Analytical catalogue of unpublished Persian treatises by Jalaloddin Davani

The methodical identification of the manuscripts of previous authors is the basis for the scientific correction of their works. Gathering an author's surviving manuscripts and compiling information about them into a personal catalogue is necessary for scholarly editing of the author's whole body of work. The goal of this study is to find manuscripts of Jalaloddin Davani's unpublished treatises, as the majority of his Persian works are treatises that can be discovered in manuscript collections. This will serve as a foundation for the scientific correction of those works. This study presents a report on the unpublished Persian treatises of Davani, based on an extensive review of over a thousand library catalogues in different languages and numerous manuscripts dating from the ninth to the fourteenth centuries A.H. The article employs a comparative method to analyze various catalogues and manuscripts, compiling bibliographic and manuscript information about seven of Davani's unpublished treatises for the first time. Research indicates that there are at least 68 manuscripts of Davani's seven uncorrected treatises worldwide. Of these, 30 manuscripts have already been cataloged in the Union Catalogue of Iran Manuscripts (Fankha). With the addition of 38 newly manuscripts, it is now possible to scientifically correct these treatises using historical, comparative, and critical codicology. This will provide researchers with a revised version of the text. Below are the names of the seven unpublished treatises, along with the number of copies for each:
1- Tohfe-ye rowhani (Divine Souvenir): 52 manuscripts;
2- Noqush-e kabatin-e nard (Dice Combinations in Backgammon): 6 manuscripts;
3- Gowhar-e Iman (The essence of faith): 4 manuscripts;
4- Elm va erade-ye elahi (God's knowledge and will): 2 manuscripts;
5- Aruz-e manzum (Poetic Prosody): 2 manuscripts;
6- Emtena al-hokm ala al-mana al-harfi (Impossibility to Judge about Prepositions): 1 manuscript;
7- Jabr va ekhtiyar (Determinism and Authority): 1 manuscript.