Calligraphy reached a high degree of perfection in the Islamic world, where representational art was spurned and Arabic script offered rich possibilities for creative fantasy (Art of Islam: Language and Meaning, 47).

Oral tradition was paramount among the Arabs in pre-Islamic days, and poets were the memory of their tribe. Then the Arabs felt the need to write down their stories, first simply as an aide-memoire, using only a few signs. With the advent of Islam in the seventh century A.D. writing began to be important because it gave visual form to the word of God. The Qur'an, the first book written

The second line of development was the calligrapher's own imagination. The accepted rules did not exclude innovation. After spending years studying the legacy of his forebears, an artist eventually gave his inspiration free rein; and it was by breaking the rules that he advanced his art.

The traditional classification of the main styles includes in addition to the above Muhaqqaq which is less round than Thuluth; Rayhani which is similar to a small Muhaqqaq; Tawqi which has many ligatures, and a miniature version of it called Riqa' used mostly for personal and informal occasions. All these styles are now obsolete and rarely used.

Thuluth is a more impressive, stately calligraphic style, which was often used for titles or epigrams rather than lengthy texts. Its forms evolved over the centuries, and many variations are found on architectural monuments, as well as on glass, metalwork, textiles, and wood. Mamluk Thuluth of the 14th century was heavy and large, while the Ottomans preferred the simpler more refined version still practiced today (The Cambridge Illustrated History of the Islamic World, 270-272).

Thereafter there were two main schools of calligraphy, that of Ibn al-Bawwab (eleventh century), who improved on Ibn Muqla's procedures, and that of al-Musta'simi (thirteenth century), who improved the calamus by cutting its nib obliquely, thus giving finer upstrokes.

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