The National Museum since its inception has acquired about 14,000 manuscripts in various languages and scripts, covering a large number of subjects such as history, literature, miniature paintings, art of calligraphy, philosophy, science, biography, geography, genealogy, archaeology, medicines, religious etc. and representing various schools and provinces. The material is valuable for the history and wonderful for containing treasures of art. It covers a long period of more than one thousand years. The earliest manuscript in the collection belongs to the 9th century A.D. Dealing with astrology and written in Sharda script of Kashmir on the birch-bark in Sanskrit, it is a rare specimen of the art of writing. The Bhagavad Gita, a portion of the Mahabharata based on the teachings of Lord Krishna to Arjuna, is the background of all the noble philosophy. It is also considered as the holiest religious text of India. The Bhagavata Purana, one of the 18 prominent Mahapuranas, is popular for Vaishnavism. The museum also has in its possession an important collection of the manuscripts and calligraphy written, illustrated and illuminated by the foreign scholars in India. The museum also possesses some rare manuscripts written, illustrated and illuminated abroad but imported in India by the scholars, poets and others during the Sultanate and Mughal periods. These are scribed on parchment, silk paper and hand made papers (Samarqandi, Khurasani). A few excellent manuscripts are described here for the benefit of visitors. Sahifa dated 1277 contains a collection of prayers scribed in Naskh script, which was the second most popular script of Arabic after Kufic. It was scribed by the last great calligrapher of the Abbasid period, Yaqut Mustasmi. The first two pages are profusely decorated with gold, lapis-lazuly and red stone colours. Black ink has been used for the text, while the headings and full stops are in red. The text is artistically written in gold and blue lines.

Copyright National Museum, NewDelhi(India) .All Rights Reserved. Site design,development and hosting byCEDTI(Mohali)