuda via purchase transacted on his behalf by his younger brother, the famous Orientalist and manuscript collector Abraham Shalom Yahuda (1877-1951).Book price (قيمت ٨٥) and kabīkaj invocation ("يا كبيكج يا حفيظ") on upper board lining ; excerpts, prayers, diagrams, etc. on leaves (originally blank) following close of text (pp.288-292) including jadwal for use in determining the opening day of each month of the year (هذا بيان غرة الشهور) on p.289 ; ownership statement on p.290 ; statement in Turkish on lower board lining ; extensive marginal and interlinear glosses and corrections