Thread by @CellardEleonore

Thread : Diacritics in early Qur’ān manuscripts.
1/6. I recently read : « The Hijazi script has no diacritical signs » (Mraizika, "Le Coran décrée"). I intend to show evidences against this theory and give a brief overview of practices of putting diacritics in early Qur’ān mss

2/6. Generally, diacritics are added in the same ink as the rasm, by the copyist. In Hijazi mss, they are sparsely added and seem to be a matter of copyists. In the Codex Parisino-Petropolitanus, each copyist (event E, the less skilled of the group) add more or less diacritics.

3/6.Their use increases quickly during the 2nd century H. But we still find more diacritics in small copies, as Codex Amrensis 1, than in large mss. Is it related to the function of the mss? Surprisingly, around the end of 2nd cent. H., diacritics almost disappear as in C.III mss

4/6 The rules of positioning diacritics are already fixed in the 1st cent. H., except for fā’ and qāf. Here, we find 2 ways of dotting, used at least since the 2nd H. Note that the 2 ways are related to scripts styles, as only A script uses the 2nd one. Perhaps a regional marker?

5/6. The A script shows in early stages a lot of irregularities in the system. Some are perhaps without consequences, as šin with 4 dots or other strange practices. Other could be significant, as the 2 diacritics associated with lam-alif, which I still question its exact function

6/6. A special attention should be paid to the diacritics used for prefixes in verbs conjugation in imperfect. They are often missing in Hijazi mss, but more frequent in early hybrid hijazi/kufic mss, with a general tendency to diacritize the prefixe as a ta, whatever the context