block printed

Preparation Steps

Original Recipe Text

The ink is applied via Arabic block printing (tarsh). The text layout often includes decorative text headings (p. 190), magic squares containing numbers (p. 199), and series of letters known as 'mysterious letters' (fawātiሖ or ሖurũf al-muqaሒሒaɹāt) (p. 195). Kũfĩ script is frequently used for headpieces, often rendered in reserve (p. 199). In some sophisticated examples, a single line of larger text (e.g., thuluth) is arranged vertically at right angles to the main horizontal text, where the outline of the vertical letters is composed of parts of the horizontal text (p. 199).

Evidence

"In other block prints, (see Figure 7.2) many of which also contain Qurɱanic citations, appear texts whose invocations for divine intervention begin with the word aɹũdhu or uɹĩdhu (‘I seek refuge [in]’ or ‘I invoke’)... and so are clearly meant to be amulets."

Remarks

The author argues that the elaborate nature of block-printed decorations was an attempt to appeal to a cultured, urbane consumer and perhaps to address a weak market for handwritten amulets in the eleventh century (p. 203, 204). The use of Kũfĩ script may have been intended to associate the amulet with the visual power of monumental architectural inscriptions (p. 199). The Gutenberg block print is noted as a unique example exhibiting a linear series of numbers with clearly magical purport (p. 197).