The Qur’aan was compiled in Madina by Uthman (radhiallahu anhu). He made 7 copies. One is in Topkapi Palace, Istanbul. To prevent disputes he had this definitive version completed in 651.
After his death a copy was taken by Caliph Ali to Iraq. 700 years later, when the Mongol Tamerlane laid waste to Iraq, he took the Qur’aan to Samarkand. It stayed there for 400 years, until the Russians conquered in 1868. They sent it to St Petersburg where it was kept in the Imperial Library. After the Bolshevik revolution, Lenin sent it to Ufa, Bashkortostan. In 1924 it went to Tashkent, Uzbekistan and stayed there since. It is kept in Mui Mubarak Madresa.
⅓ of the original survives - about 250 pages - written on deerskin in the Hejazi script, similar to Kufic.
Earliest Qur’aan
