Al-Fatawa Al-Zahiriya Part II: A 13th-Century Islamic Legal Manuscript

Qatar National Library provides a high-resolution digital master copy of manuscript HC.MS.00800 from its Heritage Collection. The manuscript is titled 'Al-Fatawa Al-Zahiriya Part II' and was authored by Zahir al-Din Muhammad bin Ahmad bin 'Umar al-Bukhari Abu Bakr in 1222 AH (1807 CE). The 8.9 GB ZIP file was last updated on June 3, 2026.

Use Cases

• Train Optical Character Recognition (OCR) models for classical Arabic script based on high-resolution manuscript images.
• Analyze the structure and content of historical Islamic legal rulings (fatwas) based on the manuscript's described subject.
• Conduct textual analysis on classical Arabic legal terminology and arguments from the provided text content.
• Digitally preserve and archive a historical cultural artifact for long-term scholarly access based on the high-resolution master copy.

Strengths

• High-resolution digital master copy ensures clarity for detailed study.
• Direct provenance from Qatar National Library's Heritage Collection provides authoritative sourcing.
• The manuscript is clearly dated to 1222 AH (1807 CE), providing a specific historical context.
• Released under a permissive CC0-1.0 public domain dedication license.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• The description lacks details on the manuscript's physical condition, page count, or specific script style.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment for quantitative tasks.

Provenance

Source

Qatar National Library Heritage Collection, manuscript HC.MS.00800.

Collection Method

Digitization of a physical manuscript.

Time Range

Authored in 1222 AH (1807 CE).

Freshness

Last updated 2026-06-03 06:41:44; freshness should be verified.