Topic
Early Islamic Inscriptions
Inscriptions carved into buildings, coins, milestones, and papyri form a body of evidence distinct from literary and manuscript sources: they are physically fixed, frequently datable by internal reference to a regnal or hijri year, and were not subject to later scribal copying. The Dome of the Rock inscriptions (72 AH / 691–692 CE) are among the earliest and most extensively studied examples.
Content referencing this topic
- Research Paper
The Dome of the Rock Inscriptions and Early Islamic Identity
What the 72 AH Dome of the Rock inscriptions can and cannot tell historians about the state of the Qur'anic text and Islamic religious identity at the end of the first Islamic century.
- Evidence Library
The Dome of the Rock Inscriptions (72 AH / 691–692 CE)
A monumental Kufic inscription band, roughly 240 meters long, running around the interior and exterior arcades of the Dome of the Rock: the earliest securely dated substantial body of Qur'anic-related text.