Dastoor al-Kateb fi Tayeen al-Marateb

Dastoor al-Kateb fi Tayeen al-Marateb is one the most significant books on the subject of composition and correspondence, in the 8th AH century. The book was once published in 3 volumes, in Moscow, between the years 1964-1976. Recently, the first volume of this book was published again, relying on the previous edition and though the second editor collated it with only one later manuscript, it is reckoned as another critical text of the Dastoor al-Kateb fi Tayeen al-Marateb. The text suffers from the confusion produced by the unfamiliarity of the editor, hasty publishing, and incompetence with the art of text criticism. He makes more confusion by changing the original style of writing practiced by the author, and wished by the editor to retain it as his goal; by alteration of the prose style and the orthography; and by his un-uniformity with reading the variants. The article studies and provides a critical review of this edition.