Stefano Carboni

The ‘Book of Surprises’ (Kitab al-bulhan)

of the Bodleian Library
THE SUBJECT OF THIS article is an illustrated manuscript in the Bodleian Library
(Kitab al-bulhan, Bodl. Or. 133).1 This codex is particularly dear to me because it was
the subject of my dissertation at the Faculty of Oriental Languages of the University of
Venice, now almost 30 years ago, where my main subjects were Arabic and Islamic Art.2
I am not aware if this is still the case, but at the time a student without a degree was
not allowed direct access to the manuscripts at the Bodleian, only to their microfilms.
I remember fondly that, when I was denied access to the Kitab al-bulhan, I ‘sneaked in’
with my mentor, Professor Ernst J. Grube, looking over his shoulder while we discussed
and studied the manuscript together. Professor Grube sadly passed away in 2011 and I
wish to dedicate this paper to his memory.
The Kitab al-bulhan is written in Arabic, this being the main reason why it was not
included in the Love and Devotion exhibition at the State Library of Victoria which was
focused on Persian manuscripts. However, it was produced in a Jalayirid environment at
the end of the 14th century. The Jalayirids (c. 1336–1432), who dominated the area of
western Iran and Iraq with capitals both in Tabriz and Baghdad, epitomised Persian and
Arabic culture of the time, and so the production of manuscripts in Jalayirid Baghdad
can be regarded as a hybrid of both literary cultures. In this article I will focus on the
Kitab al-bulhan in general and in particular on its talismanic illustrations. The talismanic
sciences were very common in the medieval Arab and Persian world and one of the most
appreciated signs of devotion.
A proper translation of the manuscript’s title presents the first challenge. The word
kitab (book) is straightforward but bulhan is an unusual term stemming from the root
b-l-h. The title is clearly written at the beginning at folio 1r. When the manuscript was
studied in depth for the first time by D. S. Rice in an article on the ‘Seasons and Labours
of the Month’, he translated it as ‘The Book of Wellbeing’.3 According to Lane’s Lexicon,
which is the best source for medieval Arabic, the word ablah, which comes from the
same root (b-l-h) means ‘someone who has little knowledge of uncommon things’, and
so I believe that a more suitable translation of this title is ‘The Book of Surprises’, which
would appropriately place this manuscript into the literary body of ʿ ajab (wonder)
literature exemplified by the text of Zakariya ibn Muhammad al-Qazvini who wrote
his celebrated work ʿAjaʾib al-makhluqat wa gharaʾib al-mawjudat (‘The Wonders of
Creation and the Oddities of Existing Things’) in the late-13th century.4 Thus, while
mentioning it throughout in its original title, Kitab al-bulhan, I’d like to refer to it in
English as ‘The Book of Surprises’.

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 The ‘Book of Surprises’ (Kitab al-bulhan) of the Bodleian Library

The sage, Abu Maʾshar al-Balhi, conducting an astronomical experiment.

From a manuscript of Kitab al-bulhan, mostly 14th century.
Bodleian Library, University of Oxford, MS. Bodl. Or. 133, fol. 34r.

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The purported author of the miscellaneous series of treatises bound in the Kitab
al-bulhan is Abu Maʿshar al-Balkhi whose name is clearly indicated on the second line of
the introduction to the book. Abu Maʿshar (787-886 CE) was born in Balkh (modern-
day Mazar-i Sharif) in northern Afghanistan but he moved to the ʿAbbasid court in
Baghdad at the beginning of the 9th century. Apart from his fame as an astronomer, he is
well known for having developed a system of astrological magic founded mostly on neo-
Platonic theories, which became popular in his time and are related to Arabic philosophy
dealing with mankind’s interaction with the environment and his dependence on it. Abu
Maʿshar is known especially for a large body of work entitled al-Madkhal al-kabir, ‘The
Great Introduction [to Astrology]’. The text copied in the Kitab al-bulhan and specifically
mentioned in the introduction is the Kitab al-mawalid or ‘Book of Nativities’, an
astrological treatise by Abu Maʿshar that deals with the horoscopes of men and women.5
One of the most significant full-page illustrations represents the author, identified
by the title in the cartouche at the top of the page (see p. 23): Abu Maʿshar – the
astronomer, astrologer and philosopher – sits bare-chested atop a column holding an
astrolabe in his right hand; he is flanked by an attendant looking at him in a gesture
of surprise (his finger raised to the mouth), captivated by the experiment the master is
attempting; books and the astronomer’s clothes complete the painting on the right side.
The Kitab al-bulhan was rebound in random order at some unknown time, but this
illustration was probably the first in the series of full-page paintings introduced by a title
and without accompanying text, which is so characteristic of this manuscript.
We also know the name of the calligrapher who copied the text of most of the
manuscript. He is ʿAbd al-Hasan ibn Ahmad ibn ʿAli ibn al-Hasan al-Isfahani, who states
on fol.1v that he was born in Baghdad and was a student of the Aristotelic ‘demonstrative’
(burhan) sciences. He was therefore a native of Baghdad whose family originally came
from Isfahan in Iran. We learn from his presentation that he was the calligrapher as
well as the compiler of the overall content of the Kitab al-bulhan, which is composed
of a series of treatises that deal with the demonstrative sciences. At fol. 2r, he writes
that ‘this book I have compiled (rasamtuhu: also ‘drawn, sketched, designed, painted’)
includes some of the explanations of these [demonstrative sciences] with illustrated
drawings (nuqush musawwarat) and coloured figures (ashkal musabbaghat)’. The use
of the verb rasamtu is interesting because it also means ‘I sketched, I drew’ and we are
therefore informed that the colour illustrations were part of the initial planning of this
manuscript. He also states that he wrote this book ‘for the dear brother, the tongue of
the time (al-akh al-ʿaziz lisan al-zaman) . . . Husayn al-Irbili . . .’ Consequently, we also
know the name of the person who commissioned the manuscript or was instrumental in
its genesis, a prominent citizen whose family was originally from the town of Irbil near
Mosul in northern Iraq.
The manuscript offers additional useful information at fol. 131r: ‘This blessed
book passed from the hands of . . . al-Irbili to . . . Haydar ibn al-Hajji ʿAbd al-Karim
ibn Muhammad . . . in the month of Shaʿban 812 [December 1409 – January 1410]
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. . . Written for and owned by Shaykh al-Diya Husayn al-Irbili’. This means that the
manuscript can be safely attributed to the late Jalayirid period because the original owner
(Husayn al-Irbili) gifted it, or sold it, to someone else in the last decades of Jalayirid
rule. Al-Irbili also copied in his own hand some of the treatises in this compilation (in
addition to those written by al-Isfahani), among which are the Kitab al-fal or ‘Divination
of the Imam Jaʿfar’ and the Fal al-anbiya or ‘Divination of the Prophets’ at fols. 131-174.
At fol. 163r we can read his signature: ‘… by the hand of … al-Diya Husayn ibn al-ʿAbd
ibn Muhammad al-Irbili . . . he wrote it himself in date . . .’ and at fol. 169r: ‘This blessed
divination was finished on Sunday 13 dhu-l-hijja of the year . . . by the hand of its owner
. . . al-Diya Husayn ibn al-ʿAbd ibn Muhammad al-Irbili …’ Unfortunately the years are
unreadable, but we can postulate that – since al-Irbili sold the manuscript in 1410 and
had copied these two treatises on divination before that date – he must refer to 1388,
1396 or 1404 since the 13th of dhu-l-hijja was on a Sunday only in those years in the
previous two decades.
A number of folios are missing in the Kitab al-bulhan and the codex is now
bound in random order so that it looks like a jumble of incoherent different treatises.
There exist, however, two Turkish copies of the Kitab al-bulhan made at the time the
manuscript must have been in Ottoman Turkey when its pages were still bound in their
correct sequence. Consequently, they provide the models for a proper reconstruction of
the original codex.6 These two copies were made in c. 1582, one for Aysha Sultan and
the other for Fatma Sultan, both daughters of the Ottoman sultan Murad III (r. 1574–
95). The manuscripts are today in the Pierpont Morgan Library, New York and the
Bibliotèque Nationale, Paris, and bear a title that can be translated as ‘The Ascension
of Propitious Stars and the Sources of Sovereignty’ (Mataliʿ al-saʿada wa yanabiʿ al-
siyyada). Both codices have been studied to some degree: the latter was published in
Spain as a facsimile under the title ‘The Book of Felicity’ whereas Barbara Schmitz
included the former in her catalogue of Islamic manuscripts in the Piermont Morgan
Library.7 These two Ottoman copies represent the translation made by the well-known
poet Seyyid Mehmet ibn Amir Hasan al-Suʿudi who was at the court of Murad III. It is
mentioned in the introduction that he used an illustrated copy for his translation, which
must be the Bodleian Kitab al-bulhan.
The Ottoman manuscripts include a portrait of Murad III depicted as a man of
culture and a bibliophile with an open copy of the manuscript he commissioned in
which we can recognize some of its astrological images. As I mentioned above, these later
copies are instrumental in filling the present gaps in our knowledge and understanding
of the Kitab al-bulhan.
As expected from a text that includes Abu Maʿshar’s writings, the Kitab al-bulhan
contains a series of illustrations related to astronomy and astrology. The ‘Book of
Nativities’ requires at least one illustration for each of the twelve Signs of the Zodiac but
we can see also full-page miniatures depicting the Rainbow and the Stars, others with the
28 Stations of the Moon, the Apogee (exaltation) and Perigee (dejection) of the Seven
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Iblis, lord of all the demons. Shamhurash, the demon king of Thursday.
From a manuscript of Kitab al-bulhan, mostly From a manuscript of Kitab al-bulhan, mostly
14th century. 14th century.
Bodleian Library, University of Oxford, MS. Bodleian Library, University of Oxford, MS.
Bodl. Or. 133, fol. 33r. Bodl. Or. 133, fol. 32v.

Planets and the Lunar Node, the Climates and the Seasons. In the ‘Book of Nativities’
(Kitab al-mawalid) each Sign of the Zodiac is represented in conjunction with its Planet
by means of a full-page illustration (for example, at fol. 21v Saturn is the master of
Aquarius therefore the planet is shown as a dark-skinned man pulling water from a well)
and three small vignettes at the bottom depict the planets that influence the three decades
of the month related to the sign (in the case of Aquarius these are Venus, Mercury and
the Moon). An interesting double page shows an illustrated chart that links the 7 Planets
to different activities and professions; for example, Saturn (the ‘dark Planet’) is related
to jobs that have to do with dirtying one’s hands, such as blacksmith or leather tanner;
the ‘Planet’ Sun looks over rulers and money-makers having to do with power and gold.
In the illustrations that deal with the seven Climates of Earth, each climate is linked to
a Planet. Once again, for example, Saturn is responsible for those regions of the world
where dark-skinned peoples are found. Four more miniatures are related to the Seasons
and are among the best illustrations in the Kitab al-bulhan as already noted by Rice in his
1954 ‘Seasons and Labours of the Month’ article.
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 The ‘Book of Surprises’ (Kitab al-bulhan) of the Bodleian Library

The most interesting section, however, at least from the art historical viewpoint,
is a series of extraordinary full-page illustrations that require interpretation because the
only way to understand their subject – in addition of course to having enough familiarity
with its iconography in order to decipher correctly the scene represented in the painting
– is by reading its title placed in large letters at the top of the page. There is no text (and
never was) associated to these works, which makes this section intriguing, fascinating,
and unique in this period of development of Islamic book illustration.
We do not know if these full-page illustrations can be linked to Abu Maʿshar’s
writings: it seems unlikely because most of them have a narrative content, although some
have talismanic significance and they might indeed be related to the famous astrologer.
This series starts with the extraordinary image of Iblis, the ‘Accursed Devil’ (iblis al-
laʿin) who is sitting frontally in an enthroned position, as appropriate for the ruler of
all jinns and devils (opposite). The jinns are neither humans nor angels, they are made
of smoke and are usually invisible to man but they live on earth, present themselves
through dreams and can be responsible for many illnesses and life challenges.
In the Kitab al-bulhan a couple of images are missing in this section on the jinns
and we can refer to the Ottoman copies in order to reconstruct the full series of the
seven ‘Kings of the Jinns’, each one connected with a specific day of the week, an angel,
a planet and a metal following many literary treatises on magic and talismans. The
original sequence in the manuscript seems to rely mostly on the writings of Buqratis
(the Greek Hippocrates) rather than Abu Maʿshar. The jinns of Sunday and Monday, the
‘Gold King’ and the ‘White King’ are missing in the Kitab al-bulhan but we know their
name and appearance from the Ottoman copies.8 Each ‘King’ is usually depicted with
his helpers and the talismanic symbols needed to exorcise him are also drawn within the
frame of the painting.
Among the extant illustrations in the Kitab al-bulhan, the ‘Red King’ (al-malik al-
ahmar) is the jinn of Tuesday and here the talismanic symbols are evident both in the
monotonous repetition of individual letters (in this case, the letter ‘ta’), and numbers,
and in the so-called ‘spectacle symbols’ originally deriving from the Kabbalah or other
mystical and magical traditions (fol. 31r). The Red King of Tuesday has a close relationship
with Mars, the planet of war, and is consequently depicted as a monstrous being riding
a lion while holding a sword and a severed head. The ‘Black King’ (al-malik al-aswad) is
the jinn of Wednesday (fol. 30v). His talisman is elaborate and also his helpers are quite
extraordinary. The jinn of Thursday is a king named ‘Shamhurash’, the title specifying
that he is nasrani (‘Christian’), who is also known from some sources as Abu al-Walid or
‘Father of the Child’ (opposite). This is probably the reason why he is represented with a
naked child in his hands, held upside down, although it is unclear whether Shamhurash’s
influence over him is positive or negative. The talismanic symbols are complex and
include also the hexagon, the ‘Seal [on the ring] of Solomon’ (khatam sulayman) which
is formed by two triangles, one upright and the other upside down, symbolising the
entire universe combining the upper and lower spheres.
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The jinn of Friday is the four-headed King ‘Zawbaʿa’, sitting frontally in a royal
position of power (fol. 31v). The combination of monstrous horned heads and harmless
facing equines is quite extraordinary. The last King of the week is the jinn of Saturday,
‘Maymun’, which also means ‘monkey’ in Arabic and is here described in the title and
represented in the illustration as ‘Maymun of the Clouds’ (maymun al-sahabi, fol. 32r).
He is therefore one of the flying jinns who visit humans and he also has a child in his
hands like the above-mentioned Shamhurash.
The sequence of the seven Kings of the week is complemented in the Kitab al-
bulhan by additional jinns who can be related to illnesses or ways of disrupting one’s
life. One of these is ‘Kabus’, the ‘Nightmare’, who puts one’s life in disarray while the
subject is asleep (see p. 30). In the interior setting of a bedroom, Kabus visits a hapless
sleeping man as a menacing dark figure. The ‘spectacle’ talismanic signs are evident in
this painting. We know the name of another of these jinns from the Ottoman copy since
the original title is damaged in the Kitab al-bulhan: it is the ‘Evil Eye’, one of the most
common talismans also today, available everywhere in the Middle East as a blue glass
disk with the centre representing the eye and pupil (fol. 28v).
Another interesting character is the female jinn Tabiʿa (fol. 29v). Her origins
hark again back to the Kabbalah and the figure of Lilith, the demonic goddess who was
purportedly destined by God to control and weaken human babies. She can also be
related to the queen of witches in Christian demonology and so this image acquires an
extraordinary significance linking Hebrew, Christian and Islamic traditions together.9
The last of the illustrations of the jinns is Huma, the ‘Fever’ (fol. 30r). This jinn has
three heads, sits in a frontal position and embraces the surrounding space with his arms,
ready to snatch someone’s body and make him feverish. This series of paintings is truly
extraordinary and they have no comparison in other manuscripts,10 which makes the
Kitab al-bulhan one of the most fascinating of Arabic manuscripts.
In the 14th century as well as today, talismans were usually housed inside small
metal boxes that hang from the neck. They are written using Qurʾanic verses, invocations
and incomprehensible talismanic symbols and are sometimes illustrated with drawings
before they are folded several times and inserted into these boxes. Unlike a few other
known illustrated talismans form this early period,11 the pages in the Kitab al-bulhan
were never detached from the manuscript and folded, so they can be interpreted as a sort
of manual or compendium of talismanic illustrations.
From the literary point of view, Abu Maʿshar may have played a part in the
creation of the talismans in the Kitab al-bulhan but it is likely that these illustrations
are the result of a variety of sources. One of the most important authors who may have
been consulted to create the talismanic symbols in the paintings of the jinns is Ahmad
ibn ʿAli al-Buni (d. circa 1225) whose major work is the ‘Great Book of the Sun of
Gnosis’ (Shams al-maʿarif al-kubraʾ), which includes a large number of diagrams,
symbols, magic squares with the names of the 28 Stations of the Moon, the 28 letters of
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 The ‘Book of Surprises’ (Kitab al-bulhan) of the Bodleian Library

the alphabet, the twelve Metals, the twelve Signs of the Zodiac and the four Elements.12
In reference to the ‘spectacle’ symbols, the most likely source is Ibn al-Wahshiyya (active
late 9th–10th century, therefore almost contemporary to Abu Maʿshar) and his ‘Book of
Nabatean Agriculture’ (Kitab al-filaha al-nabatiyya) where one can find these talismanic
signs, each one connected to a letter of the Arabic alphabet.13 The ‘spectacle’ symbols
became popular in the Arab and Persian Middle East and continuity in their use can
be demonstrated until very recently, since pages including these very same talismanic
characters were created by the renowned Ethiopian calligrapher Gera Mawi Mazgabu
(1941-2006) in Addis Ababa.14
The talismanic pages of the Kitab al-bulhan are extraordinary but there are many
other full-page paintings in the manuscript that relate to wonders and stories that must
have been quickly identifiable by the average viewer just from the title and the image.
One of the most interesting ones, which is unfortunately missing in the Kitab al-bulhan
but is present in the Ottoman copies, is the illustration of the ‘Laughing Snake’ (mar-i
qahqaha) that is able to kill with his look and is therefore approached by a group of
men holding a mirror in front of him in the hope that it will self-destroy by looking at
its own image. We do not know whether this was originally part of the section on the
jinns but in the later copies this image is placed as the last of the jinns or the first of the
following section. The ‘Laughing Snake’ represents a medley of different myths ranging
from the Basilisk – also a snake or reptile able to kill with its look – to the mythical life
of Alexander the Great (Iskandar in Arabic and Persian).15 A similar story is present
al-Qazvini’s Wonders of Creation in which the largest creeping creature on earth, the
gigantic Sannaja, is approached by other animals with their eyes closed so that it will die
if it sees them first.16
There are a few other images in the Kitab al-bulhan that are related to magic and
divination. For example, one illustrates the Hermetic temples of Egypt and the Maghreb.
Abu Maʿshar wrote an entire treatise, the Kitab al-uluf (‘The Book of the Thousands’)
dedicated to the occult sciences of Hermes Trismegistus.17 The miniature represents the
interior of one of these Hermetic temples, probably the temple of Abu Sir in Akhmim
(Panopolis) in Upper Egypt (fol. 29r). This painting, like that of the ‘Laughing Snake’
provides a perfect transition in the Kitab al-bulhan from the jinns to the physical and
human world and its multifaceted stories.
There is a plethora of images that refer to man-made wonders, one of the most
famous of which is the ‘Lighthouse of Alexandria’ (fol. 36r). The illustration shows
schematically the city of Iskandariyya (Alexandria) and the famous tower with its mirror
on top, which was used to reflect the sun and warn the ships of the nearby coast. One of
the celebrated seven wonders of antiquity, the Lighthouse of Alexandria was in ruins by
the 14th century and its stones were used in the late-15th century to erect buildings for
the Mamluk sultan Qaitbey.18
Another famous building is the Mosque of the Umayyads in Damascus, which
according to many Arab authors was one of the four most significant edifices in the
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The demon Kabus.

From a manuscript of Kitab al-bulhan, mostly 14th century.
Bodleian Library, University of Oxford, MS. Bodl. Or. 133, fol. 28r.

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 The ‘Book of Surprises’ (Kitab al-bulhan) of the Bodleian Library

The Baths of Tiberias. The wall of Alexander (Iskandar).

From a manuscript of Kitab al-bulhan, From a manuscript of Kitab al-bulhan,
mostly 14th century. mostly 14th century.
Bodleian Library, University of Oxford, Bodleian Library, University of Oxford,
MS. Bodl. Or. 133, fol. 35v. MS. Bodl. Or. 133, fol. 38r.

world (fol. 36v). The building pre-existed the advent of Islam and was re-utilised from
the Christian Church of St. John in order to be turned into a mosque. It is interesting to
notice that bells are depicted atop the minarets: this may be a reference to the original
Christian building.
Tiberias is a city in modern-day Israel on the western shores of the largest lake in
the area, the Sea of Galilee. Founded in honour of the Roman Emperor Tiberius in the
early 1st century CE, it became a famous thermal station and continued to be used in
the Islamic period. The illustration represents the celebrated Bath of Tiberias, like the
Mosque of the Umayyads one of the most famous structures in the region, where the
water was always so warm that there was no need to keep the fire going (see above). The
painting suggests that the water remains hot because there are jinns who look after the
fire and keep it warm all the time. The interior of the bath shows two floors: various
hammam-related activities take place on the upper floor whereas the lower section
represents the underground with two busy jinns in conversation while they take care of
the fire.
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Another well-known building was the Monastery of the Raven, which is reported in
many travellers’ accounts as located in Spain or in Portugal (fol. 37r). The extraordinary
story about it is that a talking raven, depicted atop the dome in the illustration, knows
the name of every person who enters the monastery and announces it loudly and clearly
on their arrival.
The famous story of Alexander the Great and the construction of the ‘Wall of Gog
and Magog’, originally a Biblical narrative,19 are encountered in many accounts including
the Qurʾan (see p. 31). Alexander erected a huge wall made of fused bronze that separated
the civilised world from the wild and savage realm, exemplified by the people of Gog and
Magog (juj wa majuj) who are represented as naked creatures licking the wall with their
rough tongues in the hope to find their way out and riding writhing snakes. The large
figures outside the wall are automata playing a long trumpet and drums, making noise
and music to make the people of Gog and Magog believe that there was an entire army
of people waiting to kill them if they tried to climb the wall.
There are several illustrations which are familiar today to the readers of The
Thousand and One Nights20 although they may have been included in other collections
of stories in the period of creation of the Kitab al-bulhan, since the final version of this
celebrated text is relatively recent and ultimately the result of English, and especially
French, ‘orientalist’ contributions to the various editions that started to appear at the
beginning of the 18th century. One of these illustrations is entitled ‘The Traveller and the
City of Copper’ and depicts a story of two travellers (the emir Musa and the shaykh ʿAbd
al-Samad) which is included in the tales related to the ‘Jinns Imprisoned in the Jars since
the Times of Solomon’ in The Thousand and One Nights (fol. 45v). Here the traveller is
one instead of two but the story must be the same: the City of Copper has neither gates
nor other entrances and anyone who tries to climb its metal walls would fall in and die;
however, ʿAbd al-Samad becomes the hero of the story and manages to get safely into
the city helped by his prayers.
One of the most famous tales in The Thousand and One Nights is in the long section
on the adventurous travels of the sailor Sindibad, from his fifth voyage. One of the most
accomplished paintings in the Kitab al-bulhan and the first to be published in 1928,21 the
illustration relates to the story of Sindibad (called simply ‘the Arab’ in the title) and the
Old Man of the Sea (opposite). Sindibad arrives on a deserted island and sees a strange
creature, half-old man half-fish. He takes pity on him because he can’t walk and appears
to be starving, so he takes the odd creature on his shoulders not knowing that he would
cling tightly to him without letting him go, start to order him around and hit him hard
on his head. Sindibad does not know how to get rid of him until he notices vine trees
with ripe fruit. The illustration shows the sailor crushing grapes in order to turn them
into wine that he will give the Old Man of the Sea to get him drunk. The creature will
weaken his grip on Sindibad’s shoulders and fall on the ground, after which the sailor
will kill him with a stone.
Another story narrated by Sindibad the Sailor in The 1001 Nights takes place in
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 The ‘Book of Surprises’ (Kitab al-bulhan) of the Bodleian Library

Sindibad and the old man of the sea. The Waq Waq tree
From a manuscript of Kitab al-bulhan, mostly From a manuscript of Kitab al-bulhan,
14th century. mostly 14th century.
Bodleian Library, University of Oxford, Bodleian Library, University of Oxford,
MS. Bodl. Or. 133, fol. 43r. MS. Bodl. Or. 133, fol. 41v.

a valley in Sirindib (Ceylon, modern Sri Lanka). This valley is full of precious stones,
diamonds and rubies that are easy to spot from the top of the surrounding mountains
because they are scattered everywhere on the ground (fol. 46v). The valley, however, is
populated by terrible poisonous snakes that make it impossible to collect the stones. The
local people thought up a great stratagem: they take a few sheep, kill them and cut them
up; the chunks of raw meat are thrown down into the valley so that the stones that lie on
the ground become caught in the meat; predatory birds are attracted to the meat, they
carry the chunks to the mountains in order to attend to their meal, the merchants scare
them away and so they can get to the stones. This improbable but exhilarating tale was
cleverly précised by the painter of the Kitab al-bulhan in a miniature that includes all
elements of the story except for the local people and Sindibad: a valley defined by rocky
formations at its sides, animated snakes, birds flying around with meat in their beaks and
colourful pebbles on the ground.
In the sea of China there is also the famous island of Waq-Waq as reported by
most medieval Arab geographers. This island is ruled by a queen and the population is
only female: it is usually illustrated in al-Qazvini manuscripts of the Wonders of Creation
showing the queen surrounded by her female attendants.22 In the Kitab al-bulhan,
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however, the painting titled the ‘Tree of Waq Waq’ is rather extraordinary because it
illustrates the way in which the all-female population reproduces and self-perpetuates
(see p. 33). Female figures grow from the tree as if they mature like fruit until they are
‘ready’ and they drop to the ground emitting a cry that sounds like ‘Waq Waq!’.
More wonders of nature are present in the Kitab al-bulhan. The ‘Mountain of
Fire and the Salamander Birds’ is a story related to the Phoenix who dies in the fire
immolating itself and is later reborn from its ashes (fol. 42v). According to some Arab
geographers, this tale does not relate to a single bird but to a large number of them
called ‘salamander birds’ (the salamander being also often quoted as a reptile that is able
to survive in the fire in medieval texts).23 This is the way it was illustrated by the painter
of this section of the Kitab al-bulhan: a burning rock formation surrounded by flames
amongst which several small birds are perched.
A second marvellous story about birds and the wonders of the natural world is
set in Upper Egypt: a small domed building located atop a remote mountain is visited
every year by a flock of different species of birds (fol. 46r). The extraordinary fact is that
one of the birds inserts its beak into a slit of this building and remains in that position
for an entire year until it is replaced by the next one, after which it dies. These birds are
attracted to the building by a magical power and no one can explain their behaviour.
Following this brief survey of some of the most interesting and fascinating aspects
of the pictorial cycle of the Kitab al-bulhan, it is important to emphasize the unique nature
of this illustrated manuscript. What looks today like a random collection of different
treatises in its present condition is due to its eclectic nature but especially to its history.
An analysis of the signatures and attributions reveals that there was a relationship and
friendship (‘. . . the dear brother, the tongue of the time . . .’)24 between ʿAbd al-Hasan
al-Isfahani (the copyist, compiler and possibly even the illustrator25 of the larger part of
the text) and Husayn al-Irbili (the first owner and the copyist of some of the treatises
bound in the book, such as the ‘Divination of the Imam Jaʿfar’ and the ‘Divination of
the Prophets’). If one looks closely to the style and some details in the illustrations, one
can see that there is a clear relationship between the full-page paintings included in the
earlier part, for which al-Isfahani was responsible, and the works that appear in later
sections attributed to the pen of al-Irbili (for example, the use of similar conventions
to illustrate the buildings as well as details of the vegetal backgrounds throughout the
manuscript). Whether al-Isfahani was indeed the painter or a different professional
artist was hired for the task, the final product was likely planned by these two individuals
in the late-14th century. This consistency has not been properly acknowledged yet, but
I believe that the Kitab al-bulhan should be now rightfully positioned within the small
body of early illustrated literature on the ‘Wonders of Creation’ principally represented
by a handful of late-13th century and 14th century copies of al-Qazvini’s ʿAjaʾib al-
makhluqat,26 in addition to a copy of Abu Maʿshar’s Kitab al-mawalid,27 a manuscript
that partially survives in the Keir Collection in London.28
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