Khaje Ekhtiar Munshi is the most renowned scribe of this pen from the Safavid era and is still well-known today. Aqqoyunlu scribes took ta‘liq to Istanbul from western Iran where it was transformed into divāni/ دیوانی by Ottoman calligraphers. They spread to Turkey and the Indian subcontinent, where they became the model for a local variety used for Persian manuscripts in India, and for both Persian and Turkish in Turkey, but they never became popular in the Arab countries of the region, and thus were rarely used for writing Arabic texts.įor several centuries, since the Mongol period and particularly after the 15 th century, ta‘liq and also shekasteh (broken) ta‘liq/ شکسته تعلیق-in the format of widely spaced lines ascending from right to left in a curved shape-were the main chancery scripts typically used for decrees ( firmans/ فرمان), letters of recommendation ( ziyaratnāmeh/ زیارت‌نامه), permissions, diplomatic correspondence, and other official documents in Iran and Turkey. These scripts existed and had evolved much earlier over a long period of time but were standardized and refined in the hands of these distinguished calligraphers. The influences of various Persian genres such as lyric poetry during the Mongol rulers of the 13 th century led to the development of two new and distinctive hanging scripts: ta‘liq تعلیق (meaning suspension or hanging) attributed to Taj al-Din Salmāni, and nasta‘liq/ نستعلیق‎ attributed to Mir ‘Ali Tabrizi. These rules derive from the concept of a square-shaped/rhombic dot drawn by whichever pen a calligrapher is using. He was the vizier of the Abbasid court and he has even been called a prophet in the field of calligraphy for the fundamental role he played in laying down a comprehensive system of basic rules. The beauty of the writing of ibn Muqla was praised by several contemporary admirers during the 10 th century. Riqā’, also the smaller counterpart of tawqi’, is said to have originated from thuluth due to its joined unconnected letters ( ra / ر and waw / و for example, run over or touch the following letter). Thuluth is the plumpest and most rounded script of the six pens with svelte curves. Ray ḥ an is the smaller counterpart of mu ḥ aqqaq, in which unconnected letters are kept rigidly separate and so this script was grouped as ‘derived’ ( far’/ فرع) as opposed to ‘principle’ ( aṣl/ اصل) by Mamluk authors and practitioners. While r ay ḥ an is a rectilinear script it bears many resemblances to the curvilinear naskh the most distinguishing feature is in the ‘tail’ of the ra/ ر, waw/ و, mim/ م, ya/ ی, and other descending letters the gentle curve of which in ray ḥ an contrasts with the upward hook-shaped endings in naskh. What follows is a brief overview of some of these styles and the figures associated with them, and especially those associated with Persian. Over this long and geographically broad history many styles have flourished, each with their own contexts, rules and characteristics which have ultimately influenced the way people in Iran and across the Islamic world still write today. That distinctive relationship between calligraphy and the Arabic script survives to this day, even as the script has travelled and been adopted by various languages, such as Persian. Calligraphy was used to decorate the walls and façades of buildings, as well as objects made in various media, such as coins, where it was the main-even the only-element of decoration. In Islam, where the depiction of humans and animals is often avoided, the importance of calligraphy as a form of art was emphasized even further, and a great effort was put into the decoration and proportions of individual scripts to make them worthy of preserving the word of God.

The Arabic language and its script, as the means of preservation for the Qur‘an, have always carried great significance in Islamic culture, and so very early on this script developed from a practical means of writing into a highly refined form of art. Calligraphy, the art of writing, is a distinctive feature of Islamic civilization and its history goes back as far as the 7th century CE.

Linguan calligraphy