[Egypt - British engineering].MareMagnum
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Oblong small folio (238 x 320 mm). Photo album with 197 albumen prints, mounted between 3 and 6 per page on 49 cardboard leaves. Various sizes, typically 70 x 100 mm. Some larger small-format panoramas. Captioned in ink. Contemporary full cloth with handwritten title-label. An interesting album recording the construction of new British military barracks at Abbassia, Cairo, shortly before World War I. Compiled by James Frazer Annan (1887-1957), a British engineer working for the contractor Henry Lovatt Ltd. in Abbassia between 1910 and 1913. Some 40 photographs depict construction at its various stages, showing workers and equipment, including a concrete mixer, details of walling blocks, column caps and shells, scaffolding, and a consignment of cement, as well as a panoramic view of the construction site from July 1910. - Other images show memorable events including the coronation ceremonies for King George V in 1911, Lord Kitchener presenting prizes at a Rifle Meeting, and the Mahmal passing through Cairo during the annual pilgrimage to Mecca. City views of Cairo and Heliopolis, street scenes "in the Mousky district" and "among the Bazaars", the Eshekieh Gardens, the Pyramids, the Nile barrage and dam, tombs of the Khalifs and "typical Mosque tombs": A few more personal scenes such as Christmas dinner 1910 and a picture of baby "James junior" complete this appealing collection. - Occasional light spotting and duststaining. Provenance: Peter Johnstone, whose paternal grandmother, Elsie Amelia Johnstone, was housekeeper to James Frazer Annan. Peter Johnstone numbered the pages and loosely inserted an autograph description of the album, dated 13 May 1996.
4to. VI, 294 pp., final blank leaf. With watercolour frontispiece, 5 (instead of 7) watercolour plates, and numerous black and white photographic illustrations and sketches in the text. Contemporary half calf library binding with giltstamped spine, leatherette covers and shelfmark label. First edition. Richly illustrated travel report describing Egypt and the Nile, Lebanon, Syria, and Palestine. This "altogether satisfactory book of travel" (Luzac) describes an extensive trip undertaken in the late 1890s by the German painter Hermann Götz, the Director of the Grand Ducal School for Arts and Crafts in Karlsruhe. - In Genoa Götz boarded a steamer to Port Said, from where he proceeded to Cairo, Thebes, Luxor, and Aswan, then on to the Lebanon and Syria, stops including Beirut and Baalbek, Damascus and Haifa; he eventually reached Jaffa, Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Jericho and the Dead Sea. The lovely watercolours, reproduced after works by the author himself, show the statue of the wife of Ramesses II in the temple of Luxor, the entrance to the temple in Medinet-Habu, the ruins at Baalbek, and a bazaar in Jaffa, as well as atmospheric sunset scenes on the shores of the Nile and on Mount Olivet. The photographic illustrations show famous landmarks including the Pyramids, the Cairo citadel, the Dome of the Rock, and the windmills of Alexandria, as well as bazaar and street scenes, local types, views of the Nile, and group portraits of Götz's travel companions. - Spine very lightly rubbed. Tear to the upper edge of the title-page; pp. 63f. somewhat damaged and stained. Still a good copy of this entertaining travelogue seeking to encourage Europeans to travel the Middle East. Kainbacher I, 57. Luzac's Oriental List and Book Review XII, 236. OCLC 315953018.
4to. 114, (2) pp. With 24 numbered photographic plates. Original printed wrappers. Notable paper on mediaeval Swedish glass originating from the Middle East. It discusses lustreware of the Fatimid period, as well as glass of the Raqqa, Fustat, Aleppo, Damascus, and Syro-Frankish groups, studying grave finds as well as finds of enamelled and gilt glass in sites including the monastery of Vreta, Lund, Hälsingborg, Barkarby and Birka. The plates show well-preserved glass cups and goblets as well as jewellery and fragments of glass vessels and lustreware. - Lamm studied archaeology at the University of Stockholm. He wrote about the glass excavated at Samarra in 1928 and became a leading scholar on Islamic arts and crafts, notably in glass and carpets. He was on the staff of the Stockholm Museum and taught at Uppsala University. - Uncut copy. - In near-mint condition. OCLC 473515059.
4to. (4), 271 pp., final blank page. Contemporary half vellum over marbled boards with giltstamped spine, giltstamped spine-label, and and handwritten shelfmark to spine. First edition, rare. Historic edition of the notable Syrian treatise on incarnation and the Trinity. In Syriac type. - Pencil annotations to pp. 33-69. Stamps of ownership of Joseph A. Nelson and the library of St. Joseph's Seminary in Dunwoodie, New York, to title-page (the latter also to lower flyleaf). OCLC 652404559.
4to. 3 vols. (4), CII, 603 pp. VIII, 730 pp. VIII, 650 pp. Contemporary brown full calf by Gosselin of Paris, with richly gilt spines, red giltstamped title labels to spines, and giltstamped borders to covers, leading edges gilt, gilt inner dentelles. Marbled endpapers. All edges sprinkled red. Important collection of research on and excerpts from manuscripts concerning history, diplomacy, literature, and science from the Bibliothèque du Roi, now the Bibliothèque nationale de France, including important contributions by the oriental scholars Antoine Isaac Silvestre de Sacy and Joseph de Guignes, the historians François de l'Averdy and Louis-Georges de Bréquiny, and the classicists Guillaume Dubois de Rochfort and Jean-François Vauvilliers. - Volume 1 contains a long preface on the history of the oriental types of the Imprimerie Royale that were cast for the diplomat and orientalist François Savary de Brèves (1560-1628). Acquired by Richelieu for the Imprimerie, the valuable types were almost destroyed in the 18th century and saved by Joseph de Guignes, who wrote the preface. The volume also contains Guignes's comments on Al-Masudi's "Kitab Muruj al-Dhahab wa-Ma‘adin al-Jawhar" and Ibn-al-Athîr's "Al-Tarikh al-bahir fi al-Dawlah al-Atabakiyah bi-al-Mawsil" and two essays on Arabic manuscripts by Silvestre de Sacy. - Volume 2 includes two contributions each by Joseph de Guignes and Silvestre de Sacy on oriental manuscripts of the Bibliothèque du Roi. - The final volume focuses primarily on documents relating to the trial of Jeanne d'Arc, with several articles written by François de l’Alverdy. To this volume Guignes contributed a commentary on a 15th century Arabic manuscript recommending pilgrimages to the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem, and another on a manuscript entitled "On the prerogatives of the Al-Aqsa Mosque" by Ibn Abul Sherif. - The collection was inceived under the auspices of King Louis XVI and the Baron de Breteuil. By 1965 it grew to encompass 43 volumes, but only the three volumes at hand were published under the original title by the Académie Royale des Inscriptions & Belles-Lettres. The printing of a 4th volume had already begun in 1791 when it was interrupted by the French Revolution, which also led to the suppression of the Academy in 1793. - Spines rebacked, spine ends, corners and hinges repaired. Internally entirely sound.
Large folio (265 x 404 mm). Large paper copy. (18), 398, (8) pp. Complete copy with engraved frontispiece, engraved author's portrait, the frequently missing large engraved folding map of the Mediterranean Sea and all 122 plates. 18 large folding panoramic views, 28 folding plates and 56 full-plates, numerous half-plates text illustrations. Contemporary Dutch blindstamped vellum. First edition, large-paper copy, of this beautifully illustrated account of De Bruyn's first journey through Egypt, Syria, the Holy Land, Rhodes, Cyprus, Scio and Turkey. - The Dutch traveller and landscape painter Cornelis De Bruyn (1652-1726/28) left the Netherlands in 1674 to travel through the Levant by way of Italy. He stayed in the Levant for seven years before settling in Italy in 1685 and returning to the Netherlands in 1693. The work is especially valued for its plates after De Bruyn's own drawings, made on location and then engraved by such well-known artists as Jan and Caper Luyken, including folding panoramas of Alexandria, Antalya, Constantinople, Bethlehem, Jerusalem, Rhodes and Chios. De Bruyn's costume plates are mostly of the different types of Greek and Turkish head-dresses. The publication was soon followed by editions in English and French. - All panoramas in fine condition, not creased or torn (as often), only the panorama of Smyrna (Izmir) is trimmed with considerably narrower margins. Binding repaired with old vellum; some splitting to front hinge; upper spine-end damaged; loss to lower end. A few occasional internal stains, but still a very fresh and crisp copy. Atabey 159. Tiele 207. Klaversma & Hannema 311. Gay 2101. Henze I, 378. Howgego I, p. 157, B177. Weber II, 402 (note). Röhricht 1184. Tobler 114. Cobham/Jeffery 7. Laor 967. Schwab 74. Cohen/de Ricci 610. Lipperheide Ci 48 (= 546). Graesse I, 552. OCLC 4619950. Cf. Blackmer 225 (2nd French ed.). Aboussouan 164 (1725 French 4to ed.). Gnirrep, De Levant in een kleur (1997).
8vo (206 x 162 mm). XVIII, 30 pp. Original printed paper wrappers. Housed in a full black morocco case with cloth chemise. Second edition of FitzGerald's translation, substantially expanded and revised. Omar Khayyám was a Persian mathematician, astronomer, philosopher, and poet, famous in his own country and time chiefly for his scientific achievements. He is known to English-speaking readers mostly due to FitzGerald's translations, which were quite free and liberal in their paraphrasing and would prove to be the "most popular verse translation into English ever made" (Decker, p. xiv). - Five hundred copies of the second edition were printed, with Quaritch selling each at a price of 1s. 6d.; when a copy re-appeared in their catalogue in 1929, it had already reached a price of £52 10s. (Potter, p. 12). Fitzgerald substantially revised the text of the Rubáiyát four times, with none of these five versions seen as truly definitive. The first edition had 75 quatrains, while the present second edition, which has 110 quatrains, is the longest of the five. - Some light foxing throughout. Some soiling and creasing to wrappers; contemporary ownership inscription, dated 1869, to upper cover. Potter 129.
Folio (141 x 42,5 cm). Five folio leaves, printed in French and Arabic in two columns and pasted together vertically to form a single broadside. A massive broadside intended for wall-mounting, by which the newly appointed commander-in-chief introduced his government (and himself) to the people of Egypt in Arabic and French: "Habitans de l'Egypte, écoutez ce qu j'ai à vous dire au nom de la République Francaise. Vous étiez malheureux; l'armée francaise est venue en Egypte pouir vous porter le bonheur [...]". - Menou, who succeeded Kleber at the head of Egypt as general-in-chief, following Kleber's assassination in June, converted to Islam and took the name of Abdallah. Unlike most announcements published by his predecessor at the same press, the present proclamation is not headed with the motto of the French Republic, but rather with the Shahada ("There is no deity but God, Muhammad is the messenger of God") in both languages. Menou continues to set out his principles for a good government for Egypt, emphasizing his firm stand against abuse and corruption in the local administration of taxation, justice and the police, and finally threatens any attempt at rebellion with severe retaliation. - An important document from the first printing press in Arab world, of the utmost rarity due to its sheer size and ephemeral nature, according to OCLC recorded in four copies only: "The expedition of Napoleon Bonaparte to Egypt from 1798 until 1801 was a prelude to modernity. It was to change permanently the traditional Arab world [...] The French brought Arabic typography to Egypt, where it was practised under the supervision [...] of Jean Joseph Marcel [...]. Only a few days after the French troops landed [...] they set up the Imprimerie Orientale et Française there. It was an extraordinarily important turning point. For, leaving aside the Hebrew printing presses in Egypt of the 16th to the 18th centuries, until this date announcements and news adressed to Arabs there, as well as in other parts of the Arab-Islamic world, had been spread only in hand-writing or orally, by criers, preachers or storytellers" (Glass/Roper). - Traces of folding, but uncut with temoins. A surprisingly fresh survival. Cf. D. Glass/G. Roper, The Printing of Arabic Books in the Arab World, in: Middle Eastern Languages and the Print Revolution (Gutenberg Museum Mainz 2002), p. 177-225, at 182.
4to. (4), VI, 7-100 pp. With lithographed frontispiece and 3 lithographed plates. Original printed wrappers. Third edition. Rare treatise on equine appearance by a prominent figure of the French cavalry. Unlike the first edition, which included only two illustrations, the present third edition features 4 lithographed plates, including an Arabian horse and the horse's skeleton. Frequently cited by later works on hippology, Morris's essay discusses all aspects of the horse's physique, including proportions and the angular structure of the skeleton, which "can rather be applied to the Arabian horse than to European breeds" (de la Lance). - Wrappers slightly browned near margins. A fine, uncut copy of an equestrian classic. Mennessier de La Lance II, 227. Not in Boyd/P.
4to (150 x 190 mm). (40), 128 pp. With large engraved view on title-page, 3 full-page engr. plates in text, 9 half-page engr. plates in text, and 1 folding engr. plate bound at rear. Bound in contemporary stiff vellum with remains of manuscript title on spine. Extremely rare sole edition of this guide to fortification, written by a French sapper who had served in the Venetian navy during the Ottoman Siege of Candia (1648-69), in Crete. In his 40-page preface "au lecteur", Poullet writes at length about his experiences as a military engineer during the siege (illustrated in two half-page plates in text), and even includes 'attestations' in Italian of his military service under Marcantonio Giustiniani, dated from Zante (Greece), 1st March 1670. - Writing shortly before the Siege of Vienna in 1683, Poullet expresses the hope that his manual incorporates some of the lessons learned from the 21-year battle for Candia - seen as an impressive feat of resistance, despite ending in defeat for the Venetian forces. His illustrated examples of fortifications constantly refer to the best methods for fighting 'les Turqs' and the mistakes made in Crete. - With a handful of early manuscript corrections in text; plate 11 printed upside-down; head of spine with some loss, crudely repaired; internally one or two discreet wormholes, otherwise a very good copy. - A rare survival: OCLC shows just 5 copies worldwide (none in the US or UK); KVK adds one further, at the Austrian National Library. The copy at the Czech National Library is lacking one leaf of prelims. Mayer, Wiens Buchdrucker-Geschichte I, 1849.
Folio (270 x 360 mm). 167 pp., final blank page. With 4 illustrations in the text, and 36 numbered plates with mounted full-color reproductions of Islamic book bindings, included in pagination. Text and plates with gilt borders. Contemporary cardboard with 6 gilt ornaments, 3 each to upper and lower cover. Edition "B" of this sumptuous work on Islamic bookbinding. Exhibits some of the finest and most valuable tomes from Berlin's Bode Museum as well as examples from a private collection. Bound in the original adorned binding, the giltstamped ornaments featuring floral motifs as well as a hunting scene of a lion attacking a bull. - A total of 36 bindings are here reproduced in excellent colour facsimiles, impressively demonstrating the high quality of Egyptian, Persian, and Turkish book production from the 14th to 19th centuries. Each specimen is accompanied by a page of descriptive text. - Edited by the German orientalist and art historian Sarre (1865-1945), who amassed a great collection of Islamic art during his lifetime. - Extremities somewhat rubbed. Interior in excellent condition. Mejer 554. OCLC 905430423.
4to. (22), CXXI, (7), 320, (1) pp., final blank page. With lithographed folding map of the itinerary and a map of the Bengal Gulf. Publisher's original blue full cloth with giltstamped ship "Victoria" and blindstamped border to cover, as well as giltstamped spine-title. First Hakluyt edition and the principal English translation of "the first recorded visit by a Christian to Mecca" (Blackmer), containing the first printed eyewitness account of any place in today's United Arab Emirates, first published in Italian in 1510. - On his return journey from Mecca, Varthema visited Ras al-Khaimah ("Giulfar") and portrayed the city as "most excellent and abounding in everything", with "a good seaport", and whose inhabitants are "all Muslims". While Montalboddo's famous anthology of discoveries, printed in 1507, contained the first printed reference to the Arabian Gulf region, it was Varthema's work, published only three years later, that offered the first actual report from the region by a Western traveller who had visited the coast. - A gentleman adventurer and soldier from Bologna, the author left Venice at the end of 1502. In 1503 he reached Alexandria and ascended the Nile to Cairo, continuing to Beirut, Tripoli, Aleppo and Damascus, where, adopting Islam and taking the name of Yunas, he joined a Mameluke escort of a Hajj caravan and began the pilgrimage to Mecca. Thanks to his knowledge of Arabic and Islam, Varthema was able to appreciate the local culture of the places he visited. Impressed and fascinated, he described not only rites and rituals, but also social, geographical, and day-to-day details. After embarking at Jeddah and sailing to Aden, he was denounced as a Christian spy and imprisoned. He secured his release and proceeded on an extensive tour of southwest Arabia. Stopping in Sanaa and Zebid as well as a number of smaller cities, he describes the people, the markets and trade, the kind of fruits and animals that are plentiful in the vicinity, and any historical or cultural information deemed noteworthy. Returning to Aden, and after a brief stop in Ethiopia, he set sail for India. - From the collection of Col. Samuel Barrett Miles with his stamp of ownership to flyleaf. His widow sold the book to the Bath Public Reference Library in 1920 (their bookplate and shelfmark to pastedown, their blindstamped ownership to several pp., including the folding map). Old shelfmark label to spine. - Heads of spine and corners somewhat rubbed, slightly scuffed. Occasional light spotting; tear to right margin of folding map; pp. 39-42 loosened. A good copy. Howgego I, V15. Macro 2240. Cf. Blackmer 338. Gay 140.
11 pp. Re-stapled paper. A detailed war-time newsletter from the Middle East, relaying through the soldier's wives at home the regiment's movements at the front for family members back in the UK. Covering August 1942 to March 1943, it focuses on general updates of the regiment's position and provides lists of soldiers, facts which would give some comfort to their families. Whilst there are humorous bits on the trivialities of warfare, the confidential nature and redacted passages remind the reader that this was an internal communication with the bare minimum of information allowed. - The letter starts with addresses which a reader would need to write to for inquiries as to whether family members had been wounded or captured as prisoners. It then proceeds into "regimental letter number 1", which describes the regiment boarding a steamer and at sea; the typical routine is portrayed as a "wild rush to get the mess deck clean, hammocks and mattress stacked, blankets rolled and so on before breakfast" (p. 3). - The 2nd letter commences with 8 Dec. 1942, making reference to landing in Egypt and preparations for fighting Germany. In the same format as the first letter, it is followed by a battery notes section, listing ill or other soldiers who had to remain at HQ, promotions, soldiers injured and casualties sustained from the fighting. - A humorous note concerns an incident involving poisonous creatures of the desert, where "Battery Commander was dragged from his bed to take L/Bdr. Tait to the M.O. for treatment for scorpion sting. The scorpion, later in the night, was captured alive [...] and severely dealt with. Bdr. Hood G's scorpion sting turned out to be a piece of sardine tin, and it's thought that the piece of hand grenade alleged to have fallen on Gnr. Elliot's truck may have been the remainder of the tin" (p. 10). As discussed at the end of the letter, the paper rationing introduced in the UK meant that "it will be impossible to make the future circulation of these letters as wide as it has been" and that in the future a lady in each area of the UK would pass a single letter around for the families eager to find out about the loved ones on distant shores. - Some spotting and staining with a 3 cm tear along the central hold line to some pages. In good condition for a fragile letter.
4to. IX, (3), 188 pp. With 24 black-and-white photographic prints and 2 sketch maps of the route (one double page). Original blue full cloth with white stamped spine-title. Original illustrated dust jacket. First edition. Illustrated account of exploration along the Incense Route in Yemen and Saudi Arabia, written by "probably the first woman to have made the journey" (blurb). A gift copy with an 1969 inscription to flyleaf: "To Fred with love & best wishes for many happy returns of your birthday from Mina". - The seventh book in Toy's famous travel series involving her Landrover Pollyanna - or 'the desert gazelle', as it came to be called - narrating how her plan to follow the Incense Route was fraught with a disabling combination of immense danger - crossing war-torn Yemen - and burdensome bureaucracy. Her first attempt to cross the Saudi Arabian border was foiled, but she was able to join a pilgrimage caravan and became a valued member of the group due to her first aid box. - Toy's fascinating travelogue describes the sights and sounds along the route, includes anecdotes of Bedouin fables, and compares the rapidly developing country with memories of her previous travels in the Middle East. It includes an account of the Hejaz railway, some sections of which Toy followed on her trip, as well as the railroad's history and the various attempts to re-establish it after the destruction caused by T. E. Lawrence and his men. - Dust jacket unclipped, slightly worn at extremities. Block edges slightly spotted. A fine copy of this important piece of travel literature by one of the first Westerners to visit Saudi Arabia. OCLC 778317775.
4to (165 x 213 mm). Arabic manuscript on polished oriental paper. 53 pp. on 28 ff. 19 lines, per extensum, written in a Naskhi script in black ink, some words in red, some marginal notes. Contemporary half leather binding over marbled boards with fore-edge flap. A manuscript on Arabic prosody and metrics, forming a commentary on the well-known prosodic manual "Kitab al-'Arud al-Andalusi" by Abu al-Jaysh al-Ansari al-Qisti al-Andalusi (d. 626 H / 1229 CE). - The commentator Al-Qaysari, who flourished in Anatolia in the 14th century CE, both condensed and expanded on the work of Al-Jaysh, with the aim of providing a summary for students as well as adding his own perspective on the study of poetic metre and verse. He dedicated his effort to Emir Süleyman bin Tashun, an important political figure in Anatolia, who had commissioned the book. After a traditional introduction and long foreword, Al-Qaysari's work contains quotations from the original text, which he then juxtaposes with his own opinions. For his commentary, Al-Qaysari also drawn upon the standard works of Al-Khalil ibn Ahmad al-Farahidi (who first systematized the art of Arabic prosody) and Al-Khalil's student Al-Akhfash al-Avsat. - By tradition, Arabic prosody ('Arud) scans poetry not in terms of syllables (as in most Western languages), but in terms of vowelled and unvowelled letters, which are combined into larger units, which in turn make up feet. Sixteen types of metre are distinguished, some very common, others exceedingly rare. - The present copy was written in the early 18th century CE by a scribe who names himself as Ali ibn Muhammad ibn Ali ez-Zuhri es-Shirvani al Madani, a scholar who is known to have resided in Medina all his life. On the recto of the first leaf are a few later pencil notes which erroneously attribute the work's authorship to Al-Madani himself, though the copyist did indeed add several notes of his own supercommentary in the margins. - Binding a little rubbed; hinges chipped and weakened in places, interior very well preserved with minimal staining or smudging. A fine example. GAL I 310, 8 & S I 544, 9. Cf. Joan Maling, The Theory of Classical Arabic Metrics (1973). Ernest N. McCarus, "Identifying the Meters of Arabic Poetry", in: Al-’Arabiyya 16.1/2 (1983), pp. 57-83.
8vo. (4), II, 3-438 pp. Original printed wrappers of the identical fourth edition. Fifth edition of General Daumas' work on all aspects of the Arabian horses of the Sahara desert. With commentary by the Algerian Sufi saint and military and religious leader Abd-el-Kader (1808-83), the Emir of Mascara who founded the Algerian state and led the Algerians in their struggle against French domination, and in 1847 was imprisoned with his family by the French government in the fortress of Lamalgue in Toulon. - Divided into two parts, the book includes extensive information on the principles of Arabian cavalry, military costumes of horsemen, celebrated Arabian horse breeds (Haymour, Bou-ghareb, Meizique), how to choose and acquire one's horse, nutrition, hygiene, the meaning of the variously coloured equestrian attires, rigging, veterinarian medicine and illnesses, crippled horses, castration, various kinds of military attacks in the desert and how to execute them, tribal wars, as well as ostrich, gazelle, and falcon hunting. - Daumas (1803-71), a French general of the first cavalry division, was posted to Algeria in 1835, which Charles X had invaded five years previously. Daumas participated in 18 Algerian campaigns, including those of Mascara and Tlemcen. Between 1837 and 1839, Daumas resided in Mascara as consul and personally got to know the Emir of Mascara. While in Algeria, Daumas learned the Arabic language and became one of the French army's leading experts on Arab culture in North Africa. Tribesmen came to respect him for his skills on horseback. In April 1850 he became director of Algerian affairs at the Ministry of War in Paris. - Contemporary handwritten ownership by the French scholar Paulin Malosse to half-title. Occasional light foxing. A fine copy of this equestrian classic. Mennessier de la Lance I, 349. Huth 178. Boyd/P. 33. Cf. Gay 1524. Not in Podeschi.
8vo. 64 pp. Contemporary half cloth. Very rare second edition of this Yiddish-language study of the Prophet Muhammad, essentially a reissue of the Meir Chinsky edition of 1898. It includes not only a biography of the Prophet and a discussion of the Qur'an and of Islam, but also chapters with a specifically Jewish perspective, such as on the Jewish population of Arabia (especially in Mecca and Medina), on Muhammad's "dreadful revenge on the Jews", etc. The author published similar accounts on Jesus of Nazareth ("Yeyshu Hanoytsri: zayn ersheynen, leben und toydt: algemeyner iberblik vegen der entshtehung fun kristenthum") and Sabbatai Zevi ("Der Terkisher Meshieh: a historish romantishe shilderung iber dem leben und virken fun Shabtay Tsvi"). The highly versatile journalist, novelist, and playwright D. M. Hermalin (1865-1921) was born and educated in Bucharest, where he worked for various newspapers before being compelled to leave Romania and emigrating to the United States at the age of twenty. Here, he taught French and Hebrew and achieved distinction as a much-admired family page editor for Yiddish newspapers such as the "Folks Advokat", the "Yiddisher Herold", and the "Wahrheit". He wrote thrillers, but also translated Tolstoy, Maupassant, Zola, Bocaccio, and Shakespeare into Yiddish; his 1901 translation of Goethe's "Faust" was the first complete Yiddish version. - Stamps of ownership of the Jewish Socialist Branch of Chelsea as well as the Chelsea Labor Lyceum Association Library to lower pastedown and several pages, including the title-page. Shelfmarks to front pastedown and title-page. Extremities slightly rubbed, paper browned and brittle. - No copy in trade records; online library catalogues list copies at the British Library, Brandeis University Library (Waltham, MA), Yivo Institute for Jewish Research (New York), and the Hebrew Union College (Cincinnati). OCLC 122983891.
Standard issue, 695 x 1025 mm. Scale 1:876,000. Fine nautical chart of the western portion of the Arabian Gulf. With 3 inset maps of Kharg and Khárgu, Jezirat Halul anchorage, and Sheikh Shu'aib, as well as 18 small panoramic coastal views. - The chart provides details of Qatar and Bahrein as well as of parts of Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia. Major labelled localities include Basra, Kuwait and Kuwait Harbour, Bushire, Al Qatif, Doha and Muharraq. Further, the chart marks the Anglo-Persian oil pipeline as well as landmarks including Dilam fort and several tombs. - The British Admiralty has produced nautical charts since 1795 under the auspices of the United Kingdom Hydrographic Office (HO). Its main task was to provide the Royal Navy with navigational products and service, but since 1821 it has also sold charts to the public. The present chart was composed after Admiralty surveys between 1821 and 1934; it was first published in 1862 and saw several corrections up to 1948. - With a single fold. A few faint pencil notes. Upper left corner slightly creased.
4to. XII, 127, (8) pp., final blank page. Front flyleaf included in the pagination. Original printed wrappers. With dust jacket. Only edition, very scarce. - Noted essay on the physique of the Anglo-Arabian horse, challenging the theory of its over-lightness and insufficiency - the "gravest and most unjust" criticism levelled against the breed. Prepared by the vice-president of the prominent Toulouse stables "Écurie coopérative du Midi", Claude Marty. Of the utmost rarity: a single library copy traceable internationally (French National Library). - The main part of this work is made up of highly informative tables, displaying the distribution of the various breeds in the French, Algerian, Spanish, and Prussian cavalry forces, specifying their origins, as well as weights and body measures, and occasionally even stating their given names. Several other tables show the use of the Anglo-Arabian for public transportation in Toulouse. The work concludes with remarks on the Anglo-Arabian's high bone density and their physical ability to set vehicles in motion. - Ownership stamp of the Bibliothèque de Trélissac to half-title. Dust jacket somewhat worn, minor tears. A few pages loosened. A good copy of this important work rarely seen in the trade. OCLC 457358123.
8vo. 94, (1) pp., final blank page. With a folding plan of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and a folding map of Palestine and southern Syria. Original printed wrappers. Very rare pocket guide to the Holy Land, prepared for British soldiers serving in Mandatory Palestine, encouraging them to explore sites of religious and historical interest in "a land of diversity" that can be "bewildering at times to the newcomers" (p. 5). - The book describes the most prominent landmarks of Jerusalem and its surroundings, including the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the Dome of the Rock, the Via Dolorosa, the Muristan, the Zion quarter, Gethsemane, and Jericho, as well as Bethlehem and Hebron, and gives directions to and accounts of other places including Jaffa, Tel Aviv, Haifa, Beirut, Nazareth, Damascus, and Baalbek. In addition, it contains a short history of Palestine and a chronological list of events from 2,600 BC to the Lebanon's declaration of independence in 1941. - Wrappers slightly soiled. Plan lightly waterstained; pp. 77-80 torn at lower margin without loss to text; paper evenly browned throughout. A good copy. Only two library copies traceable internationally (National Library of Israel and Stanford University Library). OCLC 234128765.
8vo. XXIV, 195 pp., final blank page. With 25 numbered illustrations mainly depicting falcons and hunting and hawking scenes, including frontispiece and of which several full-page. Contemporary full cloth with giltstamped spine-title and illustration of a hunt to front cover. First edition. One of 500 copies of this rare Persian treatise on falconry, giving a detailed account of falcons as well as hunting-birds in general, translated by Douglas Craven Phillott. The translator's introduction gives an account of the author, a prince of Persia (d. 1874), and his book. "An excellent translation [...] A valuable addition to a falconer's library, whether or not he be interested in hawking in the East" (Barber). - Corners and spine ends lightly bumped; small tears to cloth in the upper part of the spine. Bookplate of G. J. B. Barry, depicting a falcon, to pastedown. A rare and very important work by a falconer who flourished in the middle of the 19th century. Schwerdt IV, 92. Barber 14.
12mo. 1 p. Manuscript in the form of a folded letter entitled "Sheah Relique" that originally enclosed a so-called turbah, here described as follows: "Turbot. A relique of the Sheah Musulmen when they pray they kiss it. It is formed of the earth of Kerbela or Naguf Ashraf a place consecrated to the Shrine of Hussain son of Ally son in law of Mohamed. They place such faith in this that they believe it will keep them from all evils and I hold it from a Persian's own mouth that if a gale of wind was to arise and the ship in imminent danger of being lost, by throwing the smallest particle of this into the sea it would instantly subside". - A turbah is a small piece of soil or clay, often in the form of a seal with imprints, that is used by Shia Muslims during daily prayers to symbolize their connection to the earth. The most favoured soil for the creation of turbahs is that from the site of the shrine of Husayn ibn Ali in Karbala, Iraq, as mentioned in the manuscript. In contrast to what the description suggests, not only soil from Karbala or Najaf Ashraf, another holy city of Shia Islam in Iraq, can be used for a turbah. However, apotropaic properties such as safeguarding against calamities have been ascribed to the "turbah Karbala". - Two worn pieces of leather that originally held the turbah described in the text are still enclosed. On English paper with watermark from 1828. Minor foxing and stains; traces of folds and several large tears not affecting the text.
8 vols. 1mo and folio. With 7 (of 8) engraved frontispieces (lacking that of volume 4), 4 engraved dedications, 117 engraved maps on 61 leaves, 7 engraved plates and 502 engravings in text. Further with 127 (of 128) title-pages (including a general title-page, a title-page to 7 (of 8) volumes, lacking that of volume 4, and 118 for the separate works). Volume 1-3 & 5-8: contemporary mottled calf, gold-tooled spine and board edges; volume 4: modern calf. Large paper copy of the so-called "folio-edition" (although here mostly printed as 1mo) of Van der Aa's voluminous collection of important voyages to the East and West Indies and other countries, undertaken by all European countries, other than the Dutch. Including voyages by Acosta, Balbi, Cabot, Cavendish, Chester, Columbus, Cortes, Coutinho, Da Cunha, Drake, Evesko, Frobisher, Gallonye, Da Gama, Garay, Garcia, Gilbert, Jenkinson, Harcourt, Herberer, Magallanes, Mildenhal and Cartwright, Mouette, Petelin and Andrasko, Raleigh, Saris, De Soto, etc. - The work is falsely attributed on the title-page to Johan Lodewijk Gottfried, by Van der Aa, most likely because he made good money publishing Gottfried's "Chronicle" in 1702. In reality Gottfried had nothing to do with the present work. The work was edited and co-published by Pieter van der Aa, known for his ambitious projects. Where other publishers were primarily concerned about the profits, Van der Aa wanted to publish outstanding books. For the present series of travels he either reused and revised older Dutch translations or had the original accounts translated for the first time into Dutch. In 1706 he already started publishing the translated voyages both in small (8vo) and large instalments (folio or 1mo), and a year later he published a 28-volume set of the 8vo editions. The folio editions were afterwards issued and divided in four large collections of two volumes each. The present issue, is a reissue of these four collections with their own independent title-pages and frontispieces, and ads a new general title-page and list of subscribers. - While all sets seem to be described as "folio" the present set is printed mainly as 1mo, with some occasional quires in folio. And as the large editions of the two volume sets were available on normal paper (80 guilders) and on large paper (100 guilders; Hoftijzer, p. 43), it seems very likely the present set is one printed on large paper. All leaves are unwatermarked and the 1mo leaves are only slightly trimmed (measuring 396 x 238 mm with the tranchefiles often still visible) the folio leaves are trimmed more and don't have visible tranchefiles. The fourth volume is from a different set which is trimmed down much more, but also combines both 1mo and folio leaves. - Some occasional spots, a couple minor restorations and a few wormholes; a very good set, but with the fourth volume from a different and heavily trimmed set (though printed on the same large paper), in a modern binding and lacking the frontispiece and the title-page to the volume. The seven volumes with contemporary bindings slightly worn along the extremities and with some minor wear on the sides, but otherwise very good. Cordier (Sinica) 1942f. Muller, America 1889. Sabin 3 (note). Tiele, Bibl. 10. For Van der Aa: P.G. Hoftijzer, Pieter van der Aa (1659-1733), Leids drukker en boekverkoper (1999).
8vo. XXII, 290, 8 pp. Contemporary full blue cloth with remains of a printed spine title. First edition. Entitled "The Book of Wonder, or the Summary of News of the Maghreb", this is the best-known work of the Moroccan historian 'Abd al-Wahid (1185-1250): a personal and at the same time neutral account of Almohad rule from its foundation to the 13th century, but also of the preceding dynasty of the Almoravids, with a summary of Al-Andalus history from the Muslim conquest until 1224. The book is written in a lighthearted spirit with many anecdotes; 'Abd al-Wahid explained that his intention was to inform and entertain the students in a summarized way since academic history books tend to be overly lengthy which can sometimes bore the reader. The work also contains valuable information about 'Abd al-Wahid's contemporary Ibn Rushd (Averroes), whom he may have known personally, as well as information directly taken from the Almohad archives, various princes and accounts of events that the author witnessed. A number of details point to Egypt as the place of writing, and the author himself states that he completed the work on 15 July 1224. Dozy's important edition of the Leyden MS. was republished in 1881. - Corners and spine-ends a little bumped. Occasional quite insignificant foxing; uncut and untrimmed as issued. Provenance: removed from the library of Carberry Tower, the Scottish castle mansion owned by the Elphinstone family from the 1860s to the 1960s, with bookplate and shelfmark to front pastedown. GAL I, 322. For Dozy's editions of historical texts on the history of Muslim Spain see Fück, p. 182.
4to (170 x 225 mm). Arabic manuscript on polished paper. 77 ff. Black and occasional red ink, 21 lines, per extensum, extensive marginalia throughout, a few smaller interleaved sheets of commentary. Contemporary brown papered boards with rebacked leather spine. An extensive Arabic astronomical manuscript in seven parts, comprising: - 1. (fols. 1-18) a rare treatise on the astrolabe, providing the names of its various parts and segments and instructions as to its use, by Abd al-Hakim al-Qaysari (Sweilam Zadeh, Abdalhalim al-Qaysari Söylemzade). - 2. (fols. 19-33) Muhammad Abi Bakr (Sajjili Zadeh), Taeliqat ealaa risalat al-adab 'l-i-Tash Kabry Zadeh (a commentary on Tashkoprizadeh). - 3. (fols. 34-42) Ibrahim bin Muhammad bin Arabshah al-Isfara'ini (d. 944 H/1537 CE), Sawf ealaa risalat alayjy. - 4. (fols. 43-62) Ahmed bin Omar bin Ali, Hashiat ealaa Tash Kabry Zadeh (brief remarks on Tashkoprizadeh). - 5. (fols. 63-66) Ejalat kfayyt liwasayil alssayilin liwazayif alkalam (Sufficient urgency for the questioners' means for speech functions). - 6. (fols. 67-71) Sharah alshamsya (Explanation of the sun). - 7. (fols. 71-77) Ahmad ibn Muhammad al-Qaz Abadi, Sharah risalat al-adab li-'l-Barkawi (Explanation of the commentary on manners by al-Barkawi). - Binding a little stained; paper slightly brittle along the edges, but clean. Cf. GAL S II, 1017.