Pages of Ancient Koran Among Oldest Yet Discovered
Manuscript found by student may date to Islam’s earliest era.
Two pages of an ancient Koran have been discovered hiding in plain sight at the University of Birmingham’s Cadbury Research Library in the United Kingdom. The pages date to between A.D. 568 and A.D. 645, making them among the oldest Koran manuscripts yet discovered.
“If the dating is correct, then we are taken back to maybe 20 years from the period in which the foundational events of Islam were taking place,” David Thomas, a professor of Christianity and Islam at the University of Birmingham, said in an interview.
Graduate student Alba Fedeli discovered the ancient pages inside a slightly newer manuscript in the university’s collection of Middle Eastern texts. The leaves, Thomas said, came to the library sometime in the
