Colour lithograph, 790 x 625 mm. Mounted on original cloth with maps series key printed on verso. Folded. The finest contemporary map of the Çanakkale sector of the Gallipoli Campaign, the site of the dreaded "Narrows" of the Dardanelles where Allied naval forces made their ill-fated attempt to "force the straits" towards taking Istanbul. Drafted in Cairo under the direction of T. E. Lawrence at the Arab Bureau's Intelligence Office, based on a recently captured Ottoman map. - In the early days of World War I, the Entente sought to knock the Ottoman Empire out of the conflict by taking Constantinople, by way of the Dardanelles. The Gallipoli Campaign (17 February 1915 to 9 January 1916) involved a force of 490,000 British, Indian, Australian, New Zealander and French troops making various landings upon the Gallipoli Peninsula that strategically guarded the mouth of the Dardanelles. The 325,000 Ottoman defenders, backed by German forces, successfully repelled these raids in what was one of the most bloody military contests in world history. - From the outset, the Allies were hampered by a lack of accurate maps of the Gallipoli Peninsula and the adjacent Asian shore of the Dardanelles. They eventually succeeded in capturing a complete six-part set of excellent, newly published Ottoman surveys showing the battle theatre in its entirety. These maps were rushed to the map department of the Intelligence Office (later the famed "Arab Bureau") in Cairo, where they were translated, enlarged and improved by a team headed by Lieutenant T. E. Lawrence, later known as "Lawrence of Arabia". These maps were printed by the Survey Department, Egypt, as a series of six interconnecting maps, although each map was designed to act as a stand-alone work complete in and of itself (a geographic key to all six maps is present on the verso of the present map). - Overall clean and bright, with some very light staining to upper-left quadrant and some light wear at some fold vertices.
Small folio (207 x 311 mm). 295, (1) pp. 26 ff., numbered 1-27. Issues 1 through 7 (of 8) bound together, with an additional booklet is bound at the end of the volume (addendum file no 1., 29 Oct. 1967). Contemporary blue full cloth binding with gilt-printed title label in Hebrew and Arabic to upper cover. The first orders issued by the IDF military authorities in the West Bank after the Six-Day War (Milhemet Sheshet Ha-Yamim, or Harb 1967). Printed in Hebrew and Arabic, the pamphlets include more than a hundred and fifty orders, proclamations and lists of position-holders. - Binding somewhat stained, but generally well preserved. OCLC 20345168.
8vo. XVIII, (2), 93, (3), 8 pp. (ads). With lithographic frontispiece of "A Persian Girl" sketched on stone by the translator, printed by C. Hullmandel. With an inserted slip. Original boards, rebacked with new spine label. First English edition: a prose version by the British oriental scholar James A. Atkinson (1780-1852). "This is a specimen of Persian humour, a jeu d'esprit, founded upon female customs and superstitions. It pretends to be a grave work, and is in fact a circle of domestic observances, treated with the solemnity of a code of laws" (preface). With a fine lithographic frontispiece drawn by Atkinson, faithfully depicting a "Persian Girl" in traditional dress, with a lute and hookah by her side, her hair adorned. - Provenance: 1) Wilberforce Eames, (1855-1937), U.S. bibliographer and librarian, known as the "Dean of American bibliographers" (his ink ownership to flyleaf); 2) pencil ownership "Wm. Berrian" (?) to flyleaf; 3) bookplate of the Wisconsin Consistory Library to pastedown; 4) Quaritch notation to pastedown (sold by them). A fine copy; scarce. Wilson 10 & 123. Cat. of the Library of Wilberforce Eames (NY, Anderson Auction, 1905), no. 6247 (this copy).
8vo. 2 parts in one volume. (2), 52; 15, (1) pp. With colour-lithographed title to the Ottoman text. Stitched as issued. Lagus's dissertation for the professorship in Helsinki (which he lost to Kellgren). Includes the Ottoman Turkish text. - Some browning. Uncut, untrimmed copy. Henriksson-Puuponen 78. Marklin 34. OCLC 66728813.
4to. (2), (8), (3)-75, (1) pp. With 1 folding table. Contemporary marbled brown boards, spine reinforced with later brown cloth. An orientalist dissertation by the Hessian scholar Happel, incorporating a grammar of the Arabic language and a glossary harmonising Hebrew terms from the first four books of Genesis with Arabic words from three Qur'an suras, namely sura 1 (Al-Fatiha), 12 (Yusuf), and 64 (At-Taghabun), previously edited by Erpenius. - Some browning throughout due to paper. Lacks free endpapers; front hinge reinforced. 19th and 20th century ownerships to pastedown. Schnurrer 87. GV (1700) 56, 6. OCLC 31311242. Not in Fück.
Large 4to. X, (2), 134 pp. Contemporary green half calf over marbled boards with giltstamped spine title. Marbled endpapers. First edition. - History of the Muslim world and its rulers from Muhammad's flight (AD 622) to the year 1020 AH (AD 1611). The Danish oriental scholar Jan Larson (Jens Lassen) Rasmussen (1792-1826) had studied in Paris with de Sacy (cf. Fück 156). - Binding rubbed and bumped. Some browning and light dampstaining to interior, old shelfmark label to pastedown. Provenance: stamp of the oriental scholar Charles Barbier de Ménard (president of the École des Langues orientales from 1898 to 1908) on title, with additional Canadian library stamps of the Ottawa Commissariatus, Terrae Sanctae. Rare. OCLC 953808200.
8vo. 2 vols. (4), XV, (1), 400 pp. (4), 488 pp. With 10 engr. plates (2 folding). Contemporary quarter calf over mottled boards on four raised bands. Gilt lettering and decoration to spines. Marbled endpapers and edges. First edition of J. T. Reinaud's (1795-1867) rare catalogue of the famous collection of Islamic Art amassed by the French statesman Blacas. Most copies have title changed to "Monumens arabes, persans et turcs". This copy is inscribed by Reinaud to the Duc de Luynes, another famous French antiquarian. - The French antiquarian and diplomat Pierre Louis Jean Casimir, prince de Blacas d'Aulps (1770-1839) acted as prime minister to Louis XVIII when he succeeded Napoleon in 1814 and later served as French ambassador to the Holy See. Remaining in Rome for many years, he provided Ingres with a commission and became a patron to the German classicist Theodor Panofka. He worked closely with Italian archaeologist Carlo Fea in the excavation of the Roman Forum, supported the orientalist Jean-François Champollion and created the "Musée Egyptien" within the Louvre. In 1866, his descendants sold most of his collection to the British Museum, where it remains to this day. - The plates show beautiful specimens of Arabic calligraphical art (including many seals). Some browning and staining throughout. From the library of the Ducs de Luynes from the Château of Dampierre with bookplate to pastedowns. Ibrahim-Hilmy II, 159. Gay 3592 bis (variant title). Brunet IV, 1198. Graesse VI, 72. Quérard VII, 513. OCLC 39974885. Not in Arntzen/Rainwater.
21 album leaves with 1 drawing mounted on each recto. Album: full-sheet leaves (oblong folio, 395 x 525 mm); drawings: oblong folio and oblong 4to. An album with 21 watercolour drawings on paper with views of sea coasts from the shore (240 x 310 mm to 295 x 465 mm), one with a 22nd watercolour drawing on the back with a similar view, and one with about 15 human figure drawings in graphite pencil on the back. All bear the artist's stamp on the front (Lugt 3703) and 4 are signed or initialled by the artist. Richly gold- and blind-tooled green goatskin morocco, sewn on 3 recessed cords (not aligned with the six flat raised bands on the spine), each board with a blind-tooled inner oval frame of interlaced abstracted leaves and vines, surrounded by a gold-tooled frame of similar decoration (oval inside and rectangular outside), surrounded by 2 frames of thick-thin fillets, the front board with the owner's initials in textura capitals in the centre: "A.L.", signed at the foot of the spine, "A. Giroux & C:" (last recorded in 1856), white watered silk endleaves (the paste-down in the form of a doublure). The whole in a protective folder lined with thick leather, with green goatskin morocco where it wraps around the 2 short ends, and chemical-marbled paper sides (black papier croise d'Annonay: cf. Wolfe XXI, 1-3: France, 1830s-50s), with remains of a green cloth tie on the flap. A richly gold- and blind-tooled album (ca. 1850/56) containing 22 excellent and detailed watercolour views of rocky sea coasts, all or nearly all in New Caledonia and Peru (plus 1 graphite pencil drawing of about 15 human figures), the coastal views made from the shore. All were executed by Osmond Romieux (1826-1908), a leading amateur artist who made them during his tours of duty as a French naval officer. At least 18 have a pencil note on the back identifying the location: 15 "Nouvelle Caledonie", 2 "Pérou" (drawings 18, 20) and 2 "Callao" in Peru (drawings 17, 18). We have found no location indicated on drawings 3 (with views on both sides), 8 and 19 (with figure drawings on the back). Most of the drawings were made from the sea shore, looking out over both the sea and the nearby coasts, nearly all with rocky cliffs or outcroppings and some with trees or other plants. Many were made along bays or inlets where one can see the coast on both sides and the water in one view. Some show fortifications or other buildings, a few show boats in the water or on the shore and several show people on the shore, all or nearly all in European dress. Drawings 2, 8, 15 and 17 are signed or initialled by the artist. - No drawing in the album bears a date, but the album shows no signs of other items having been removed, so the drawings probably date from before or soon after the album was manufactured. The album leaves are made of wove paper with no watermark, but A. Giroux & Cie is not recorded after 1856 and the binding style suggests the album is not much older. Most of the drawings are made on thick wove paper with no visible watermarks and with a rough surface texture much like many of today's watercolour papers. Drawing 4 is on thinner and smoother wove paper with no watermark visible and drawings 9 and 11 are on laid paper watermarked (in the centre of a half-sheet): grapes on a crowned shield (20 grapes plus stem, rendered naturalistically, with grapes arranged in an irregular pattern rather than a honeycomb and sometimes overlapping), about 118 x 70 mm (chainlines 26 mm apart). Unfortunately, the watermark literature does not cover this period well, but the crown is in the general style of those used much earlier for a fleur-de-lis on a crowned shield, such as Heawood 1822. Drawings 20 and 21 may be on the same stock as 9 and 11 but show no watermark, though 20 was made in Peru and the others in New Caledonia. Drawings 9, 20, 21 and probably 3 and 19 are executed on oblong 4to leaves; at least most of the others are on oblong folio leaves. Drawing 13 may be backed with smoother wove paper. - Prosper Halvor Henri Oscar Romieux, who used the first name Osmond, joined the French navy at Rochefort (less the 30 km from his native La Rochelle) in 1841 and passed his exams at the École Navale in 1843. He made his first tour of duty in Polynesia during the Franco-Tahitian War (1844-47), at least from 1845 aboard the ship "La Virginie". We find no record of Romieux or the ship visiting New Caledonia during this period, although it is "only" 4500 km from Tahiti. Romieux must have shown artistic skill from early childhood, for already on this first tour he made excellent watercolour drawings, and he continued to make watercolour views around the world until he retired from duty in 1891. He was made a chevalier of the Légion d'Honneur in 1863 and later an officier. Other undated drawings also record him in New Caledonia and Peru (including Lima and Callao). He is documented in New Caledonia in 1880 and 1882, but the present drawings are unlikely to be that late, and we have found no date for his visit(s) to Peru. We have little record of Romieux's movements from 1848 to 1850, but if he left the South Pacific he soon returned, for he is recorded in Hong Kong in 1851 and the Philippines in 1852 (in 1851 he was an Enseigne on the ship "l'Algérie"). He must have left in 1852, however, for he is recorded in the Seychelles (in the Indian Ocean) in 1852 and Italy in 1853 and 1854. In this last year he was promoted to Lieutenant, but we have another gap in the records of his movements from that time to 1860. He may have made the present drawings during this period, for he set off for the Levant on the ship "Redoutable", apparently in or shortly before 1860, since he is regularly recorded in Syria, Lebanon, Greece, Algeria and Jerusalem from 1860 to 1864. He was promoted to Capitaine in 1867 and continued his travels, but since the present album was probably bound in or before 1856 we think it unlikely that he made the drawings after 1864. - Although the binding is signed by Giroux, the firm operated primarily as suppliers of artists' materials and Ramsden plausibly suggests that they "commissioned bindings by the best executants of the day". Alphonse Giroux established the firm by 1799, but his son Alphonse Gustave Giroux (1809-86) managed it from at least 1838 and the father died in 1848. - We have not identified the "A.L." who apparently acquired these watercolours and had the album made in the 1850s: Lugt lists several French collectors with those initials active at the time. One watercolour has a small corner torn off at the lower right, another is slightly frayed along the right edge and the one on thin wove paper is very slightly browned, but the watercolours are otherwise in very good condition. The binding may have been expertly rebacked, preserving the original backstrip, but so unobtrusively that one must wonder if the binding was originally made that way. It is further in very good condition and even the folder is olny slightly rubbed.A lovely and finely executed series of large watercolour drawings of the coasts of New Caledonia and Peru, probably made in the 1850s and mounted in a stunning gold- and blind-tooled contemporary album. For Romieux: Lugt 3703. For Giroux: Flety, Dictionnaire des relieurs francais p. 82; Ramsden, p. 94.
8vo. XXI, (3), 529, (1) pp. and pp. 515a-518a. Modern red library cloth. First book edition; very rare. "The first and only comprehensive bibliography of Arabic texts and books on Arabic language and literature by European scholars, printed in Europe 1505-1810" (Breslauer-Folter). "Extremely diligent descriptions, for the most part based on autopsy" (cf. Fück). Dedicated to de Sacy, the bibliography was first published in 1799-1806 as a series of seven university programmes. - Some browning and brownstaining throughout as common, due to paper. Old shelfmark label to spine and title-page, with additional Canadian library stamp of the Ottawa Commissariatus, Terrae Sanctae. A good, tight copy of a standard work almost unobtainable in the original edition. Breslauer-Folter 119. Besterman 152. Breslaueriana 1090. Fück 146. Zenker I, 1755.
Large 4to (220 x 274 mm). (6), 47-58, 483-782 pp. With 4 tables. Later red half morocco over marbled boards with gilt title to spine. Offprints from vols. 47 & 48 of the "Mémoires de l'Académie Royale des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres" with separately printed title-page. The four "mémoires" which make up the first piece were variously read in public between 1787 and 1791, but published for the first time in 1793; the second, much longer part, was first heard on 5 April 1785. Includes long extracts in Arabic from Masoudi, Sirat Alresoul, Kitab Aldjouman, Tabari, and others. - Shelfmark to spine, unobtrusive blind library stamp to title & following 2 leaves. Ownership inscription of Col. S. B. Miles to front free endpaper, and his wife's presentation bookplate (Bath Public Reference Library) to front pastedown. Wilson 197.
Small 8vo. 71, (1) pp. plus (12) pp. of publisher's ads. Publisher's original printed red cloth. Rare manual of vernacular Egyptian Arabic, intended "for the Navy and Army, Travellers, Missionaries, and Traders on the Nile, in Alexandria, or in the Sudan [...] By the use of this book, students will find they are quite competent to make themselves clearly understood by all classes of Arabs met with in Egypt, the Sudan, and a considerable part of North Africa". Includes "colloquial phrases, travel talk, naval, military and commercial terms, money, weights, and measures", omitting grammar and Arabic characters, instead employing Latin-alphabet transliteration throughout. - Binding loosened; traces of use and moisture. Handwritten ownership of "Alexander Morrison", dated 1897, to front flyleaf.
Ca. 550 x 770 mm. Ottoman Turkish manuscript with large Tughra of Sultan Abdülmecid I (reigned 1839-61). 1 page. Black ink on single sheet of sturdy, smoothed laid paper (watermark: "GFA"; Fratelli Gava manufactory of Lombardy & Venice?). A scarce example of a mid-19th century Levantine manuscript firman granting permission to travel in the Ottoman Empire, issued to Sir Jacob Henry Preston (1812-91), 2nd baronet of Beeston St Lawrence. Preston was educated at Westminster and Trinity College, Cambridge (B.A. 1832); his seat was at Beeston Hall near Norwich in Norfolk. - Traces of old folds. Small stain with related small hole not affecting text; contemporary ink annotation on verso: "Travelling firman for Sir Jacob Henry Preston". In fine condition.
8vo. XVI, 668 pp. With a frontispiece printed in colours and gilt in the style of an Arabic title (lith. Bastide). Elegant oriental-style red morocco binding with fore-edge flap, covers blindstamped with gilt borders, spine gilt in western style. Marbled endpapers. Widely received introduction to Arabic by L. J. Bresnier (1814-69), a disciple of Silvestre de Sacy and the first professor of Arabic in Algiers. - Some insignificant foxing to margins, but a fine copy in a unique binding, from the library of the Algerian essayist and Muslim leader Mourad Kiouane, a participant in the World Muslim Conference held in Karachi in February 1951 (with his ownership stamps). Even many leaders among the Algerian Muslims of the 1950s, educated by the French colonial system, spoke good French but only Algerian Arabic rather than the standard variety, which hampered their ability to converse with the leaders of other Arab nations. Famously, Algeria's first president Ahmed Ben Bella broke out in tears when invited by Nasser to speak for the first time before an Egyptian audience, but finding himself unable to do so. Partly in response to this, and to promote pan-Arabism, Nasser sent droves of Arabic instructors to Algeria in the 1960s. OCLC 929616431.
Tables only: 11 genealogical tables on 15 folding sheets. Contemporary red half morocco; marbled covers and endpapers. Slightly foxed throughout. From the library of Richard C. Hodges (his etched bookplate on front flyleaf); later in the library of Sidney Edward Bouverie-Pusey (1839-1911), only son of the agriculturist Philip Pusey (cf. DNB XLVII, 64), with his bookplate on front pastedown.
4to. VI, 32 pp. With 2 lithogr. plates and 28 ff. of Arabic letterpress with lithogr. borders, toned in various colours. Modern boards with the original wrappers bound within. First edition. - Without any doubt Hammer’s finest work in imitation of an oriental manuscript: the Persian text of the famous Sufi manual ‘Golshan-e Râz’ is printed in seven four-leaf quires of varying colours, each framed by a lithographed sequence of interlaced flowers and animals (pheasants, deer, antilopes, panthers, jackals). The German translation, the unsophisticated typography of which provides a striking contrast to the luxurious Persian text, is illustrated by two plates of topographical interest. The binding preserves the original blue paper wrappers with a large emblematic lithograph of a shell hidden among a bouquet of roses, drawn by Pauline von Koudelka-Schmerling. - Occasional slight foxing. Untrimmed. Goedeke VII, 767, 100. Rabenlechner I, 122. Cf. Brunet III, 34 (Vienna, 1838 ed.).
4to. 2 parts in one volume. VIII, 140 pp. (8), 315, (1) pp. 19th century cloth with giltstamped spine title. The complete text of the Arabic version by Ibn al Muqaffa of this collection of animal fables with didactic overtones designed to illustrate wise conduct, printed in the beautiful types of the "Imprimerie Royale", with an introduction and critical notes in French. The typeface, based on Arab or Turkish specimens of calligraphy and cut in Rome in the early 17th century for Savary, "was the mainstay of Arabic typography in France until the late 19th century; it also provided a model for others" (Roper, p. 145). - Spine sunned; occasional browning and foxing, but a good copy. Chauvin II, p. 11f., no. 17. Cf. G. Roper, Early Arabic Printing in Europe, in: Middle Eastern Languages and the Print Revolution. A Cross-Cultural Encounter (Westhofen 2002), pp. 129-150.
8vo. 19, (1), 22, (2) pp. Contemporary grey wrappers. First Arabic edition. "Silvestre de Sacy translated the Last Will and Testament of Louis XVI into Arabic and had the translation printed together with the French original in 1820, in hopes that it might prove a comfort and encouragement to the Christians of the Orient, while giving Muslim readers a demonstration of Christian submission and evangelical meekness" (cf. Fück). Three years previously, de Sacy had published the late King's Testament (together with the last letter of Marie Antoinette) in a luxurious folio edition. "Sacy never let his Christian convictions hamper his work as a scholar, for he saw religion as a personal matter. Although he revealed his faith at times, it was never to pose it as the strongest model against which to judge other religions. He was nevertheless very pious. There is no other way to explain his translation of the guillotined king, Louis XVI, into Arabic [...]. He apparently wished to show how devout, simple and charitable his beloved monarch had been" (Kamal as-Salibi, The Druze [London 2005], p. 20). - The orientalist de Sacy, a monumental figure in the development of oriental studies in France, began his career as professor of Arabic at the École des Langues Orientales Vivantes in 1796. In 1806 he was offered the chair of Persian at the College of France and in 1824 was appointed director of the school of oriental languages. He also acted as advisor to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, translating political propaganda into Arabic, including the "Bulletins of the Grande Armée" (cf. Atabey 1134). - An excellent, untrimmed and wide-margined copy in mint condition, printed on strong paper, the central counter-leaf remaining uncut. Fück 144 (note 377). Bibliothèque de Sacy III, 4781f. OCLC 25217438.
8vo. 13 [instead of 17, lacking pp. 3-6], (1), 2, 386 pp. Contemporary half leather with coloured paper boards. Fourth volume only of the Ottoman military manual "Ta'limat al-'Askariya al-Mustajadda" ("Instructions for the New Model Army"), discussing firearms, guns and artillery in the Ottoman army. Translated from Turkish into Arabic by Captain Hasan Effendi Muzahhar with the assistance of his fellow officer Mohammed Effendi 'Abi'l Hasan. The title ("Gun Instructions - The Shishana") denotes an old Ottoman lock rifle produced mostly in Syria. - Binding severely rubbed and bumped; spine chipped; remains of old lending label on upper cover. Handwritten English note on flyleaf: "found in a tent at Tel-el-Kebir / 14 September 1882 / T. J. Jones". In the Battle of Tel El Kebir (13 Sept. 1882), fought near the Suez Canal, the British military defeated the Egyptian army led by Ahmed Urabi following an insurrection of Egyptian soldiers during the Anglo-Egyptian War.
4to. XII, 23, (5) pp. Arabic letterpress text within red ornamental borders. Contemporary papered spine. Only edition; exceedingly rare. - At first glance, the editio princeps of an ancient Arabic encomium based on two manuscript sources, accompanied by copious notes on the text as well as by German and Latin versions, and published on the occasion of the 50th teaching anniversary of Christian Woltersdorf, the director of the Salzwedel grammar school, by Friedrich Wilhelm Gliemann (1792-1864), teacher at the school. The few holding libraries unanimously cite the author as "Abu-’l Harr al-Mumallih", a poet entirely unknown to oriental literary history. Contemporary reviewers were quick to point out that the publication is, in fact, an elaborate hoax as scholarly as it is witty: "Indeed, the poem constitutes a cento assembled by Mr. Gliemann, in the main based on several poems of the Hamasah genre and on the encomium of Safieddin, edited by Bernstein [in 1816]. Yet the feat of properly conjoining these various pieces to form a whole, in a single, pure and correct metre, reveals no mean knowledge of Arabic. Several of the verses are of Mr. Gliemann's own invention. And so it is evident that the purported editor is none other than Abu’l Charr himself (the 'father of the embers', a pun on the name, 'Glühmann'), and that the variant readings of the second MS are nothing but different readings of the various passages of the original" (cf. Ergänzungsblätter zur A.L.Z. [1829], col. 263f.). - Printed on fine, crisp writing paper with tree watermark. Slight corner flaws to Latin and Arabic title-pages, otherwise a clean and wide-margined copy. Only four copies known in institutional possession (Halle, Leipzig, Göttingen, Greifswald). A rare and highly original piece of Arabic scholarship. OCLC 257626548.
8vo. (37)-84 pp. Contemporary half calf with giltstamped title to upper cover and spine. Endpapers marbled. All edges gilt. Only edition. - Rare account, by the French physician Paul Aubry, of Turkish military and civil hospitals, describing in detail their design and medical capacities, including accurate numbers of beds. An exceptional documentation of health care infrastructure in the Ottoman Empire, mentioning the Yildiz Ambulance, the Haider Pacha military hospital and the Haseki Hospital in Istanbul. The present offprint also contains a medical bibliography of works in German, Danish and Swedish published in 1886-87 as well as several abstracts, including an article on gonorrhoea by the Ottowa physician Coyteux Prévost, published in the "Union Médicale du Canada" in the same year. - Inscribed and signed by Aubry to Sultan Abdul Hamid II (1842-1918) on the front flyleaf. Binding slightly rubbed. Small marginal tears to pp. 39-42; last few pages somewhat creased. Library stamps erased from flyleaf and first page. From the library of Sultan Abdul Hamid II, the last Sultan of the Ottoman Empire to exert effective contol over the fracturing state and also remembered as a poet, translator and one of the dynasty's greatest bibliophiles. While his passion for books is memorialized by the many precious donations he gave to libraries all over the world and which mostly have remained intact to this day (including the 400-volume "Abdul-Hamid II Collection of Books and Serials" gifted to the Library of Congress), his own library was dispersed in the years following his deposition in 1909: books were removed to other palaces and even sold to Western collectors, the greatest part of his collection is today preserved in the Chester Beatty Library in Dublin. U.S. Army, Index-catalogue of the library of the surgeon-general's office VII, 393. Wohnlich-Despaigne, Les Historiens Français de la Médecine au XIXe Siècle 59.
8vo. 302 pp. With photo illustrations in the text throughout. Red half morocco over cloth boards with giltstamped spine title. Top edge red. Marbled endpapers. Rare first edition of this important work on Arabian horses. "Spanish commission sent to observe Arabian horses in Turkey, Syria, Mesopotamia, and Palestine [...] Used as a reference source by Gladys Brown Edwards in 'The Arabian: War Horse to Show Horse'" (Boyd/P., p. 11). An English translation ("In Search of the Arabian Horse") appeared in 2001; an Arabic one ("al-Bahth `an al-husan al-`Arabi") was published in Riyadh in 2007. A fine copy with the bookplate of José Luis Marín-Sánchez to half-title. Boyd/Paul 10. OCLC 49468733.
Large 12mo. V, (3), 20 pp. Modern half calf over marbled boards with black morocco label to spine, gilt. Padded at the end with 22 sturdy blank leaves with binder's ticket of "Period Binders, Bath". First edition of this rare introduction to Arabic. As the author writes in his dedication to the Rev. John Frederick Usko, "The object of the following pages is to put the Hebrew student in possession of just so much Arabick as may enable him to profit by the illustrations of Hebrew words in the Lexicons of Simonis and others." He proceeds to explain and justify his methods in the face of the many difficulties encountered by students. The text looks at the construction of the alphabet itself, compares Hebrew and Arabic letters, and similarly verbs and their tenses. - Attributed to Thomas Burgess (1756-1837), who served successively as Bishop of Salisbury and St. David's. He was educated at Winchester college and gained a scholarship to Corpus Christi College, Oxford, where he spent most of his time studying Greek. He was ordained in 1784 and at this time he became interested in Hebrew and theology. A prolific author, he published over a hundred works - the first while at Oxford. Early in his career, he came under the patronage of the Bishop of Salisbury. In his spare time, he helped increase the number of Sunday schools and contributed in writing primers for the students. The present work is an obvious fruit of these interests. - No copies listed in auction records of this unusual Newcastle imprint, which also names the London bookseller and dealer in continental books, W. H. Lunn. Some contemporary handwritten annotations in ink & ownership inscription to title-page "A Bertiz / August 5, 1829". - Rare. OCLC 55524381.
8vo. 156 pp. With one folding map of Japan. Contemporary gilt full red morocco with the giltstamped inscription "A Sa Majesté Impériale Le Sultan. Hommage de l'Auteur" to upper cover, Ottoman crest to lower cover, and giltstamped spine. Leading edges gilt. Marbled endpapers. All edges gilt. First edition of this synopsis of the political and religious history of Japan, by the Belgian diplomat, photographer and writer Eggermont (1844-1923), who was appointed councillor to the legation of Belgium in Japan from 1876 to 1877. Author's presentation copy for the Sultan with the dedication giltstamped to the upper cover. The book's first part discusses Shintoism and Buddhism; the second part presents an overview of Japanese history from the origins of the Japanese people until the 1868 Meji Restoration. - Lacks upper half of the title-page; lower half is transposed before the half-title and glued on top of it, thus omitting the author's name. - From the library of Sultan Abdul Hamid II (1842-1918), the last Sultan of the Ottoman Empire to exert effective contol over the fracturing state and also remembered as a poet, translator and one of the dynasty's greatest bibliophiles. While his passion for books is memorialized by the many precious donations he gave to libraries all over the world and which mostly have remained intact to this day (including the 400-volume "Abdul-Hamid II Collection of Books and Serials" gifted to the Library of Congress), his own library was dispersed in the years following his deposition in 1909: books were removed to other palaces and even sold to Western collectors; the greatest part of his collection is today preserved in the Chester Beatty Library in Dublin. - Extremities insignificantly rubbed; paper somewhat foxed throughout. An appealing copy in a finely gilt presentation binding. OCLC 249076616.
4to (193 x 258 mm). (4), 171, (5) pp. With 30 hand-coloured aquatint plates, 1 folding engraved map coloured in outline, 1 hand-coloured engraved plan, 1 uncoloured plate. Modern blue cloth with metal corner-pieces. Top-edge gilt. First edition of this fine topography of the Holy Land. "The signing artists include G. Bramati, Citterio, D. Landini, Bonatti, A. Angeli" (cf. Lipperheide). The splendidly coloured aquatints mostly show views (including Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Bethany), costumes, churches, sepulchres, temples, etc. - Some foxing to edges and margins as common; very minor clean tear to outer margin of map. A a wide-margined copy complete of the map and the hand-coloured plates. Tobler 217. Lipperheide Lc 10. Roehricht 1757.
22 typewritten sheets (4to) in carbon duplicates, revised by hand, with two smaller hand-drawn coloured maps of the Arabian Gulf, showing Bahrain and Qatar with the "Pirate Coast". A closely typed report on Bahrain, written in the autumn of 1936, outlining the country's history, situation, population, government, economy, foreign relationships and influences. This is accompanied by two detailed coloured sketch maps of the Gulf, showing Bahrain off the coast of Qatar and the entire Gulf from Kuwait to Oman, with the British and American spheres of interest and the international air routes marked. - During the two years that followed the end of the Great War, the British held control of most of Ottoman Mesopotamia (now Iraq) and the southern part of Ottoman Syria (Palestine and Transjordan), while the French controlled the rest of Syria, Lebanon, and other portions of southeastern Turkey. In the early 1920s, British and French control of these territories became formalized by the League of Nations' mandate system, and in 1923 France was assigned the League of Nations mandate of Syria. It would last until 1943, when Syria and Lebanon emerged as independent countries. - Occasional insignificant edge flaws; rust stains from old paperclips. Holes punched along left edge. A rare survival.