View source for Hijazi script

{{Short description|Early Arabic scripts}}
[[File:Qur'anic Manuscript - 2 - Hijazi script.jpg|thumb|[[Codex Ṣanʿāʾ]]: An early Qur'anic manuscript in Hijazi script (8th century AD).]]
{{Arab culture}}
'''Hijazi script''' ({{langx|ar|خَطّ ٱَلحِجَازِيّ|translit=khaṭṭ al-ḥijāzī}}) is the collective name for several early [[Arabic script]]s that developed in the [[Hejaz]] (the northwest of the [[Arabian Peninsula]]), a region that includes the cities of [[Mecca]] and [[Medina]]. This type of script was already in use at the time of the emergence of Islam. A calligraphic Hijazi script is called a Ma'il script ({{langx|ar|مائل|māʾil|sloping}}); these are found in a number of the earliest Qur'anic manuscripts. The two terms are often used interchangeably.

Hijazi was one of the earliest scripts, along with [[Mashq]] and [[Kufic]]. Earlier scripts included [[Ancient North Arabian]] and the [[South Arabian script]].

The script is notably angular in comparison with other Arabic scripts and tends to slope to the right. The script does not yet contain any dots or [[diacritic]]al marks to indicate vowel sounds: but does differentiate consonants by the intermittent use of dashes above the graphic letter forms.

==Historicity==
Ancient manuscripts are divided into two major types, Hijazi and Kufic. Kufic style also has its own subdivisions.<ref>Cellard É., "Les manuscrits coraniques anciens", ''Le Coran des historiens,'' T.1, 2019, p. 681.</ref>
The term Hijazi was coined in the 19th century by Michele Amari, who distinguished between "Meccan script" and "Medinan script" from a 10th-century manuscript. Today, no element reinforces such a geographical distinction, and there is no clarity as to their certainty of geographic origin. Since the 1980s, the Kufic script has been referred to by François Déroche as a preference, with the definition of an "ancient Abbasid script".<ref>Cellard É., "Les manuscrits coraniques anciens", ''Le Coran des historiens,'' T.1, 2019, p. 681.</ref>

The concept of Hijazi script has been criticized by Estelle Whelan, who sees this definition as a "scientific artefact" based on the form of a single letter ([[aleph]]) and archaic explanations.<ref name=":1">François Déroche, ''Le codex Parisino-petropolitanus,'' p. 113 et suiv.</ref>
== See also ==
{{Portal|Languages}}

* [[Thuluth]]
* [[Naskh (script)|Naskh]]
* [[Tawqi]]
* [[Muhaqqaq]]
* [[Reyhan (script)|Rayhan]]
* [[Arabic calligraphy]]

== References ==
<references />

== External links ==
* [http://www.islamic-awareness.org/Quran/Text/Mss/ms2165.html British Library MS. Or. 2165] Early Qur'anic manuscript written in Ma'il script, 7th or 8th century CE
* [http://www.bl.uk/onlinegallery/sacredtexts/meccaquran.html British Library MS. Or. 2165] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180808104113/http://www.bl.uk/onlinegallery/sacredtexts/meccaquran.html |date=2018-08-08 }} ([[British Library]])
* [http://www.usna.edu/Users/humss/bwheeler/quran/maili.html Ma'il manuscript from the Tareq Rajab Museum in Kuwait] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201020223914/https://www.usna.edu/Users/humss/bwheeler/quran/maili.html |date=2020-10-20 }}.
* [http://www.islamic-awareness.org/Quran/Text/Mss/yem1b.html Folio in an italic Hijazi script] from the discoveries at the Great Mosque, [[Sana'a]]
* [http://www.islamic-awareness.org/Quran/Text/Mss/VaAr1605.html Fragment in a Makkan Hijazi script] from the Vatican library

{{Arabic language}}

{{Islamic calligraphy}}
[[Category:Arabic calligraphy]]
[[Category:Hejaz]]


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