‎Golf‎

‎[Soviet General Staff Maps] - Arabian Peninsula 1:200,000.‎

‎General'nyí shtab. (Arabian Peninsula 1:200,000). [Moscow, General Staff], 1975-1991.‎

‎A total of 382 topographic maps, colour-printed, ca. 58 x 45 cm. Constant ratio linear horizontal scale. In Russian (Cyrillic). Most of the Soviet Union's 1:200,000 General Staff map quadrangles showing the Arabian Peninsula: from the Russian series of maps produced during the Cold War, based on high-quality satellite imagery, but usually also ground reconnaissance. While there are a few lacunae in the eastern and central part of the Peninsula, mainly concerning Oman and the UAE, and a few Saudi Arabian quadrangles are lacking, most of the area is well-covered. Assembled continuously, the quadrangles would form an enormous map spanning ca. 13 x 11 metres!. - Products of a massive, clandestine cartographic project begun under Stalin and ultimately encompassing the entire globe, the Soviet General Staff maps are today noted for their extreme precision. Indeed, even in post-Soviet times they provide the most reliable mapping for many remoter parts of the world: "Soviet-era military maps were so good that when the United States first invaded Afghanistan in late 2001, American pilots relied on old Russian maps of Afghanistan. For almost a month after the United States began a bombing campaign to help oust the Taliban government, American pilots were guided by Russian maps dating back to the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s" (Davies/Kent, p. xi). - Although the details of the cartographic programme evolved over the decades, its overall system and plan remained remarkably constant. "The basic quadrangle is the 1:1,000,000 sheet spanning 4° latitude by 6° longitude [...] Each 1:1,000,000 sheet is [...] subdivided into 36 1:200,000 sheets in a six-by-six grid [... They] normally contain on the reverse side a detailed written description of the districts (towns, communications, topography, geology, hydrology, vegetation, and climate) together with a geological sketch map" (ibid., p. 19-21). "Printing such large-format plans in so many colors with near-perfect print registration itself testifies to the skill of the printers in the military map printing factories across the former Soviet Union. The quality of printing reflects the level of training and the reliability of humidity-control equipment and the electricity supply at the time" (ibid., p. 6f.). - The 1:200,000-scale maps are specifically labelled "For Offical Use". Indeed, all General Staff maps de facto constituted closely guarded military material, none of which became available in the West before the end of the Cold War in the early 1990s. - Light traces of folds, occasional wrinkles and a few odd edge flaws, but altogether in excellent condition. Cf. J. Davies / A. J. Kent, The Red Atlas (Chicago/London, 2017).‎

‎[Alf layla wa-layla]. Cherbonneau, A[uguste] (ed.).‎

‎[Qissat Shams al-Din wa-Nur al-Din]. Histoire de Chems-Eddine et Nour-Eddine, extraite des Mille et une nuits. Paris, Imprimerie nationale / L. Hachette & Cie., 1852.‎

‎8vo. VI, (7)-69, (1) pp. Publisher's original green printed wrappers. First edition of the story of Nur al-Din and Shams al-Din, edited by the French oriental scholar (Jacques-)Auguste Cherbonneau (1813-82), professor at the Collège Arabe Française in Algier. Arabic text with French notes. - Well preserved. Chauvin VI, 102, no. 270, 2. OCLC 4432899.‎

‎[Arabian Peninsula and India].‎

‎Südwest-Asien. 1:5,000,000. Grundlage: Stielers Handatlas. Gotha, Justus Perthes, 1942.‎

‎117 x 78 cm. Constant ratio linear horizontal scale: 1:5,000,000. Relief shown by hachures, contours, and spot heights. Depth shown by soundings. Loosely stored within printer wrappers. Third edition of this German wartime map of the Middle East, parts of Asia, and India, first published thus in 1940. Based on "Stielers Handatlas" and issued within Perthes' "Ubique terrarum" series (no. 20). - In excellent state of preservation, detached from its original wrappers. OCLC 164843864.‎

‎Baignieres, Paul de / Abou Naddara.‎

‎L'Égypte Satirique. Album d'Abou Naddara, illustré de 48 pages de gravues. Les deux affreux tyrans du Nil, Tewfik et son père Ismail. Vision du Cheikh Abou Naddara. Conférences: l'Egypte au xixe siècle, l'invasion anglaise, le mahdi. Paris, Lefebvre, 1886.‎

‎8vo (170 x 253 mm). 38, (2), 112 pp. With a wood-engraved portrait of Abou Naddara and numerous illustrations. Modern marbled half calf with gilt-stamped spine. Silk divider. Inscribed to Paul Leclerc, "ami de l'Égypte, hommage respectueux du Cheikh Abou Naddara", also signed in Arabic. - "Abou Naddara" was the first Arabic magazine to feature cartoons (with captions in French and Arabic), as well as the first work to use in the press a form of colloquial Arabic, radically different from the literary form. - The Egyptian journalist James Sanua ("Ya'qub Rufa'il Sanu'" in Arabic, but usually known simply by his pseudonym, Abou Naddara, "father of spectacles") was born into a family of Sephardic Jews in Cairo. He played an important role in the development of the Arabic theatre in the 1870s, but it was as a satirical journalist that he became best known, targeting the Khedive as well as the British interlopers. He founded the satirical magazine "Abou Naddara" in 1877, which immediately enjoyed a broad appeal and was quickly suppressed; of the 15 issues that appeared between March and April 1877, no copies are known. Sanua went into exile in 1878, but his celebrated journal, reproduced lithographically from manuscript in Arabic and French, continued to appear, printed in Paris at a shop aptly located in the Passage du Caire in the 2e arrondissement. Within Egypt, where the magazine's smaller format allowed it to be smuggled inside other larger newspapers, its circulation was considerable, with possibly over 3000 copies of each issue printed. There is evidence of its presence in the highest echelons of Egyptian society, and its content focused on the political and financial turmoil in Egypt, as Sanua was undoubtedly privy to information from friends and informants well-placed inside administrative circles. - Extremely rare. Loosely inserted is a folded original issue of the "Journal Oriental" ("Directeur & Rédacteur en chef: J. Sanua Abou Naddara"), no. 8, dated 25 September 1886 (entirely lithographed in Arabic). OCLC 25737746.‎

‎[Biblia turcica - NT - Actus, Epistulae, Apocalypsis].‎

‎Turkish translation of the New Testament. Secretarial manuscript with Ali Ufki Bey's autograph annotations. (Constantinople, 1665).‎

‎4to (160 x 214 mm). (80), (4 blank), (32), (4 blank), (19), (1 blank), (13), (1 blank), (81), (1 blank) leaves. Contemporary full calf with cover borders ruled in gilt and prettily gilt spine. All edges gilt. Considered lost: a volume of Ali Ufki Bey's famous Bible translation, "the lineal ancestor of today’s Turkish Bible" (Privratsky), the last manuscript in private hands. - A project born of Protestant disappointment with the outcome of the 30 Years' War, the 17th century enterprise to translate the Bible into Turkish was informed by Christian eschatological hopes that Protestantism and Islam might form a political alliance to defeat the common enemy, idolatrous Catholicism, and bring about world peace. To advance this cause, the Czech-born educator John Amos Comenius championed a Turkish translation of the Holy Scripture, whose power alone, it was assumed, would soon convert the Muslim world to Christianity. Enjoying financial backing from the wealthy arms dealer Laurens de Geer and the academic support of Jacob Golius, professor of Turkish at Leiden, Comenius's venture was entrusted to the Dutch ambassador in Constantinople, Levinus Warner. - Though himself proficient in Turkish, Warner chose to contract a translator rather than perform the arduous task himself. After his first recruit, the Jewish dragoman Hâki (Yahya bin Isaak), delivered a manuscript version around 1661 which was found deficient, Warner in 1662 entrusted the work to Ali Ufki Bey, a talented linguist and former servant of the Sultan's. Born Wojciech Bobowski in Lwów around 1610, he had been captured by Tatars as a young man, sold into Ottoman slavery, and given the name Ali. He subsequently served at the Topkapi Palace as a respected musician and translator for about 20 years, eventually gaining his freedom in 1657. - Ali Bey completed his task in December 1664; in 1665 he then proceeded to have a few fair copies produced under his supervision. One of these, in 5 volumes, is very nearly complete; another contains only Isaiah and several books of the Apocrypha. These copies, sent to Golius together with Ali Bey's rough draft in four volumes, today form part of the Warner Collection at Leiden University Library. - Only in 1888 did the Leiden Library accession an additional manuscript copy (Cod. Or. 3100), containing part of the New Testament in the hand of one of Ali's secretaries, with interlinear and marginal corrections by Ali Bey himself. The present volume is the missing part of this New Testament copy, comprising Acts, Romans, Philippians, 1 & 2 Thessalonians, Hebrews, James, 1 & 2 Peter, 1-3 John, Jude, and Revelation. Written under Ali Bey's direction and copied from his personal draft, it, too, contains marginalia and corrections in his own hand (we thank Dr Arnoud Vrolijk, curator of the Warner collection, for his kind confirmation). - Ali Bey's translation, aimed at Muslims as a target audience and full of popular Islamic cultural references, did not find favour with Golius and his colleagues. After Warner, de Geer, and Golius all died in quick succession between 1665 and 1667, the Turkish Bible project ground to a halt, in spite of the fact that Ali Bey was anxious to continue it. Not until 1819 would the New Testament alone be published in a revision of his translation (in Paris), and only eight years later would Ali Bey's entire Turkish Bible see print. A critical edition of his manuscript is still outstanding, and there is ample material for research. It remains unknown from what language Bobowski translated the Bible: "A study of Ali Bey's spellings of proper names, e.g. Petro, Se’mun, Filipo, Pilato, could reveal much about his connections with Christian tradition. Several of these are Italian spellings and suggest a Catholic connection. The fact that Ali Bey refers to St John the Baptist as Yuhanna Ma’madant, a Christian construction of John’s name in Arabic, suggests that he was in contact with the Oriental churches also, perhaps the Syrian Orthodox Church” (Privratsky, p. 19f.). - Provenance: early 18th century autograph ownership of the Hamburg theologian Johann Friedrich Winckler (1679-1738), professor of theology in Hamburg, on the title-page, and successive ownership of the Dutch theologian and orientalist Hendrik Sypkens (1736-1812) below. Subsequently owned by Nicolaus Wilhelm Schroeder (1721-98), professor of oriental languages at Groningen, and sold as no. 24 of his estate auction by van Boekeren in 1835. Purchased in the 1960s from Wrister's bookshop (Utrecht) by a Dutch theologian and acquired from him directly. Pars altera bibliothecae Schroederianae (Groningen 1834), p. 6, no. 24. Cf. Bruce Privratsky, A History of Turkish Bible Translations, v. S (2014), pp. 18-26. Darlow/Moule 9453 (the 1819 printed NT).‎

‎Blackwell, Eric.‎

‎Cairo to Bagdad. Egypt, Syria, Arabia, Iraq and other places, 1919].‎

‎Oblong 4to. Album with 148 small original black and white photographs on 18 ff. Contemporary giltstamped full cloth with printed title and 2 silhouette images. Extremley rare photographs from the first successful motor crossing of the desert from Damascus to Baghdad in 1919, preceding by four years the well-known efforts by the Nairn brothers, which resulted in the establishment of the overland mail service between Damascus and Baghdad. The photographs were taken by the 18-year old Eric Blackwell, who had planned to enlist as a pupil pilot in the RAF, had his training cut short by the Armistice, and decided instead to volunteer for the projected desert expedition. Carried out by a military convoy of 10 Model T Fords and some 15 men under the command of Lt. Col. Keeling, the aim of the expedition was to set up a chain of whitewashed stone markers to aid the pilots of an air mail service between the eastern Mediterranean and India, cutting out the lengthy Suez-Aden-Bombay sea route. - The photographs document the journey from Cairo to Haifa by train, then on to Damascus on established roads, up to the expedition's last outpost before the open desert, Dumair. The following pictures show the men setting up the stone signs, repairing their vehicles, sometimes having to push them forward (a total of six Fords had to be abandoned along the way), posing for group pictures, and travelling through the vast desert landscape, stops along the way including Abu Kamal, Ana, Ramadi and Fallujah, before reaching Baghdad, and going on to the ruins of Babylon, Basra, Bombay, Aden, and Suez. - Photographs are mounted in groups, with captions in English. Enclosed is an envelope containing seven loose photographs torn from the album, as well as a brief typewritten account of the journey, and correspondence relating to the loan of photographs for a magazine article, referring to it as a "grand trip". - Extremities lightly bumped. A few photographs loose; traces of photographs torn away in places. Impressive visual material of this little-known epic journey. Cf. Aramco World July/August 1981, vol. 32, nr. 4.‎

‎[Farasnama].‎

‎Farasnama [The Coloured Book of Horses]. Hippiatric manuscript. India, ca. 1800.‎

‎Tall 8vo (150 x 246 mm). Persian manuscript on sturdy cream paper. 254 (instead of 264) ff., 15 lines per extensum, paginated by later hands (lacking pp. 35-42 and 45-46; pp. 43-44 transposed after p. 30). Cursive nasta'liq calligraphy in black ink, catchwords in red. Illustrated with 56 (instead of 77) coloured horse drawings in the text (numbered in pencil by a later hand). Later illustrated binding with black leather spine and lacquered wooden boards with coloured floral designs. A late 18th century Indian manuscript copy of a celebrated treatise on horsemanship, the "Farasnama" ("The Coloured Book of Horses"). Constituting a Persian translation of the Sanskrit "Salihotra", its topics include horse-breeding, grazing, dressage, veterinary advice and horseracing. - The "Salihotra" is attributed to Durgarasi, son of Surgarasi, who is believed to have composed it for Mahmud Ghaznavi (d. 1030). A note on p. 2 of the present manuscript indicates that the text was translated from Sanskrit into Persian during the reign of Shah Jahan (d. 1666); other traditions give credit to 'Abdullah bin Safi, who was active under the earlier reign of Bahmanid ruler Ahmad Shah Wali (d. 1436). The present manuscript contains numerous coloured drawings of thoroughbred horses, along with observations on their salient traits, the illnesses to which they are prone, and prescriptions for their treatment. Their execution is an interesting illustration of the iconoclastic tendencies characterising painting under the later Mughal emperors. - Occasional slight traces of worming; some waterstaining to margins; some leaves remargined by an early owner. In spite of the loss of five leaves that would have contained an additional 21 horse illustrations, a fine manuscript in an attractive illustrated lacquer binding.‎

‎Hatifi, 'Abdallah.‎

‎Timur-nama [The History of Timur]. Herat, Khorasan (Eastern Persia, now Afghanistan), [1569 CE =] 977 H.‎

‎4to (170 x 240 mm). Persian manuscript on polished paper. 137 (instead of 143) ff. (lacking ff. 97-102) in elegant black nasta'liq script, 14 lines, 2 columns. With an illuminated shamsa on fol. 1r (specifying the name of the sponsor Khawaja Nasir as well as the place and date of production) and an illuminated 'unwan headpiece on fol. 1v. Light brown full morocco with blindstamped borders, corners and central ornaments. An elegantly executed Eastern Persian manuscript that chronicles the epic life and victories of one of history's most famous emperors and military leaders, Timur Leng (Tamerlane), from his birth near Samarqand in modern-day Uzbekistan in 1336. "Certainly the most famous of Hatefi’s poems [... The work] extols Timur’s deeds in accordance with the main works of Timurid historiography such as Sharaf-al-Din Yazdi's Zafar-nama [...] Hatefi’s Timur-nama became a model for subsequent poems. It certainly introduced a new genre which was developed further by Hatefi himself [...] Written in 1498, the Timur-nama has been published twice in India (1869, 1958)" (Encyclopaedia Iranica XII, 55-57). - Abdallah Hatefi (Hatifi) was the nephew of 'Abd-al-Rahman Jami, one of the greatest Persian poets and composers of Sufi mystical works. The Timur-nama, modeled after Nizami's "Iskandar-nama", appears to be his only completed work. The oldest extant copy was completed the year after Hatifi's death, 927 H (1521 CE), and was stored in the India Office Library. - Descended from the Mongol hordes of Genghis Khan, Timur participated in various military campaigns from a young age, and his victories quickly made him known as a highly skilled military leader. After a decade of internal political wrangling, he became ruler of the Timurid Empire in 1369. For the next 35 years, until his death in 1405, Timur continued to lead a number of great expeditions and wars; his conquests stretched as far west as Baghdad and the Black Sea, the shores of the Arabian Gulf, and far into modern Afghanistan and northwestern India; he took Herat, where this manuscript is written, in 1381. Timur began military campaigns against the Ottoman ruler Bayezid I and the Mamluks in Syria, as well as expeditions to Armenia and Georgia. His final campaign was in the winter of 1404, but he was stricken with fever and plague and died in February of the following year. His line continued through the glory of the Timurid period under his direct descendants, including Babur (1483-1531), the famous founder of the Mughal dynasty in India, who continued to rule until 1857. - An beautiful manuscript containing an illuminated headpiece of the greatest refinement; the illuminated border of the shamsah on fol. 1r. is a hallmark of Herati work. Surrounding the shamsa are several stamped waqf seals and various inscriptions by previous owners; fol. 140v has an inscription by Muhammad Taqi Qarakuzlu, dated 1237 H (1821 CE). - Provenance: Arts of the Islamic World, Sotheby's, 5 April 2006, lot 30. Sam Fogg, 2009.‎

‎Hyde, Thomas.‎

‎Mandragorias, seu Historia Shahiludii, viz. ejusdem origo, antiquitas, ususque per totum Orientem celeberrimus. Oxford, Theatro Sheldoniano, 1694.‎

‎8vo. 3 parts in one volume. (72), 184, (4), 71, (1), (14), 278 pp. With 12 engravings in the text, 3 folding plates and several woodcuts. 19th century mottled boards, spine ruled in gilt, titled in gilt on black leather spine label. All edges speckled. First edition of this important work dedicated to oriental games from Arabia and Persia as well as from India and China, including backgammon, draughts and dice. Includes the first scholarly account devoted to the history of chess, as well as Asian board games from Arabia, Persia, India, and China, including backgammon, draughts, and dice. Two folding plates illustrate chessboards; further in-text illustrations show the various types of game pieces in Caxton-era England, Turkey, and India. The second and third parts explain the history of dice and many other Chinese games. - Contains numerous texts in Hebrew, Chinese, Arabic, Greek, and other languages. "Ouvrage curieux. Les exemplaires n'en sont pas communs" (Brunet). Hyde was an orientalist and later became Bodleian Librarian. - Binding lightly rubbed at extremities, outer front hinge splitting, small paper library label on lower spine. Paper repair to top right edge of front free endpaper and to reverse of largest folding plate. Interior gently toned, edges of folding plates lightly rubbed, a few inked and penciled notes on front endpapers. Graesse III, 403. Von der Linde I, 88-90. Cordier (Sinica) 3142. Wing H3875 & H3877. ESTC R1348.‎

‎Kiepert, Heinrich.‎

‎Specialkarte vom westlichen Kleinasien. Berlin, Dietrich Reimer, 1890.‎

‎Folio (365 x 545 mm). 14 (instead of 15) maps (lacking no. 11). Contemporary black half-leather binding over brown cloth. Kiepert's map of the western part of Asia Minor: the personal copy of Paul Gaudin, the archaeologist and engineer in charge of the completion of the Hejaz railway. - In the margins, the numbers of the adjacent maps are written in blue pencil. On maps VIII and IX the route of the railway line as well as the names and numbers of the stations between Alasehir/Philadelphia and Karahissâr/Afiûn were added by Gaudin in red ink. - Binding rubbed. Interior in good general condition despite some minor soiling, tears and pinholes. Also included are maps of Turkey, drawn on tracing paper, showing the route of the Smyrna-Panderma and Smyrna-Afion/Karahissar railway lines. - Provenance: from the library of the archaeologist, collector and railway engineer Paul Gaudin (1858-1921), in charge of the completion of the Hejaz railway in the first decade of the 20th century and later a major donor to the Louvre Museum. OCLC 32646128.‎

‎[Mesopotamia].‎

‎Photograph album of Iraq, the Arabian Gulf, and the Red Sea. [Middle East, ca. 1914].‎

‎Oblong 4to (ca. 215 x 167 mm). 103 original photographs (ca. 40 x 58 to 53 x 78 mm), mounted under grey paper mattes with rectangular, oval, and circular windows on 24 cardboard pages. Captioned in English. Bound in contemporary blindstamped full cloth with giltstamped cover title "Photographs". Private photo album composed by a British soldier or engineer active during the Mesopotamian Campaign of the First World War. It contains not only pictures of landmarks like the Baghdad railway station, the British Residency, the Abu Hanifa Mosque in Baghdad, and the Whiteley Bridge in Basra, as well as street and river scenes, but also shows the military aircraft of the Entente (frequently after a crash), as well as portraits of pilots and the collector's comrades, including two lieutenants resting on a blanket in a meadow. Other motifs include more sinister themes such as the gallows on the Baghdad market square, but also a group of smiling soldiers bathing in the Gulf of Aden, the shorelines of Kut al Amarah and Kurnah, the Arabian Gulf, and the Red Sea. - With round green pagination labels. Album produced by W. Johnson & Sons in London. Binding slightly rubbed. Occasional traces of glue; a few marginal tears; the paper pasted on the cardboard loosened in places.‎

‎Muhammad Atma Omar Mode Homa Faqih Camal.‎

‎[Book of Shafiism]. [Probably Ottoman Arabia], [1806/07 CE =] 1221 H.‎

‎Folio (245 x 326 mm). 202 pp. Arabic manuscript written in Ruq'ah script. Single column, 11 lines, with extensive glosses above, outside, and interlinear. Black ink, emphases (name of Allah) in red. An annotated sketch of the Kaaba on one page; occasional small ornaments. Contemporary blind-stamped decorated binding. An early 19th century summary of the principles and tenets of the Shafi'i school of Sunni Islam, as laid down by Al-Shafi'i in the 9th century, with extensive examples, written in six parts (with a total of 44 chapters) on Taharah (purity), Salah (prayer), Funeral, Zakat (alms), Fasting, and the Hajj. The glosses comprise verses from the Qur'an, hadiths, prayers, instructional matter, and brief naratives. - Contents: the book of Taharah (purity) discusses the rules of cleanliness, with chapters on water (cleansing, ablution, washing the dead, tayammum), miswak (how and when to use water), wudu (detailed obligations), masah (wiping), how to use the toilet, recommended times for performing ghusl (full ablution), tayammum, najis (unclean foods), etc. - The book of Salah discusses the duty of prayer, prayer times, details of how to perform prayer, the duties of the Imam, the differences in prayer for men and women, how to dress, difference in private parts for men and women; circumstances that invalidate a prayer, etc. - The book of Funeral discusses how to treat the dead and dying, bathing and shrouding the deceased, the requirements and procedures of funeral prayer, burial, condolences and lamentations. - The book of Zakat (obligatory alms) discusses to whom and how zakat should be given, with the various types of zakat: money, land property, precious metals; but also zakat al-fitr (Breaking the Fast of Ramadan) and sadaqah (voluntary charity). - The book of Fasting discusses the duties of fasting, what those should do who cannot fast, and circumstances that invalidate the fast. - The book of Hajj (pilgrimage to Mecca) distinguishes hajj (the major pilgrimage: fard, obligatory) and umrah (the minor pilgrimage: sunnah, traditional). Various chapters discuss the time of the hajj, Ihram (the sacred state into which a Muslim must enter in order to perform the pilgrimage), and a pilgrim's duties on the hajj. This part, perhaps the most striking point of the study, includes an annotated sketch of the Kaaba that indicates "The gate of the Kaaba", "The Rukn al-Yamani" (Yemeni Corner), "The Rukn al-'Iraqi" (Iraqi Corner), "The Hajar al-Aswad" (Black Stone), "Al Multazam" (a place where prayer is acceptable), "Maqam Ibrahim" (the station of the Prophet Abraham), "The Rukn ush-Shami" (Levantine Corner), and " The Shadherwaan" (a structure built to protect the foundation of the Kaaba from rain water). - Various notes on the first and last page of the manuscript: verses from the Qur'an at the beginning, according to tradition, and expressions of reverence for the Shafi'i scholar Imam al Haramayn (the master of the holy cities Mecca and Medina) at the end, also indicating the author of the work. Some leaves loosened; some edge flaws and brownstaining, mainly confined to the edges as margins; altogether very well preserved. Cf. Muhammad ibn Idris Shafi'i & Majid Khadduri. Islamic Jurisprudence: Shafi'i's Risala (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1961).‎

‎[Palestine - Railroads].‎

‎Photograph album of Palestine during and after the First World War. [Palestine, 1916-1922].‎

‎4to. (25) ff., (7) blank ff. With 100 black and white photographs of various sizes (between ca. 75 x 105 and 90 x 145 mm), 96 of which mounted, 4 loosely inserted. A few captioned in ink on the photograph or on verso. With original hand-drawn map of Palestine in ink, crayon and ballpoint on graph paper loosely inserted. Contemporary giltstamped half cloth with a mounted reproduced drawing to lower board, showing an elegantly dressed group of people. Private photo album composed by a British engineer stationed in El Qantara, Egypt, possibly a member of the Royal Engineers, who constructed a new railway from Qantara to Romani and eastward through the Sinai to El Arish and Rafa on the border of the Ottoman Empire in January 1916. During World War I, Kantara, as it was referred to by the Allied troops, was the site of Headquarters No. 3 Section, Canal Defences and Headquarters Eastern Force during the latter stages of the Defence of the Suez Canal Campaign and the Sinai Campaign of 1916. The massive distribution warehouse and hospital centre supported and supplied all British, Australian and New Zealand operations in the Sinai from 1916 until final demobilization in 1919. - Taken on trips to Palestine between 1916 and 1922, half of the photographs focus on railroad motifs, exhibiting railway bridges, including the bridge crossing the Suez Canal in El Qantara, train stations, and tracks under construction, as well as rather spectacular accidents with locomotives and waggons fallen over in the desert. One picture depicts a decorated train of British soldiers bearing the sign "Demob special goodbye" leaving after the Armistice. The other half mainly shows views of Jerusalem, including close-ups of landmarks such as the Tombs of the Kings and the interior of Ascension Church, as well as steam ships in the Suez Canal and a "Turkish Gun". Although not identified by name, the engineer can be seen posing in several photographs, sometimes wearing a British uniform. The manuscript map shows the railway line from Qantara to major cities including Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Haifa, and Nazareth, at one point crossing into Syria and reaching Beirut. - Hinges broken; extremities slightly rubbed; crack on spine measuring ca. 5 cm. A few photos as well as the map with small marginal tears and creases. Bookplate of the British businessman and railroad enthusiast William Hepburn McAlpine (1936-2018), and stamp of ownership of Arthur Lord-Castle, who was associated with the Narrow Gauge Railway Society in 1956, to front pastedown. A unique survival.‎

‎Rakbani, Omar al-.‎

‎Kitab rihlat alsayf: Rihlat al-Hijâz [The Book of Summer Trips: Journey in Hejaz]. Tunis, Tlili Press, 1947 CE = 1316 H.‎

‎8vo (148 x 206 mm). 56 pp. Original printed pink wrappers. Omar Rakbani (1904-62), a professor at Ez-Zitouna University, was a Tunisian historian and tutor of Muslim girls. Fond of travelling, he published several accounts of his journeys through Europe, North Africa and the East in a series entitled "Summer Trips". This sixth booklet in the series is devoted to his visit to the Hejaz in 1947, when he performed the Hajj to Mecca. - Slight fraying to wrappers; slight waterstain. Extremely rare: a single copy in OCLC (National Library of the Kingdom of Morocco, Rabat). OCLC 929787399.‎

‎Sayyid Efendi Muhammad / Mohammed Brugsch (ed.).‎

‎[Ad-Durra al-'abbasiyya]. Die abbasidische Perle. (Ein Katechismus für ägyptische Schulen). Heidelberg, Julius Groos, 1925.‎

‎8vo. IV, 46 ff., 70 pp. (= counted as a total of 116 pp.), 1 blank page. Original coloured paper boards with printed cover label. Only Geman edition (published in German and Arabic parallel text) of this brief catechism of the tenets of Islam, written by Sayyid Muhammad, professor of Arabic in Nazareth and first published in Cairo (al-Matba'ah al-Kubra al-Amiriyah) in 1911. The German translation and vocalisation as well as the word index are by Mohammed Ibn-Brugsch (1860-1929). Includes a preface by Sadr-ad-Din, the Imam of the mosque in Berlin-Wilmersdorf. - Published as vol. 1/3 within the series "Der islamische Orient, 2e Abt.: Arabische Schriften, E. Religion und Ethik". Extremely rare: only two copies known in libraries internationally (Basel and Leiden universities). - Appealingly bound in the style of the famous Insel Bücherei. An immaculate copy from the collection of Friedrich Pfitzner with his exlibris stamp to the title-page. OCLC 604591995.‎

‎Arab Bureau, Baghdad.‎

‎Arab Tribes of the Baghdad Wilayat. Calcutta, Superintendent Government Printing, 1919.‎

‎Folio (212 x 335 mm). (2), 276, IX, (1) pp., final blank, with one folding plate (counted as p. 152). Contemporary half cloth with original printed boards, issued thus. Gertrude Bell's personal copy of this excessively rare manual on the social, political and economic structures of the Arab tribes living in the Baghdad Vilayet (Province) as drawn up in July 1918, only months before the partitioning of the Ottoman Empire ended the old administrative divisions and led to the formation of several new states - indeed, to the creation of the modern Arab world. - Arranged alphabetically by the names of the tribes, this handbook - essentially a carefully compiled and redacted British intelligence file printed for the use of British Political Officers and their assistants in a region then undergoing dramatic upheavals - offers surprisingly detailed information on the tribes' origins, loyalties and internal quarrels, the locations of their settlements, strength of their possessions, economic and bargaining power, as well as their kinships, often including genealogical tables. The names of the tribes' leaders are given in full, frequently also in the original Arabic. - Gertrude Bell (1868-1926), who had firsthand experience among the tribes, signed her name in pencil ("Gertrude Lowthian Bell") on the front free endpaper. Several neatly pencilled additions to some of the entries are likewise in her hand: next to the name Fahad ibn Hadhdal she notes that he died and the name of a "rival" (this underlined), apparently a "bin Dughaiyin" (p. 16). In another entry she notes that Jazza' ibn Mijlad "blockaded Turks in North for allies in 1st war" (p. 17) and that the A'marat prefer to winter near al-Hafan. There are several references to her fellow political officer, St John Philby, and a correction that the Al-Dulaim are "all Sunnis" (p. 265), and none Shi'ahs. - Gertrude Bell was a traveller, political actor, and archaeologist who was a key player in the nation-building after World War I, especially in Iraq. She founded the Iraq Museum, translated Persian poetry, and advised the British government's foreign policy at nearly the highest level. It is little surprise that she would have owned one of the few copies of this important source, containing otherwise nearly unobtainable population statistics as well as details on the political history of a region in which traditional tribal feuds became mingled with international high politics. Considering the limited scope of intended distribution and the sensitive nature of the information contained, it is safe to say that this invaluable compendium never had more than a very limited press-run; indeed; only three copies are known today in libraries worldwide, and none with such unique provenance. - Covers rubbed, title-page brittle and reinforced with two library stamps carefully removed but still faintly visible. A closed tear to the folding map. Later in the collection of the American missionary turned political biographer Harry J. Almond (1918-2007), with his handwritten ownership in ink next to Bell's own. In all very well preserved. No copy in auction records. OCLC: 921927074, 729268761.‎

‎[Biblia arabica - AT - Psalmi].‎

‎[Kitab zubur Da'ud al-Malik wa-al-nabt]. [London, printed by Samuel Palmer, for the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1725].‎

‎8vo. (6), 230 pp. (without terminal blank). Title within double rules, added ruling in red. 18th-century (probably English) gilt-tooled red half morocco, contrasting morocco lettering-piece, blue paper boards. A rare London-printed Arabic translation of the Psalms of David by 'Abdallah ibn al-Fadl al-Antaki, taken from the revised and corrected edition published at Aleppo by Athanasius, Patriarch of Antioch, in 1706. For this SPCK edition marginal notes, the Decalogue and Lords Prayer have been added. - This work, which represents the first separate British edition of the Psalms in Arabic, was printed by Samuel Palmer (1692-1732), prepared for the press by Sulaiman Ibn-Ya'qub as-Saliliyani, with a new Arabic font produced by a young William Caslon. The project was beset with difficulties: conceived in 1720, it took five years to come to fruition. The intention, as is printed in the preface of "An extract of several letters relating to the great charity and usefulness of printing the New Testament and Psalter in the Arabick language" (London, 1725), was to "preserve and propagate the Christian Faith among our Brethren in Syria, Palestine, Arabia, and other Eastern Countries from whence we first received it". - As William Brown notes "the whole impression, consisting of upwards of six thousand copies, was sent abroad, so that a copy of it is now rarely to be seen" (The History of Missions or, Of the Propagation of Christianity Among the Heathen, Since the Reformation. Philadelphia, 1816). Darlow/Moule enumerates the impression more exactly to 6,250 copies. Perhaps unsurprisingly, given the work's intended use, ESTC locates copies at just four British libraries (BL, Cambridge, Edinburgh and Oxford), two in Europe (Berlin State Library and the Dutch State Library), and a single location in North America (General Theological Seminary). - A trifle rubbed and marked, else a handsome copy with occasional marginal notes in pencil, marking to margins. Darlow/Moule 1654. ESTC T154998 (with erroneous pagination).‎

‎Burn-Murdoch, John Francis, British Major General (1859-1931).‎

‎Collection of manuscripts on military expeditions in North Africa and along the Nile. Cairo and other places, [1884-1885].‎

‎Mostly 8vo and 4to. Ca. 206 pp. A loose collection of letters, diary entries, telegram slips, inserted sketch maps, and related paraphernalia. Includes: A Map of the Nile, From the Equatorial Lakes to the Mediterranean, Embracing the Egyptian Sudan (Kordofan, Darfur, &c.) and Abyssinia (London, Stanford, 1883). Folding coloured map of the Nile, inscribed by Burn-Murdoch. Burn-Murdoch, who rose to the rank of Major General, commanded, among other things, the cavalry in Egypt as a member of the Royal Dragoons. Part of his estate is in the National Army Museum, London. The collection offered here is in several hands, largely that of Burn-Murdoch himself, partly (probably also a little later) by others, especially the sections marked "copy" on the cover sheet. - "March from Aswan to Wada Halfa" is written on one cover; another piece is untitled, but describes a military operation near Tunis. Several sketch maps are inserted. Some of the sheets are numbered by hand, showing some sections to be partly incomplete. The overarching perspective of the collection is predominantly a military one, with geographical and meteorological commentary only mentioned in connection with military matters. However, in some letters to his father, Burn-Murdoch does add a few hints of daily life: "I am writing this in great luxury as I have got hold of an old wine cask and have constructed a kind of armchair out of it". He chats casually about seeing the pyramids of Giza, and subsequently "had a very hot walk from the Pyramids into Cairo", describes witnessing an accident which led to a drowning in the Nile, and notes that they were eating well enough, having had two cooks, though "one of whom deserted at the Pyramids". Also included is a hand-coloured map, presumably once in Burn-Murdoch's ownership with his name inscribed on the front cover of its case. - Overall in good condition, with some light wear. Despite the gaps, it gives an impressive picture of the life of British colonial troops in North Africa before 1900.‎

‎[Gulf Administration Reports].‎

‎Appendices to the Administration Report on the Persian Gulf Political Residency and Maskat Political Agency for 1896-97. [Series title at head: Selections From the Records of the Government of India, Foreign Department. No. CCCXLVII. Foreign Department Serial No. 92]. Calcutta, Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing, 1897.‎

‎Folio (212 x 333 mm). Publisher's original blue printed boards, black cloth spine hand-lettered. Appendices to the annual "Administration Report" on the Gulf region which the British Political Residents submitted to the Indian Viceroy and Governor. The bland official title belies the true value of the series, which has been called "a mine of information on the development of the modern Gulf" (Cambridge Archive Editions). Regularly the reports contain political details of the local sheikhdoms as well as trade information. - The present appendix volume contains the meteorological tables for the year 1896/97 as well as, crucially, the year's trade reports for the entire Gulf region. The issue notes widespread lower trade revenues, which it diagnoses as due to an Indian plague and subsequent quarantines of port cities, as well as ongoing political unrest in Qajar Iran following the assassination of the Shah, Naser al-Din Shah Qajar, the previous year. The volume provides carefully detailed charts of imports and exports for Bushire, Lingah, Bunder Abbas, Bahrain, the Arab Coast of the Gulf, and Shiraz. Though most exports dropped, the value of Bahrain's in fact had gone up since the previous year, with its most valuable exports being coffee, rice, and printed cottons to Turkey and the especially valuable export of pearls to India. On the Arabian Gulf Coast, principal exports were, again, pearls, though these were largely bound to "Persian ports". Those on the Arab Coast also benefitted from the mother o' pearl shell trade, one of the least impacted by the upheavals of India and Qajar Iran. - The "Administration Report on the Persian Gulf" was published under various titles annually between 1875 and 1957. Original specimens are almost unobtainable in the trade. - Provenance: removed from the London Library, with their printed label on the upper cover and their stamps (in blind and printed) on title-page and final leaf, accompanied by cancel stamps. Macro, p. xii (s.v. "RAPA": Report on the Administration of the Persian Gulf Political Residency and Muscat Political Agency). OCLC 224558510. ZDB-ID 768652-3. Cf. the 1989 Cambridge Archive Editions reprint.‎

‎Ibn al-Nafis al-Qarashi, Ala'addin Abu 'l Hasan Ali / Ibn Sina (Avicenna).‎

‎Kitab al-Mujaz fi al-Tibb [A Summary of Medicine]. [Central Asia, probably ca. 1550 CE / mid-16th century CE or later].‎

‎Tall 8vo (104 x 220 mm). Arabic manuscript on polished paper. (1), 185, (1) ff. Naskh script in black and occasional red ink, with catchwords and extensive marginal notes in a contemporary hand. 19th century leather, ruled and decoratively stamped in blind. Popular and influential mediaeval Arabic handbook for medical students by the great Damascus anatomist Ibn al-Nafis (1210-88). Long considered a commentary on Avicenna, this is now viewed by scholarship as an original work which also discusses Avicenna's ideas, and thus as "an independent book meant to be a handbook for medical students and practitioners, not as an epitome of Kitab Al-Qanun of Ibn Sina as thought by recent historians" (Abdel-Halim, 2008). One of the author's most widely received works, it provides a useful sum of medical knowledge to aspiring physicians of the mediaeval and early modern periods alike. It was still being copied centuries on from the death of Ibn al-Nafis, who is famous for first describing the pulmonary blood circulation, thereby anticipating by many centuries the efforts of William Harvey. - Not dated by the scribe, but one of the ownership dates on the first leaf is dated Shawwal 1100 AH (July/August 1689 CE), and the date of copying would be estimated around 950 AH, or possibly later. Covers lightly scuffed, interior shows marginal paper repairs and slight trimming to outermost marginal notes. The main text is clean and unmarred. GAL I, 493, 37, 2 & I, 457 (s. v. Ibn Sina). Rabie E. Abdel-Halim, "Contributions of Ibn Al-Nafis (1210-1288 AD) to the Progress of Medicine and Urology. A Study and Translations From his Medical Works", in: Saudi Medical Journal 29.1 (2008), pp. 13-22.‎

‎[Ibn Khalsun, Muhammad ibn Yusuf].‎

‎Kitab al-aghdiya fi hifz al-sihha [On Nutrition and the Preservation of Health]. Paris, 1615.‎

‎4to (200 x 144 mm). 81 pp. French manuscript, black ink on watermarked laid paper. 19th century blindstamped half calf with smooth spine, title lettered in gilt. A hitherto unknown French translation of an Arabic medical and philosophical text by a 13th century author from Al-Andalus: part of the first sections of the third chapter from the "Kitab al-Aghdiya", or the "Book of Food and the Preservation of Health", by Ibn Khalsun (ca. 1203-88). This chapter discusses general hygiene and personal health, that is to say, the body and spirit in their entirety. The present manuscript fragment is entitled "Traicté des choses non naturelles" ("Treatise on matters not natural"), meaning the things necessary for human life that are part of the external, material world, such as air, food and drink, including paragraphs on wine and sleep. It provides no information as to its source, but there was at the time no French edition of the work, and this would appear to be an entirely original, albeit unfinished, effort at translating an Arabic manuscript. The first published French translation was that included with the critical edition published in Damascus in 1996. - According to the Andalusian scholar Ibn al-Khatib (1313-74), Ibn Khalsun was originally from Rueda in Spain and lived in Malaga and Granada where he was part of the Nasrid ruler Abu 'Abdallah Muhammad bin Muhammad bin Yusuf's court (1272-1302). This is his only recorded work on medicine. - Some worming to the wide margins. Binding slightly rubbed at extremeties. Provenance: from the library of the French writer Jules Claretie (handwritten note dated 1919); subsequently owned by Dr. René-Albert Gutmann (1885-1981), and acquired from his heirs.‎

‎Kirmani, Mirza Muhammad Karim Khan.‎

‎Two treatises on astronomy: Khulasa al-taqwim (Summary of the Calendar) and Risala al-Mizan (A Letter on Balance). Qajar Iran, [July/August 1856 CE =] Dhu'l-Qa'da 1270 H.‎

‎8vo (145 x 204 mm). Two treatises bound together: the first in Persian with occasional captions in Arabic, the second in Arabic. Manuscript on polished paper. 45 ff., 18-22 lines. Nastaliq and naskh script in black and red, written space ruled in red and blue, with numerous charts in red, blue, and black and chart headers in blue woodblock print. Folio 10 features moveable slips to complement a chart. 19th century full leather over wooden boards, covers decorated with lacquered gold leaf and illustrated with an astrolabe quadrant; top edge of upper cover recessed at the centre; a flower-shaped inlay to the upper cover is lost. Finely rendered and beautifully bound work on astronomy and timekeeping by Haji Mirza Muhammad Karim Khan-i-Kirmani (1810-73). Karmani was a Shaykhi-Shia scholar, a distant cousin to Fath 'Ali Shah Qajar (1769-1834), and a 19th century polymath with mastery of a whole field of Islamic and philosophical sciences, including alchemy, medicine, optics and music. - The first treatise presented here is "Khulasa al-taqwim", a calendar summary in the form of tables for ikhtiyarat, or selections: it thus guides the reader through the selection of auspicious moments in a given day, the station of the moon and the zodiac in the heavens, and describes the solar and lunar calendars, the hours of the day and night, and knowledge of horoscopes. - The second is "Risala al-Mizan", which focuses on the use and construction of astrolabes. Karmani had a particularly keen interest in the engineering behind the astrolabe, a distinctly Muslim invention which is perhaps the greatest technical triumph of the mediaeval world. Indeed, Karmani went on to invent his own version of the astrolabe. Both calendrical knowledge and astrolabe engineering require keen mathematical and geometric knowledge, the study of which is aided by the numerous and often complex charts made available to the reader throughout. One such chart features two movable slips, still fully intact and functional, which practitioners may slide up and down to match up with the chart and aid their calculations. The binding on this volume is particularly striking, as it is illustrated with diagrams of astrolabe quadrants on a field of glittering copper leaf. - Light wear to covers, slightly delicate binding. A well-preserved and uncommonly early copy of Kirmani's astronomical writings. The only comparable manuscript copy to have appeared on the market is a later specimen in a very similar binding, dating from 1312 H/1895 CE, which sold at Christie's (Art of the Islamic and Indian Worlds Sale, 27 April 2017, lot 16), commanding £21,250.‎

‎[Qur'an Juz'].‎

‎An illuminated Qur'an, Juz' XXIX. China, [ca. 1780 - 18th century CE].‎

‎8vo (180 x 252 mm). Arabic manuscript on paper. 58 ff. Script in bold black sini, 5 lines within double red rules, punctuation in red, black outlined gold rosettes between verses, headers in gold text on red ground, opening bifolium with red, blue and black and gold illuminated panels around three lines of text. 18th century full red leather with fore-edge flap, elaborately ruled and stamped in blind. Handsomely illuminated Qur'an Juz (one of thirty parts of varying lengths into which the Qur'an is divided) written in 18th century China. - Arab presence in China dates back as far as the first Caliphate: the Prophet's companion Sa'd ibn Abi Waqqas is traditionally credited with introducing Islam to China as ambassador in 650. Indeed, many major cities in China, such as Xi'an (or Chang'an, as it was known during the height of the Silk Road) and Beijing, boast a long and rich Muslim history. Qur'an sections written by Chinese Muslims show Chinese influence clearly in both the decoration and the script, which is derived from naskh. Juz' 29, the penultimate Juz' of the Qu'ran shown here, begins with surah 67, al-Mulk (The Sovereignty), and closes with the fifty lines of surah 77, al-Mursalat (The Emissaries). - Binding rebacked and spine and endpapers professionally replaced; subtle paper repairs; some later pagination marks. Altogether a beautiful example of the Chinese Muslim manuscript tradition. Provenance: Private UK collection formed in the 1960s and 1970s.‎

‎[Razi, Abu Bakr Muhammad ibn Zakariyya al- (Rhazes)] / Giachini, Leonardo.‎

‎In nonum librum Rasis Arabis medici ad Almansorem regem, de partium morbis eruditißima commentaria. Basel, Peter Perna, 1563 - (1 Feb.) 1564.‎

‎4to. 2 parts in 1 volume. (24), 454, 134 pp., (1 blank leaf), (72) pp. Woodcut initials; printer's woodcut device in two sizes to title and last page. Contemporary limp vellum (spine and edges renewed). Author's name inked on lower edge of text block. First edition of this detailed commentary on the famous ninth book of the "Kitab al-tibb al-Mansuri", a treatise dedicated by al-Razi (also known as Rhazes; 850-923 or 932) to Almansor, the Prince of Chorosan. "The manual, known as 'Nonus Almansoris', was popular among mediaeval physicians" (cf. GAL S I, p. 419). The work discusses special pathology but excludes pyrology and was one of the most popular textbooks at medical schools and faculties well into the Middle Ages (cf. Hirsch/H. I, 171). Rhazes is considered the greatest mediaeval physician next to Avicenna; he also conducted alchemical experiments. According to his biographer al-Gildaki, he was blinded for refusing to share his secrets of chemistry. - The Italian physician Leonardo Giacchini (1501-47), who composed this commentary, practised at Lucca until 1543 and later taught at the University of Pisa. His other works are collected in part two of the volume, with its own title-page, dated 1563. - Vellum rippled, spine replaced, edges rebacked. Some light dampstaining, inkstains, and general soiling to interior; edges of some marginal notes have been trimmed. - From the library of the Italian physician Giambattista Giovanetto Morello from Tavagnasco (Piedmont), whose doctoral dissertation was published at Turin in 1779 (a single copy known, in the Biblioteca Nazionale Universitaria Torino); his autograph ownership inscription on the front free endpaper, "Joanettus medicus a Tavagnasco", is dated 10 February 1780. Numerous marginal notes throughout in two hands, one belonging to the 17th century, the other apparently that of Giovanetto. VD 16, G 1940. BM-STC German 359. Adams G 581 (part 2 only). Wellcome 2823. Durling 2094.‎

‎[Sanusi, Muhammad ibn Yusuf].‎

‎Kitab al-sughra fi’ al-tawhid. [The Smaller Tract on the Principles of Faith, or, The Lesser Creed]. North Africa, [1780 CE =] 1194 H.‎

‎4to (152 x 210 mm). Arabic manuscript on paper. 57 ff. Leaves have been numbered in pencil, though incorrectly. Brown and red ink with occasional blue and yellow, ruled in red, gilt pointer in the margin marking the beginning, and ending with the name of the Prophet Muhammad written in yellow and black. Marginal notes in a modern red ink. Modern brown morocco with fore-edge flap. Modern endpapers. A theological treatise more commonly known as "Al-Sanusiyyah Al-Sughra" (The Short Version of As-Sanusiyyah) or as "Umm al-Barahin" (The Mother of All Proofs). Mohamed ibn Youssef Sanoussi (1435/36-1490) was a North African theologian who lived as a mystic in Tlemcen, Algeria. Unlike Averroes or al-Ghazali, Sanusi espoused a democratic and rational conception of theology that appealed not to the elite but to any man endowed with reason. He sought to establish practical faith through logical proof. - As stated in the colophon, the present manuscript was copied by one Ahmad ibn Ali. Recto of first leaf somewhat soiled, with later ink notes and paper repairs; the beginning of the text on the verso is only slightly affected. Light soiling and inkblots throughout, with a few marginal wormholes and dampstains. Later marginal notes; verso of f. 56 has text which is not contained in ruled margins and has thus been trimmed slightly along fore-edge. Cf. GAL II, 8.7.4.‎