The Book of the Fixed Stars (Ottoman Copy)
Al-Sufi's star atlas, still being copied and used eight centuries later.
- Work
- Kitab suwar al-kawakib al-thabita (Book of the Images of the Fixed Stars)
- Artist / naturalist
- 'Abd al-Rahman al-Sufi
- Origin & date
- Ottoman copy, 18th century (text composed ca. 964 CE)
- Held by
- The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Format
The full-resolution scan, color-managed to the source — yours to print, study, and keep.
Size
$19.00
The story
This 18th-century Ottoman copy of al-Sufi's Book of the Fixed Stars testifies to the text's extraordinary working life — nearly eight centuries after it was first composed in Baghdad, astronomers and scribes were still hand-copying it as a living reference, not a museum curiosity. Al-Sufi's original achievement was to marry Ptolemy's Greek constellation catalogue with his own precise observations of stellar magnitude and color, correcting errors that had accumulated for a thousand years. What to notice: comparing this plate to the 15th-century copy displayed alongside it, the constellation figure and its conventions have barely shifted — a sign of how authoritative and stable the text remained across the Islamic astronomical tradition. It is less a single artwork than a single idea, transmitted and re-inked by hand for eight hundred years, proof that a good star chart never really goes out of date.
About this reproduction
- Faithful reproduction of a public-domain work, sourced from The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s open-access release.
- Printed to order on 200gsm EMA matte art paper: smooth, no glare.
- Color-managed to the source scan.
- Ships in 5–8 business days; satisfaction guarantee.
