Post #2298904

2026-02-10 11:49 UTC

There seems to have been a long-standing connection in mediaeval Islamic thought between calligraphy and geometry. The scholar Abū Ḥayyān al-Tawḥīdī (c.930–1023) wrote that ‘handwriting is spiritual geometry by means of a corporeal instrument’. Much later, Aḥmad Ibrāhīmī Ḥusaynī Qummī (b. 1546) wrote in his treatise ‘Calligraphers and Painters’ (c.1606) that ‘writing is the geometry of the soul’. Al-Tawḥīdī attributed the idea to Euclid; Qummī pointed to Plato, so both undoubtedly thought that the idea was long-standing and respected. Calligraphy was codified by Ibn Muqla (885/6–940/1 CE), a vizier at the ʿAbbāsid court. Ibn Muqla&#39;s system can be only tentatively reconstructed from later sources, but it is plausible that he founded his reformed Arabic script on geometry. The basis was the rhombic dot that a reed pen produced. The ʾalif [ا] was to have a height equal to a certain number of dots. Its size defined a circle, which was then used to shape the other letters. The attached images illustrate a later geometric specification. 1/2 #calligraphy #geometry #MathArt #Arabic #aesthetics

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@ajcain@mathstodon.xyz 2026-02-10 11:49

References • Qāḍī Aḥmad. ‘Calligraphers and Painters’. Freer Gallery of Art Occasional Papers, no.3.2. Washington: Smithsonian Institution, 1959. URL: https://archive.org/details/calligrapherspa321959ahma p. 52. • A.J. Cain. ‘Form & Number: A History of Mathematical Beauty’. Lisbon, 2024. URL: https://archive.org/details/cain_formandnumber_ebook_large pp.220–1 • F. Rosenthal. 'Abū Ḥaiyān al-Tawḥīdī on Penmanship'. In: Ars Islamica. 13 (1948), pp.1-30. DOI: 10.2307/4515645 pp.6, 15. • S.H. Nasr. ‘Islamic Art and Spirituality’. State University of New York Press, 1987. ISBN: 978-0-88706-174-5 URL: https://archive.org/details/islamicartspirit0000nasr • M.A.J. Yaghan. 'Mathematical concepts in Arabic calligraphy: The proportions of the ʾAlif'. In: PLoS ONE. 15, no.5 (2020). DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0232641 • Y. Tabbaa. ‘The Transformation of Islamic Art During the Sunni Revival’. Publications on the Near East. Seattle & London: University of Washington Press, 2001. ISBN: 978-0-295-98125-3 p. 37 Images from ‘Form & Number’, figure 7.2. 2/2

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