The cover. Leaf of calligraphy.

摘要

Islam holds that the Qur'an was revealed to Muhammad by the angel Jibril over a period of 23 years, beginning in 610 CE. The Arabic alphabet was standardized in about 786 CE, but since that time Arabic script has varied in style. Unlike the Latin-based alphabet used for writing English, Arabic has no printed form in which letters are written separately. Arabic has only a cursive form, in which the letters are written in streams of closely spaced pen strokes. Cursive writing and the simplicity of forms of the Arabic letters, as compared with Latin-based script, allowed scribes to modulate the contours of the letters for artistic effect. By the 10th century, calligraphers had developed a style of script known as broken cursive to emphasize features such as balance and repetition of the markings on the page. Modulation, balance, and repetition are techniques used by Islamic calligraphers to create text that is prized for its flowing contours and linear tension.