Calligraphy · a Light

He cut the pen at an angle and changed the letters

Yaqut al-Musta'simi was taken as a boy, probably from Amasya in Anatolia, and became secretary to al-Musta'sim, the last Abbasid caliph in Baghdad. When the Mongols took the city in 1258 he is said to have sheltered in a minaret and gone on practising. His technical contribution was small and consequential: he trimmed the nib of the reed pen to an oblique angle instead of a straight one, which varies the thickness of every stroke as the hand turns and gives the letters their tapering weight. He reworked the six standard scripts on that basis, and for two centuries afterwards calligraphers identified themselves by which of his students they descended from.

Yaqut al-Musta'simi · died 1298 CE