Manuscripts & inscriptions

Ashoka's edicts cut in the rock of Gandhara, and, before print, every book written by hand: the earliest pothis of the Sikh scripture are among the most precious manuscripts of the Punjab.

TraditionsBuddhist 2Sikh 9Shared & secular 1

Vedas, Alexander and Gandhara

1900 BCE – 1000

Ashoka's rock edicts at Shahbazgarhic. 250 BCE

The Mauryan emperor's edicts on great boulders in Gandhara, in the Kharoshthi script of the north-west: among the oldest writing in the Punjab after the Indus seals.

The Taxila copper plate1st century BCE or CE

A plate inscribed in Kharosthi recording a Buddhist gift by Patika, son of a Scythian satrap of Taxila: one of the few documents of Scythian rule in the Punjab.

The Bakhshali manuscript3rd – 10th century CE (dates disputed)

A mathematical text on seventy leaves of birch bark, dug up by a farmer at Bakhshali near Mardan in 1881. It uses a dot for zero, one of the oldest written zeros known.

Gurus and Mughals

1469 – 1708

The Goindwal Pothisc. 1570s

Two or more volumes of hymns compiled in Guru Amar Das's time at Goindwal, the earliest surviving collections of Sikh scripture and a source for the Adi Granth.

The Vaaran of Bhai Gurdasc. 1600

Forty ballads by the scribe who wrote out the first Sikh scripture for Guru Arjan, traditionally called the key to the Guru Granth Sahib.

The Bhai Banno Bir1604 – 1605

A copy of the Adi Granth made by Bhai Banno, a Sikh of Mangat, who was sent to Lahore to have the Guru's scripture bound and copied it on the way.

The Kartarpur Bir1604

The manuscript of the Adi Granth written out by Bhai Gurdas under Guru Arjan's direction and installed in the Harmandir Sahib in 1604, the original scripture of the Sikhs.

Hukamnamas of the Gurus17th – 18th century

Letters of command written by the later Gurus and their wives to Sikh congregations, asking for offerings, horses and weapons, many bearing the Guru's own hand.

The Zafarnama1705 – 1706

The 'epistle of victory', a letter in Persian verse that Guru Gobind Singh sent to the emperor Aurangzeb after Chamkaur, rebuking him for the oaths his commanders broke at Anandpur.

The Damdami Bir1706

The final edition of the scripture, with Guru Tegh Bahadur's hymns added, completed at Talwandi Sabo with Bhai Mani Singh as scribe. The original is believed lost in the 18th century; every later copy descends from it.

Misls and Afghans

1708 – 1799

The B-40 Janamsakhi1733

An illustrated life of Guru Nanak with 57 paintings by the artist Alam Chand Raj, made in 1733 and one of the finest early examples of Sikh painting.

Early manuscripts of the Dasam Granth18th century

The second scripture of the Sikhs, gathering compositions attributed to Guru Gobind Singh, survives in several 18th-century manuscripts whose contents differ, one reason its compilation is still debated.