Oldest Surviving Manuscript of Imam Malik’s Muwatta’

Early Manuscripts and Fragments of the Muwatta's

Imam Malik's al-muwaṭṭa ' was compiled in the 2nd century AH (8th century CE) and was transmitted by many of his students in slightly variant versions. The very earliest physical evidence of the Muwatta's dates back to Malik’s own lifetime. For example, a papyrus fragment (PERF No. 731) from the Austrian National Library has been dated to the late 2nd century AH (around 795 CE, the time of Malik’s death).

This single-page papyrus contains a portion of the text (from the section Bāb al-Targhīb fī al-Ṣadaqah) and is written in an early angular Arabic script with diacritical marks. Such fragments confirm that written copies of the Muwatta's were in circulation by the late 700s CE, though they are too incomplete to represent the whole work. Other early partial manuscripts include, for instance, a parchment fragment dated 288 AH (901 CE) preserving chapters of Muwatta's as transmitted by ʿAlī ibn ziyad. These early witnesses, however, consist only of fragments or sections – no fully intact copy from the 2nd–4th centuries AH has survived to the present.

Different Transmissions

Currently, there exist sixteen different versions of the Muwatta, of which the most famous is the one transmitted by Yahya ibn Yahya al-Laythi, who studied and received the Muwatta in the last year of Malik’s life. Al-Laythi’s recension is considered the ‘vulgate’ or standard version in the Maliki school of law. The recension of the Muwatta produced by Ahmad ibn Abi Bakr al-Zuhri is approximately five to ten percent larger than the recension of al-Laythi. According to Al-Ghafiqithe total number of hadiths across twelve versions of the Muwatta he analyzed is 666, out of which 97 differ in the different versions of the book, while the rest are common to all the various recensions.

The Oldest Complete Surviving Muwatta's Manuscript

The oldest complete manuscript of the Muwatta's currently known dates to the 5th century AH. Notably, a copy dated 421 AH (approximately 1030 CE) is the earliest surviving Muwatta's manuscript in complete form. This manuscript was copied on gazelle parchment in a beautiful early Andalusi hand, indicating its Maghrebi-Andalusian provenance. According to manuscript experts, the entire text was carefully collated (“ʿuriḍa jamīʿuhu”) with the transmissions of ʿUbayd Allāh ibn Yaḥyā and Muḥammad ibn Waḍḍāḥ. This means the copy was checked against known reliable narrations – in particular, those of ʿUbayd Allāh (a transmitter in Imam Malik’s scholarly lineage, likely the son of the famous narrator Yaḥyā al-Laythī) and of the Cordoban traditionist Ibn Waḍḍāḥ. Collating it with these sources suggests that this manuscript’s contents align with the well-known Yaḥyā ibn Yaḥyā al-Laythī version of the Muwatta'swhich was the dominant recension in al-Andalus and the Maghreb. In other words, the oldest complete copy follows Yaḥyā al-Laythī’s transmission (the most widely received version of Malik’s text) as preserved through the Andalusian scholarly tradition.

Provenance, Location, and Condition

This 421 AH manuscript is preserved in Morocco, in the collection of the al-Hamziya (also known as al-ʿAyāshiyya) Zāwiyah library near Midelt. The al-Hamziya library’s holdings benefit from a dry, protective climate in the Atlas region – a factor that has contributed to their remarkable state of preservation. Reports indicate that the Muwatta's copy of 421 AH is in excellent condition, with its parchment folios largely intact and the script clean and legible. Marginal notes on this manuscript date from as early as 483 AH, showing that later scholars were studying and annotating it in the 11th century. (For comparison, a similarly old Muwatta's manuscript in the Nasiriyya Zāwiyah library of Tamgrout (Zagora, Morocco) – also in Yaḥyā al-Laythī’s recension – suffered some water damage from a historic flood. By contrast, the Midelt (Hamziya) copy has largely been spared such environmental harm.)

Older Versions and Conclusion

No older complete version of the Muwatta's is known to survive in any collection or transmission line. In other words, as of today, the circa 1030 CE manuscript is the earliest fully extant copy of Imam Malik’s work. Any manuscripts older than the 5th century AH exist only in fragmentary form or as a few folios. For example, the papyrus in Vienna from Malik’s own era contains only one sectionand other 3rd–4th century AH finds (such as the 288 AH fragment of ʿAlī ibn Ziyād’s transmission) preserve only portions of the text. These fragments are invaluable for textual history, but they do not constitute complete books. Thus, the oldest complete surviving Muwatta's is the 421 AH manuscript in Morocco, an Andalusian-transmitted copy. It stands as an important witness to the Muwatta's in its entirety, predating any other known full manuscript of Malik’s compilation.

Sources: The 421 AH Muwatta's manuscript (Yahyā al-Laythī’s version) is held at the al-ʿAyāshiyya (al-Hamziya) library in Midelt, Morocco. Its text was verified against transmissions of ʿUbayd Allāh b. Yaḥyā and Muḥammad b. worn. Earlier fragments include PERF no.731 in the Austrian National Library (dated to 179 AH / 795 CE) and a parchment from 288 AH preserving part of ʿAlī b. Ziyād’s Muwatta's narration, among others. These confirm the Muwatta's’s early transmission but are only partial, whereas no older complete manuscript is extant before the 5th-century copy described above.

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