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Andalusian Digital Archive الأرشيف الأندلسي الرقمي

The Virtual Museum

Step into the Museum of al-Andalus

A guided walk through the most luminous corners of the archive — eight rooms in which the manuscripts of al-Andalus and the Maghrib are no longer files in a catalogue, but objects in a cabinet, leaves in a vitrine, lines pulled into the light.

13,612manuscripts
1,010,637folios
7,343transcribed
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Enter the museum Enter the Galleries (3D walk) ↗

Hall VI

Sacromonte: The Lead Books Hall

Step inside the cave on the hill of Valparaíso — a domed chamber of engravings and paintings of the 1595 discovery, opening onto a long corridor of the 467 Brill plates in their published order.

Hall I

The Hall of Paintings

Photographs, lithographs and engravings of al-Andalus and the Maghrib — Charles Clifford's 1850s Alhambra and Toledo, the prints of David Roberts and Owen Jones, the Tiraz of ʿAbd al-Raḥmān III at the Cleveland Museum, holdings of the Met, the National Gallery and the BnF.

Enter the gallery →

Hall III

The Cartographer's Room

Worlds drawn from the south — al-Idrīsī's twelfth-century globe inverted upon itself, portolan atlases of the Sharafī of Sfax, and the cartouches in which the cosmographers of al-Andalus and the Maghrib inscribed coastlines and stars.

[Andalusi-era] US Yale Arabic MSS suppl. 598 — Qiṣṣat futūḥ Ifrīqīyah, al-Sifr 1 (Conquest of Nor p.1 — Maghreb (sanity-test Yale Qiṣṣat futūḥ Ifrīqīya) 01 US Yale Arabic MSS suppl. 598 — Qiṣṣat futūḥ Ifrīqīyah, al-Sifr 1 (Conquest of Nor p.1 — Maghreb (sanity-test Yale Qiṣṣat futūḥ Ifrīqīya) [Andalusi-era] BL Papyrus 3124 — Bilingual Latin-Arabic private letter (Egypt, post-conquest era) p.1 — Mediterranean (sanity-test BL Papyrus 3124 bilingual letter) 02 BL Papyrus 3124 — Bilingual Latin-Arabic private letter (Egypt, post-conquest era) p.1 — Mediterranean (sanity-test BL Papyrus 3124 bilingual letter) [Andalusi-era] BnF btv1b6000547t — al-Idrīsī — Nuzhat al-Mushtāq (BnF Arabe 2221) p.1 — med-basin (1.D al-Idrīsī) 03 BnF btv1b6000547t — al-Idrīsī — Nuzhat al-Mushtāq (BnF Arabe 2221) p.1 — med-basin (1.D al-Idrīsī) [Andalusi-era] BnF btv1b6000547t — al-Idrīsī — Nuzhat al-Mushtāq (BnF Arabe 2221) p.2 — med-basin (1.D al-Idrīsī) 04 BnF btv1b6000547t — al-Idrīsī — Nuzhat al-Mushtāq (BnF Arabe 2221) p.2 — med-basin (1.D al-Idrīsī) [Andalusi-era] BnF btv1b6000547t — al-Idrīsī — Nuzhat al-Mushtāq (BnF Arabe 2221) p.3 — med-basin (1.D al-Idrīsī) 05 BnF btv1b6000547t — al-Idrīsī — Nuzhat al-Mushtāq (BnF Arabe 2221) p.3 — med-basin (1.D al-Idrīsī) [Andalusi-era] BnF btv1b6000547t — al-Idrīsī — Nuzhat al-Mushtāq (BnF Arabe 2221) p.4 — med-basin (1.D al-Idrīsī) 06 BnF btv1b6000547t — al-Idrīsī — Nuzhat al-Mushtāq (BnF Arabe 2221) p.4 — med-basin (1.D al-Idrīsī) [Andalusi-era] BnF btv1b6000547t — al-Idrīsī — Nuzhat al-Mushtāq (BnF Arabe 2221) p.5 — med-basin (1.D al-Idrīsī) 07 BnF btv1b6000547t — al-Idrīsī — Nuzhat al-Mushtāq (BnF Arabe 2221) p.5 — med-basin (1.D al-Idrīsī) [Andalusi-era] BnF btv1b6000547t — al-Idrīsī — Nuzhat al-Mushtāq (BnF Arabe 2221) p.6 — med-basin (1.D al-Idrīsī) 08 BnF btv1b6000547t — al-Idrīsī — Nuzhat al-Mushtāq (BnF Arabe 2221) p.6 — med-basin (1.D al-Idrīsī) [Andalusi-era] BnF btv1b6000547t — al-Idrīsī — Nuzhat al-Mushtāq (BnF Arabe 2221) p.7 — med-basin (1.D al-Idrīsī) 09 BnF btv1b6000547t — al-Idrīsī — Nuzhat al-Mushtāq (BnF Arabe 2221) p.7 — med-basin (1.D al-Idrīsī) [Andalusi-era] BnF btv1b6000547t — al-Idrīsī — Nuzhat al-Mushtāq (BnF Arabe 2221) p.8 — med-basin (1.D al-Idrīsī) 10 BnF btv1b6000547t — al-Idrīsī — Nuzhat al-Mushtāq (BnF Arabe 2221) p.8 — med-basin (1.D al-Idrīsī)
Unroll the maps →

Hall IV

The Decoded Transcription Room

Twenty-two manuscripts in which every page has been read — line by line — by humans and machines together. Click any leaf to see the Arabic of the folio set against its decoded transcription.

21 manuscripts · 672 pages

Folio I

al-Waraqāt

Identified as Al-Waraqāt by Imām al-Ḥaramayn al-Juwaynī (d. 478 AH / 1085 CE), or a close commentary thereon.

Eight lines, hand-glossed against the corrected transcription. Each citation is anchored to the verse, ḥadīth, or classical source the copyist quotes.

  1. أقيموا الصلاة

    “Establish the prayer.”

    Qur'an 2:43

  2. لا تقربوا الزنا

    “Do not come near to fornication.”

    Qur'an 17:32 — Sūrat al-Isrāʾ

  3. قياس الأرز على البر في امتناع بيع بعضه ببعض إلا مثلاً بمثل يداً بيد

    Analogical reasoning: rice judged like wheat — both fall under the prohibition of unequal exchange (ribā al-faḍl).

    Ḥadīth — Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim, on ribā

  4. والفقه: معرفة الأحكام الشرعية التي طريقها الاجتهاد

    “Fiqh is knowledge of the legal rulings whose path is independent reasoning (ijtihād).”

    Al-Waraqāt

  5. هذه وريقات قليلة تشتمل على معرفة فصول من أصول الفقه ينتفع بها

    “These are a few small leaves containing the chapters of the principles of jurisprudence…” — the celebrated opening of al-Waraqāt.

    Al-Waraqāt

  6. وإذا حللتم فاصطادوا

    “And when you are released from pilgrim sanctity, then [you may] hunt.”

    Qur'an 5:2 — Sūrat al-Māʾida

  7. واسأل القرية أي أهل القرية

    “Ask the town” (i.e. ‘the people of the town’ — metonymy).

    Qur'an 12:82 — Sūrat Yūsuf

  8. إلى الذهن قصداً لا إلى الخارج. والمجاز بالاستعارة كقوله تعالى: {جِدَارًا يُرِيدُ أَن يَنقَضَّ}

    “…a wall on the verge of collapsing.” (lit. ‘a wall that wants to fall’)

    Qur'an 18:77 — Sūrat al-Kahf

Browse the leaves

01 Ma'rifat fuṣūl min uṣūl al-fiqh 2 pages 02 Qaṣīda Kāfiyya 3 pages 03 al-Muqaddima al-Raḥbiyya 8 pages 04 Ta'līq ... 'alà l-qaṣīda al-kāfiyya 11 pages 05 Risāla fī 'ilm al-zairaya 12 pages 06 Kitāb al-ʿAwāmil al-miʾa 13 pages 07 Šarḥ mujtaṣar 'alà l-muqaddima al-Raḥbiyya fī l-farā'id 18 pages 08 Al-Nukat li-Ǧalāl 19 pages 09 Kitāb Šarḥ Lāmīyat al-afʻāl li-Ibn Mālik 22 pages 10 Qurrat al-ʻayn li-šarḥ waraqāt Imām al-Ḥaramayn 22 pages 11 Îǧaz al-taʻrīf fī 'ilm al-taṣrīf 25 pages 12 Kitāb al-faṣīḥ 28 pages 13 Kitāb šarḥ al-Aǧurrūmiya 31 pages 14 Šarḥ Lāmīyat al-afʻāl 40 pages 15 Kitāb šarḥ al-Aǧurrūmiya 43 pages 16 Šarḥ Lāmīyat al-afʻāl 54 pages 17 Šarḥ Alfiyyat Ibn Mālik 55 pages 18 Kitāb al durra al-naḥwiyya fī šarḥ al-Aǧurrūmiyya 59 pages 19 Šarḥ 'alà l-muqaddima al-Aǧurrūmiyya 65 pages 20 Taḥqīq al-maqāl wa-tashīl al-manāl fī Šarḥ Lāmiyyat al-afʿāl 68 pages 21 Šarḥ Lāmīyat al-afʻāl 74 pages

Hall V

The Wing of Special Collections

Each special collection is a museum within the museum — formed under a partner library's name, or curated around a corpus the archive holds in deep concentration. Open any door to step into that institution's reading room.

Closing

Read what you've come to see.

Every manuscript in this museum is in the public domain. Read it, cite it, build upon it — share and redistribute it freely.

Browse the archive → Search the transcriptions →

Curated for the public reading room