Abdurahman Jami's Treatise on Music and Its Role in Music Education During the Timurid Period

This article examines Abdurahman Jami’s Risala-i musiqi (Treatise on Music) within the development of music education during the Timurid period, focusing on its structure, the sequence in which musical knowledge is presented, and its educational significance. The study aims to clarify the treatise’s role in teaching musical theory and practice and to explain the progressive organisation of its subject matter. Drawing on the historical and musicological sources cited in the article, the analysis considers Timurid patronage of scholarship and the arts, Alisher Navoi’s initiative in commissioning musical treatises, and Jami’s engagement with earlier scholarly traditions. It examines the relationships among tone (naghma), sound, interval, tetrachord, pentachord, mode, maqom, and rhythm within the sections devoted to ‘ilm-i ta’lif (the theory of composition) and ‘ilm-i iqa‘ (the theory of rhythm). The central analytical focus is the progression from elementary to complex concepts and its contribution to the systematic acquisition of theoretical knowledge. The article also considers the place of ideas concerning music’s effects on human thought, mood, and psychological states. The educational function of Jami’s treatise is explained through its integration of performance practice and theoretical preparation, its accessible presentation of musical concepts, and its development of learners’ knowledge from basic ideas about sound to questions of composition and rhythm. The conclusion identifies the treatise as an important source in the history of music education in the East and argues that its structure and conceptual continuity reflect an established tradition of learning and teaching music.