Tashreeh Al Ain (Amatomy of the Eye): Unpublished Persian Illustrated Manuscript Dated 861AH/1451AD

Tashreeh Al Ain (Anatomy of the Eye) is an original unpublished Persian illustrated manuscript by Shams Al Din Mohamed Ibn Al-Hassan Al-Kahal, dated 861 A.H/1451 A.D, and preserved in Qasr Al-Aini, the School of Medicine, Cairo University, History of Medicine Museum, Cairo, Egypt, MS 40, 323 folios, MS 17X11 cm. This MS is embellished with seventy-four (74) fine pictures illuminated in gold, silver and colors, representing the subject of anatomy of eyes and eye diseases. The MS was written by Sadr Al-Din Ahmed Ibn Mahmoud Al-Hussein, in Nasta'lik handwriting in black with red titles, golden frames, one column on a page, from 8 to 11 lines in each page. The painter is unknown.
This MS is of great scientific and artistic value, because it indicates the importance of the medical manuscripts in the Timurid period, especially those which explain eye diseases and the ways of treatment. On the other hand, it testifies to the care taken to explain the meaning of the texts and the main idea by drawing the details of the symptoms for several diseases of eye. In addition, this manuscript testifies to the constant attention to the study of eye anatomy and eye diseases, which can be found throughout the rich history of Persia.
We will focus our attention on the following: (i) a detailed comparative study of the medical manuscripts which pertain to the anatomy of the eye, especially those preserved in the Dar-El-Kutub (The National Library) in Egypt, and highlighting their distinctive traits. (ii) discussion, comparison and clarification of the long road which man has trodden in his fight against eye diseases, as evinced by the MS (iii) a study and a publication of a group of unpublished images to examine the ways for transmitting and transforming medical texts, and the ways in which the painters succeeded in explaining the main medical text.
Finally, medicine and disease have had an undeniable effect on the whole history, and the development of any civilization is measured by the development of the medical science and its ways of dealing with the most common diseases.t.