Impact analysis of applying material evidence to Islamic traditions and viewpoints on the origin and development of Arabic script

One of the basic issues in studying the History of Quran, is the script that was used in the Arabia and Arab territories. Discovering the origin and chronology of the developments of this script is considered important in understanding the accessibility of Muslims to proper styles of writing in order to record their holy scripture. The Islamic traditions on the issue constitute of inconsistent and isolated narrations and views. According to these reports Muslim scholars and orientalists have suggested variant hypotheses on the origin and development of the Arabic script. On the other hand in the recent decades with the rise of discovery of material evidence in Arabia and Arab region, paleographers have reached definite conclusions on the beforementioned subject. Among these achievements is the origination of the Arabic script from the Nabatean script, showing that this script has evolved during a period of several hundred years, as well as the fact that the scripture was used 200 years before Islam in different northern areas. The comparative study of the Islamic reports and material evidence, thus, reveals the defects of the reports, in addition to criticizing the alternative theories of Syriac or Southern origins for the Arabic script, lack of proper script for writing in the newly established Islamic nation of Hijaz, as well as the possibility of writing the Quran in other scripts.