Earliest Mushaf al-Quran

What is today called the Qur’an was originally a set of oral recitations by Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) over 23 years in various times, places, contexts, and situations.

It was common for the Prophet's companions to memorize these recitations and write some of them down on rocks, leaves, parchment, etc.


Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) never collected the Qur’anic recitations into a single document and never published the Qur’anic recitations as a “book".


It was Abu Bakar, ‘Umar bin Kattab, Zayd bin Thabit who collected the verses of the Qur’an into a codex. Later, Zayd led the project to compile a standardized uniform version of the Qur’an text (mushaf al Quran) under the supervision of Uthman bin Affan (d. 656).


The earliest known manuscripts of the Uthmanic Codex of the Qur’an still in existence till present day are:


1. University of Birmingham Manuscript – carbon dated to the period 568-645 AD. (codex Parisino-petropolitanus)

2. Tubingen University Manuscript – carbon dated to the period 625-673 AD. In November 2014, the University of Tubingen in Germany announced that a partial Hijazi Quran in their possession (Ms M a VI 165), had been carbon dated to between 649 and 675.

3. Sanaa Manuscript – carbon dated with 68% probability to the period 624-656 and 95% probability to the period 578-669 AD. A radiocarbon analysis has dated the parchment containing the lower text to before 671 AD with a 99% accuracy.

4. The Samarkand Kufic Quran (kept in the Hast Imam library, in Tashkent, Uzbekistan) - carbon dated to the period 765 and 855 AD.

5. The Topkapi Quran kept in the Topkapi Palace Museum, Istanbul, Turkey - no carbon dating record

Wallahu'alam