Poetry and Prayer: Islamic Manuscripts from the Walters Art Museum

This exhibition showcases masterpieces of illuminated and illustrated manuscripts produced in Islamic lands from the ninth to the nineteenth century.

These irresistible objects of art cover a range of textual genres: devotional, scientific, historical, epic and poetic. In the Islamic book, the primary vehicle for literary and artistic expression, the power of poetry, prayer and visual form collides.

Poetry and Prayer: Islamic Manuscripts at the Walters Art Museum coincides with the initiative to catalogue and make high-resolution digital surrogates of all Islamic manuscripts and single pages preserved at the Walters Art Museum, a project generously funded by a Preservation and Access Grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.