Uthman Quran - History

History

The copy of the Quran is traditionally considered to one of a group commissioned by the third caliph Uthman; however, this attribution has been questioned, although no evidence was proffered. In 651, 19 years after the death of Islamic Porphet Muhammad, Uthman commissioned a committee to produce a standard copy of the text of Quran (see Origin and development of the Quran). Five of these original Qurans were sent to the major Muslim cities of the era, with Uthman keeping one for his own use in Medina. The only other surviving copy is held in Topkapı Palace, in Turkey.

Uthman was succeeded by Ali, who took the Uthman Quran to Kufa, now in Iraq. The following history of the Quran is known only from legends. According to one of them, when Tamerlane destroyed the area, he took the Quran to his capital, Samarkand, as a treasure. According to another, the Quran was brought from the caliph of Rum to Samarkand by Hoja Ahrar, a Turkestan sufi master, as a gift after the curing of the caliph. Though the fact that this manuscript originally belonged to Uthman is highly disputed by scientists.

The Quran remained in Hoja Ahrar Mosque of Samarkand for four centuries until 1869, when Russian general Abramov bought it from the mullahs of the mosque and gave to Turkestan Governor-General Kaufman, which in turn sent the Quran to the Imperial Library in St. Petersburg (now known as the Russian National Library). It attracted great attention from Orientalists and finally the facsimile edition was published in Saint-Petersburg in 1905, though its 50 copies soon became a rarity. The first thorough manuscript's description and dating was made by a Russian Orientalist Shebunin in 1891.

After the October Revolution, Vladimir Lenin, in an act of goodwill to the Muslims of Russia, gave the Quran to the people of Ufa, Bashkortostan. After repeated appeals by the people of Turkestan ASSR, the Quran was returned to Central Asia, to Tashkent, in 1924, where it has since remained.