[Palestine - American Colony].MareMagnum
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Oblong 8vo (190 x 130 mm) 57 albumen prints (mostly 90 x 65 mm) mounted on 15 black sheets, 9 more loosely inserted. Wooden boards with a coloured view of Rachel's tomb, captioned in Hebrew and English. Charming souvenir album, privately assembled by a British soldier and captioned by him throughout with his ownership entry "Jerusalem. E. Stacey. 9.9.46" to inner front board and a photo ("Boys of the Shack 147") showing him among his comrades in front of their baracks. The majority of the photos bear the ink stamp of the Matson Photo Service on the reverse. The Matsons were handed the management of the American Colony photo service in 1934. The American Colony was a utopian Christian sect formed by religious pilgrims who emigrated to Jerusalem from the United States and Sweden.
33 x 44 cm (neat line). Pencil on paper. Charming dressage scene between an Arab in back view and two bridled Arabian horses with luxurious saddles and a backdrop of tents. The stallion on the left is carrying a round shield and a bow. The signing artist Charles Paris was probably an amateur and is not otherwise known. - Professionally restored. The upper and right margins show traces of tears and brittleness, probably due to old water damage. Browning and minor foxing overall. Some light spotting to the lower margin. The drawing is little affected by the paper flaws.
4to (188 x 254 mm). Arabic manuscript on paper. 51 ff. Script in bold black sini, 5 lines within red rules, vowel markers in black and corrections in red, surah headers in red, illuminated double-page frontispiece 'Unwan decorated with geometrical and floral designs in gold and colours in a typical Yunnan style of mainly gold on a red ground highlighted with green and blue. 16th century full brown leather with fore-edge flap, prettily ruled and stamped in blind with Islamic and Chinese-influenced designs. Very early Qur'an Juz (one of thirty parts of varying lengths into which the Qur'an is divided) written in 16th 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' 19 begins with surah 25, al-Furqan (The Criterion), contains in full surah 26, ash-Shu'ara (The Poets), and closes with the beginning of surah 27, an-Naml (The Ant). - The colophon in red script on the recto of the last leaf states that the manuscript was "copied by Shams al-Din ibn Musa al-Sini in the month of Safar of the year 953 AH in the city of Yunnan, one of the Chinese cities which has been honoured and blessed by Islam". - Binding rebacked and spine and endpapers professionally replaced; subtle paper repairs. An excellent example of the Islamic Chinese style of Qur'anic calligraphy and illumination. Provenance: Private UK collection formed in the 1960s and 1970s.
4to (182 x 275 mm). (6), VIII, 40 pp. Publisher's original illustrated printed wrappers. First edition of this study on the origins of the Wahhabis, published from the archives of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs. With a preface by the French historian Édouard Driault (1864-1947). An Arabic translation ("al-Tadhkirah fi asl al-Wahhabiyin wa-dawlatihim") appeared at Riyadh as recently as 2004. - Binding somewhat frayed and chipped. Uncut, untrimmed copy from the library of the respected Cairo-based Egyptologist and dealer in antiquities, Roger Khawam (1922-2016), who dispersed his library four years before his death (his Scarab bookplate to the front free endpaper). Macro 1874. OCLC 5277329.
8vo. 372 pp. With frontispiece portrait, 4 maps (1 folding) & 17 plates. Publisher's gilt cloth with chipped and spotted dustjacket. First edition of this overview of Arab history and culture work that draws upon the author's own experience in the region and includes some of T. E. Lawrence's exploits. - Inscribed on the front free endpaper in the year of publication: "To the Rt Hon and Mrs L.S. Amery, With respects, Bertram Thomas, May 1937". - Bertram Thomas's (1892-1950) "first crossing of the Empty Quarter, albeit by the shortest and easiest route, assured him a permanent place in the history of European exploration of Arabia. He was admired by T. E. Lawrence (who wrote a preface to one of his books) and by his successor Wilfred Thesiger, who found twenty years later that Thomas was remembered by the Bedouin as an honourable, brave, and tolerant man" (ODNB). Leopold Amery (1873-1955) served a Colonial Secretary as well as Secretary of State for India and Burma in Churchill's war ministry. - A few minor spots, but still a very good copy. Macro 2186.
Albumen print, 279 x 218 mm.
8vo. (8), 384 pp. Cloth-backed red boards with title inked on spine, likely privately bound. Very rare privately published botanical text on the famous expedition of the Jewish agronomist Aaron Aaronsohn (1876-1919) through the Anti-Lebanon mountain range and his subsequent discovery of what was claimed to be the oldest wild wheat, ancestor of all farmed wheat today. - While the exact line of descent of modern wheat is contested and complex, Aaronsohn's wheat - wild emmer - was indeed ancient, and its discovery remains a landmark moment in historical botany and the study of the history of human civilization. Like much of Aaronsohn's work, his detailed notes on the wild wheat distribution and other botanical notes on the landscapes he surveyed were published posthumously by Aaronsohn's family. The text includes numerous scientific names and an index, plus 13 botanical designs and 38 photoplates documenting the expedition. A folding map at the rear is titled "Aaronsohn's travels in Jordan and the distribution of wild wheat in the land of Israel". Largely in Hebrew, supplemented with scientific Latin, this Hebrew version is very uncommon, as Aaronsohn's work was originally published in French as "Florula transiordanica: révision critique des plantes récoltées et partiellement determinées", also by his family, in 1931. - Binding bumped at extremeties; a few library stamps to title-page, along with some minor paper repairs. Altogether in good condition. OCLC 42945306.
Small folio (280 x 212 mm). 5 issues. Original illustrated wrappers. Five issues of Aramco World. In November 1949 the Arabian American Oil Company launched "Aramco World" as an interoffice newsletter that linked the company's U.S. offices with "the field" - primarily Dhahran, in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia. The journal quickly grew into a monthly (later bi-monthly) educational magazine featuring historical, geographical and cultural articles that helped the American employees and their families appreciate an unfamiliar land. - The present collection comprises vol. 3, nos. 2, 4, and 11; vol. 5, no, 10, and vol. 6, no. 7. - Heads of spine somewhat worn. Interior in excellent condition.
4to. 106, 22 ff. (as numbered; some leaves numbered with 'a' numbers according to preceding leaf, per standard industry practice). Published as a mimeographed typescript with inset illustrations, many folding. Bound in original wrappers with metal split pin fasteners. Second revised edition. A very extensive report supplied to Aramco regarding the Convair CV-340, a passenger jet designed largely for airlines like United, but quite popular in Saudi Arabia during the first decades of Saudi passenger air service. - The early 1950s saw the dawn of what would become Saudi Arabian Airlines, precipitated in part by the gift of a Douglas DC-3 passenger jet from U.S. President Roosevelt to King Ibn Saud in 1945. It would be the DC-3 and the CV-340 which would comprise the first fleets of passenger planes in Saudi Arabia. That Aramco, a large regional employer, might be interested in the CV-340 is thus understandable; in fact, both planes are remembered by Aramco employees from the 1950s and 1960s - and especially by their children, who were often sent to prep schools in cities like Rome, but flew home on DC-3s and CV-340s to Aramco installations like Dhahran with their peers for holidays. - The CV-340 was developed by Consolidated Vultee (later Convair) from the earlier CV-240, but was newer and larger; the first flight test took place on 5 October 1951. The CV-340 seated at total of 44 passengers. In all, 209 aircraft of this type were sold to airlines but 37 went to private operators, potentially including those interested in purchase at Aramco and more generally in Saudi Arabia and along the Gulf. In extensive text and diagrams, every aspect of the engineering and design of the plane is presented, from the new layout of the tailfin to the shocks in the landing gear to the fire extinguishing system. - A touch of wear, otherwise a well-preserved example of a rare publication produced in a very limited number of copies for promotional and reference use only.
Large 8vo (180 x 250 mm). (288) ff. Full auburn leather, titled on paper spine label. A volume of medical pathology printed lithographically in Persian (with occasional Arabic), featuring detailed descriptions of physical ailments, including the appearances of ailing organs as might be seen by a surgeon, the areas of the world in which a particular disease or ailment was more common, and the history of a disease as known to medical science at the time. Each entry is titled and numbered, though not always consecutively, and a table of contents can be found at the rear. - An interesting and detailed medical textbook, covering everything from the venereal to the cardiovascular, probably reproduced lithographically from a contemporary manuscript. The likely scribe of that original manuscript, named in the colophon, was Muhammad Baqir ibn Muhammad Jawad al-Mussawi al-Asfahani. - Blindstamps from the library of the Fabryky Sergyeva, Ukraine, appear on some pages. Light exterior wear. Title-page loose with edge flaws, occasional light stains, otherwise generally in good condition.
8vo. 3 vols. XXIV, (2), 328 pp. XII, 304 pp. XII, 384 pp. With 8 plates, 4 of which are folding, and one folding map. 19th century cloth-backed brown boards, paper spine labels. Second edition. "Acclaimed by critics as one of the most valuable books on travel that had ever appeared, it was the first comprehensive account of the whole of Central Asia" (Howgego, p. 83). - The best-known work of Alexander Burnes (1805-41), a Scottish diplomat, military officer, spy, and explorer who was once nicknamed "Bukhara Burnes" for his role in establishing contact with and exploring Bukhara, a historical stop along the Silk Road and today the seventh-largest city in Uzbekistan. Burnes began his career serving in the army of the East India Company and swiftly became enmeshed in what the British called The Great Game: a series of disputes between the British and Russian empires as each sought to acquire Afghanistan and surrounding areas under imperial rule. This had large ramifications in West Asia and the subcontinent, and Burnes was familiar with many of the local political actors who rose to become major players in the Game, such as Ranjit Singh (1780-1839) and especially Mohan Lal Zutshi (1812-77), an Indian fellow explorer and diplomat who guided Burnes on his trip to Bukhara. Zutshi and Burnes remain at the heart of Burnes's narrative. The folding map at the rear of vol. 1 illustrates the path Mohan Lal Zutshi and Burnes took through West Asia. - Light exterior wear, front cover of vol. 3 detached, otherwise in good condition. OCLC 3813162. Cf. Wilson 35 (1835 ed.). Howgego, 1800-1850, B77.
Large 8vo. Vol. 1 (out of 5) only. 320 pp. With numerous charts and in-text illustrations, folding map at rear. Burgundy cloth ruled and stamped in blind, covers with bevelled edges, title in gilt, with a colour map of Russia and Northeast Asia decorating the front cover. First volume of this illustrated history on the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905 in Ottoman Turkish, featuring numerous in-text illustrations and a large colour folding map depicting China and Manchuria, Korea, Japan, and Russia at the moment of conflict. - The Russo-Japanese war was one of the precipitating events of the 20th century, and played its part in leading Russia towards destabilization and revolution as well as affecting the trajectory of Japan's relations with the West. It is of particular interest to Turkish history and indeed was of great contemporary interest in Ottoman Turkey; the outbreak of war "generated waves of enthusiasm in Turkey as a traditional arch-rival of Russia", though the results of war "on the empire proved disastrous" (Esenbel). Many in Turkey identified with the Japanese, having recently fought and lost territory to Russia themselves. Though the official Ottoman stance was neutrality, in an attempt not to antagonize Russia, individuals felt differently: "When Muslim newspapers celebrated Japan’s defeat of Russia as the victory of the downtrodden Eastern peoples over the invincible West, a Turkish nationalist feminist, Halide Edip, like many other women, named her son Togo after the commander of the Japanese fleet, Admiral Heihachiro Togo" (Esenbel). The Ottoman fascination with the war and with Japan is clear from the text and its numerous illustrations of Japanese people and scenes. - There are at least four Persian translations of this history held in the Afghanistan Digital Library in Kabul, but no copy of the original version, which, interestingly, is always labelled as "unknown Turkish work" by the cataloguer. - Spine shaken and splitting, binding remains firm. Özege 14434. Selçuk Esenbel, "The Impact of the Russo-Japanese War on Ottoman Turkey", in Shingetsu Electronic Journal of Japanese-Islamic Relation 4 (Sept. 2008), pp. 16-24. OCLC 645667890.
565 x 441 mm chromolithograph map, folding down to a 240 x 120 mm pamphlet. Original pink wrappers. A rare map of Jerusalem during the British Mandate Period, printed especially for British and allied forces stationed in the area. The map is a chromolithograph by the Düsseldorf-born artist Bernhard Gauer (1882-1955), with outer districts pleasantly hand-coloured in yellow and pale green and selected buildings depicted pictorially. On the reverse is a brief guide to everything a serviceman was expected to need in Jerusalem: churches of various denominations (Church of England, Methodist, Greek Orthodox, etc.), four Masonic lodges, officer's clubs for the well-to-do and YMCAs and hostels for the less affluent, and, naturally, bookshops. A map of Palestine and southern Syria is printed on the rear wrapper. An uncommon and thorough guide to the city, from the minutiae of taxi service rates to the locations of holy sites and Europeans' preferred neighborhoods. - Light wear, otherwise in excellent condition. OCLC 1100427555.
Oblong folio (327 x 232 mm). 13 ff. containing 52 mounted silver gelatin photographs, with one press photo laid in (photograph sizes range from 60 x 60 mm to 90 x 140 mm and 170 x 235 mm). Contemporary saddle-stitched red cloth decorated in blind. Loosely inserted is a 1952-62 German passport with a 1957 residence permit/visa for Iraq and many stamps from Iraq in the 1950s. The photo album of German Friedrich Hemmeter (1928-2019), featuring construction, building projects, and interesting scenes of 1950s Iraq. Hemmeter was likely in Iraq employed as a construction manager or similar; certainly, he had an interest in the architecture, engineering, and modernization of the country's infrastructure. - Hemmeter's photographs capture both traditional buildings and ways of life and the sweeping changes of the construction yard, often with an artistic eye for the camera. Alongside striking photographs of workers shoveling concrete under a bright desert sky, or taking a break in the shade of a small shed, are photographs of the elegant architecture of mosques and ancient sites in Iraq and Egypt. Mounted next to a photograph of a modern European-style building is a snapshot of the Taq Kasra; this contrast provides an illuminating picture of Iraqi architecture in the twentieth century. - Laid in is a 1964 press photo of Vice President of Egypt Mohamed Abdel Hakim Amer and Iraqi president Abdul Salam Arif during Amer's visit to Iraq. - With just a few minor creases, quite well preserved.
Folding map of Arabia (180 x 135 cm), coloured in outline, dissected and mounted on cloth (24 sections). The exceptionally rare first independently issued edition of this famous, meticulously prepared map of Arabia and the Gulf. The "Hunter map" is an enormous, wall-size chart showing an astounding degree of detail. The "Gulf portion being largely based on actual surveys can be considered fairly accurate. [...] Kuwait (except that portion based upon actual surveys) Hasa, Jabal Shammar, Qasim, 'Aridh, Oman, Hadhramaut are the result of exhaustive use of detail supplied by travellers supplemented by months and months of enquiry by local Political Officers. The map of these portions can certainly claim superiority over any previous work of the kind" (Notes on the Map of Arabia and the Persian Gulf [...] compiled by Capt. F. Fraser-Hunter 1905-1908 [Calcutta, 1910], p. 1). - The Canadian-born Hunter later became a major figure in British India's Intelligence Service. As the author recalled in his 1919 "Reminiscences", "a great deal of the information on the map was from sources considered secret at the time" (p. 357). Special surveys of the country's interior areas were carried out to achieve a hitherto unprecedented degree of accuracy: "The map was a distinct advance on anything which existed, as in 1908 no general map of Arabia on such a large scale existed" (p. 360). - Hunter's map was first issued in a very limited press-run to accompany John G. Lorimer's "Gazetteer of the Gulf" (1908); at that time it still bore the title, "Map of the Persian Gulf, 'Oman, and Central Arabia". It was subsequently used (and praised) by St John Philby during his journey across Arabia. Indeed, reliable topographical information was an invaluable asset not least to the local Sheikhdoms in their territorial disputes during this politically volatile age: Hunter recounts that on one occasion, the Sheikh of Umm-al-Qaiwan went so far as to torture his relative, the Sheikh of Abu Dhabi, into signing away his right to strategically important islands in the Arabian Gulf, a stratagem foiled only by the happy intervention of the British Political Resident. - Stamp of the University Library of Nijmegen on the cloth backing. A very few minute traces of worming, otherwise in fine, spotless condition. Never seen in the trade: the only two copies of this map in auction records were both of the 1914 issue (Christie's, 2012, and Sotheby's, 2013). Not in Al Ankary or Al-Qasimi.
Oblong folio (297 x 216 mm). 12 ff. 10 silver gelatin photographs mounted in photo corners, each 175 x 115 mm. Contemporary patterned cloth with saddle-stitched binding. Rare original photographs of bridge construction in Amara, taken shortly before the 1958 Iraqi revolution the following year. Sequential photographs show materials and cranes gathering on the banks, the cranes at work lifting steel girders, wooden pylons being sunk, the busy construction zones on each bank, and workers inspecting their materials. The album's title is handwritten in German on the first leaf. - Between 1950 and 1960 two steel-deck-type plate-girder highway bridges were designed in Britain for the Iraq government, the first of which was the New Amara Bridge, a twin-box girder bridge with pier foundations featuring large bored piles, likely the project pictured here. - Quite well preserved.
Oblong folio (240 x 166 mm). 20 ff. 25 silver gelatin photographs, one of which is laid in at the rear; each is roughly 90 x 140 mm. Contemporary textured brown cloth, saddle-stitched with tassel. A rare collection of photographs of the political actors of 1950s and 1960s Iraq and the Kurdistan Region, each set having been taken only a year before the revolutions of 1958 and 1968, respectively. The photographs have been collected here with handwritten captions in German, possibly by one of the German engineering technicians featured in one snapshot. The earlier photographs feature the royal family, including the crowds of spectators awaiting King Faisal in 1957, the banquet for the guests of King Faisal in Sulaymaniyah, and the visit of the Regent and Crown Prince of Iraq, Abd al-Ilah, to Sulaymaniyah in the wake of the flooding in Autumn of 1957. - The laid in photographic print is dated 1955 and titled "im Garten v. Naji Khedairy", featuring a nighttime snapshot, presumably of Khedairy, staring down the camera with a glass in hand. - The later photographs are from September of 1967, several months after the Six Days' War, and feature the political landscape once again on the brink of change: two photos of Iraqi Prime Minister Tahir Yahya in a pinstripe suit walking with leader of the Kurdistan Democratic Party Mustafa Barzani, another photo of Barzani walking alone; several shots Abdul Razzak, Mustafa Barzani, and Tahir Yahya seated together with refreshments, including one of Barzani and Yahya laughing together, another photograph of Barzani captioned "Der kurdische Führer im Gespräch mit einem irakischen Militär", several casual snapshots of the "Kurdische Delegation" relaxing between meetings, one of which features one woman in Western dress, and a snapshot of the Kurdish military headquarters in Quaradagh. - Altogether, a photographic record of the political leaders of the region during two tumultuous decades, and their meetings amid conflict. Well preserved.
Oblong folio (335 x 240 mm). 16 ff. 110 albumen and silver gelatin photographs mounted in photo corners, with handwritten captions. Contemporary saddle-stitched faux crocodile leather boards with tassel. Over one hundred original photographs of R.A.F servicemen in interwar Iraq. Scenes range from the wreckage of a deadly plane crash, men driving an early tank, locals going about daily life, and servicemen entertaining themselves in their recreational time. Most photographs are captioned by the anonymous owner of the album, with a few captioned in plate; all provide a snapshot of the early days of both the R.A.F. and of modern Iraq. - Various contemporary aircraft are photographed, including a Vickers Vimy Commercial experiencing an awkward landing, the first-ever prototype of the Vickers Victoria (captioned simply, "John's plane"), the de Havilland DH.60 Moth ("Stack and his 'Mooth' aeroplane"), a Halifax II which would go on to be shot down over France during the second world war (captioned "Soap with Snipe"; it is unclear between the plane and the pilot which is Soap and which is Snipe). - One photograph of "Alan Cobham and his plane" shows Cobham (1894-1973), by then already a world-famous aviator posing with a biplane, and another five (one of which has been colorized) show Cobham's de Havilland DH.50 floatplane on the Tigris, likely en route through Baghdad on his record-breaking flight from Britain to Australia. These photos would have been taken very shortly before Cobham's engineer of the D.H.50 aircraft, Arthur B. Elliot, was shot and killed after the pair left Baghdad on the 5th of July 1926. More somberly captioned are five photographs of the "Result of the Vernon Crash", dated two weeks after the incident and showing the wreckage of the No. 45 Squadron's Vickers Vernon, which had crashed into a shed at Hinaidi, killing seven: Oswald Kempson Stirling Webb, Reginald Carey Brinton Brading, Eric Miller Pollard, Edgar Kennedy, Francis Crawford Inglis, Horace Leslie Davies, and Edgar Whittle. - Photographs of local Iraqis and scenery around Baghdad include a line of convicts, a pontoon bridge spanning the Tigris, milk sellers, farming methods, money changers, pottery shops, letter writers, butchers, an Armenian family, a flooded Baghdad North Station, the "Baghdad Bridge", falconers, copper merchants, the Kadi mosque, mourners at a funeral, a distant view of the crumbling crusader fort Qal'at al-Shaqif (captioned "Belfort Castle"), and an "oil gusher" spouting in Kirbuk district. - The remainder of the photographs are devoted to soldiers at rest and the mishaps of military life (including many lorries stuck in the mud); men play tug-of-war, and one serviceman poses with his accordion and a small dog sitting atop a stool with a pipe in its mouth. There are fancy dress parties, snapshots of the barracks and troop ships, and servicemen tromping through calf-deep mud. A thorough collection that provides a sum of daily life in interwar Iraq, ranging from the humorous to the tragic, including both military and civilian life. - Quite well preserved.
Oblong folio (387 x 265 mm). 16 ff. 20 silver gelatin photographs mounted in photo corners with handwritten captions; photographs range between 150 x 207 mm and 120 x 185 mm. Contemporary saddle-stitched faux leather boards with tassel. Twenty R.A.F. photographs of Iraq in the interwar period and associated with the No. 45 Squadron, many of them aerial views and mid-flight snapshots of contemporary aircraft. Most are labelled and numbered in the plate, possibly as official R.A.F. photographs. Aerial photographs of R.A.F. aircraft include the Vicker Victoria Troop Carrier, a "Formation of Vickers Vernous" (that is, Vickers Vernons), and several shots of a pilot referred to simply as "Henry" testing out the newly arrived Airco DH.9A over the mountains and hills of Iraq. Further aerial shots show the Ctesiphon Arch from "200 feet" (61 meters) as noted in-plate, the R.A.F. British Hospital, the Al-Askari Shrine of Samarra surrounded by the old city, and the Maude Bridge in Baghdad. The remainder of the photographs are dedicated to scenes around Baghdad, from British military headquarters to a crowd outside a post office. The first photograph of the album shows what is presumably the No. 45 Squadron (who were in Baghdad in 1926, and are the only squadron in Baghdad known to have flown both the Vickers Vernon and the Airco DH.9A ca. 1926), captioned "All the 'Boys' and me". The No. 45 Squadron famously nicknamed themselves "The Flying Camels" after their squadron badge, which featured a winged camel. - Quite well preserved.
8vo. 84 pp. 5 folding maps. Contemporary loose cardstock wrapper, stapled. Slightly altered version published in 1947 as "Historical Memoranda" or "Historical Survey". A rare Zionist booklet issued in Hebrew by the General Council of the Jewish Community of Palestine to the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry. This publication was part of a series of three such pamphlets issued in 1946-47, each presenting a history of Jewish populations in Palestine and diasporic movement. Of the three, this pamphlet deals the most with the history of ancient Palestine. The folding maps illustrate waves of Jewish immigration from 640-1882 CE and identify sites of Jewish settlements in Roman, early Muslim, Crusade, Mamluk, and Ottoman periods. - Somewhat toned; maps are bright and clear. OCLC 244129609.
8vo. (10), 70, (6), (43 plates), (2), 106, (1) pp. With folding map frontispiece. Red leather-backed blue cloth. A guide to the treasury of Qur'ans in the Museum of Ancient Iran in Tehran, printed in Persian and illustrated with over forty black and white plates from photographs. The plates illustrate the range of time periods, decoration practices, and calligraphic styles represented in the museum's mid-century Qur'an collection. A folding map frontispiece shows a floor plan of the relevant gallery, with arrows helpfully indicating to an interested visitor which way to best take in the exhibits. - The Iran Bastan Museum, also called the Museum of Ancient Iran, falls under the umbrella of the Iran National Museum. However, it is housed in its own specially designed building in Tehran, and was in fact the first structure in Iran purpose-built to act as a museum: its large arched entryway and brickwork are representative of the famous arch of Taq-e Kasra of Ctesiphon and the ancient traditions of Persian brick construction. Today, the Iran Bastan Museum largely houses much earlier relics of Iran's past, such as Neolithic spear points and Sassanian artifacts, with other sites of the Iran National Museum taking up the focus on Muslim-era manuscripts. A scarce piece of literature on Qur'ans in 1940s Iranian museum collections. - Exterior lightly worn, but in good condition. Uncommon. OCLC 61120487.
4to (165 x 205 mm). (18), (11 blank) ff. Decorated with hand-drawn maps in ink and crayon, labelled in handwritten Hebrew. Original black wrappers. All edges red. Unique private copybook of folk art hand-coloured maps from an unknown Jewish girl named Sarah Klein. Klein was likely a schoolgirl; most of the maps she has drawn and labelled in neat Hebrew are of European countries, including Spain, Italy, Greece, Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, Turkey, Great Britain and Ireland, Iceland, France, Portugal, and Scandinavia, as well as one map of the entirety of Africa. The northern coast of France is shown twice and in greater detail than many others. Most of the maps are carefully hand-coloured in crayon or perhaps oil pastels, often indicating rivers and mountain ranges. - A unique preservation of a Jewish schoolgirl's vision of her world. - Light wear, one leaf detached but present, altogether well-preserved.
Oblong folio (305 x 220 mm). 12 ff. 40 silver gelatin photographs mounted on leaves; sizes range from 177 x 120 mm to 85 x 65 mm. Contemporary plaid cloth with a small brass label on front cover, saddle-stitched binding. Unique photograph album of early Zionist military presence in British Mandatory Palestine, focussing on the Hapoel companies: a sports movement that in the early 1930s was developed into an organizational labour militia intended to stand up against revisionist and right-wing movements as well as against communists. Promoted by David Ben-Gurion, they served as an executive-political arm of the Histadrut until the 1960s. - The photographs show numerous scenes of training and daily life: both male and female soldiers pose in uniform, eat their lunches, hold athletic competitions such as tug-of-war and wheelbarrow races on the beach, meet in the canteen, and line up in formation. Largely presenting an idyllic picture of soldier life, scenes of more serious military drills include soldiers scaling high walls and practicing their army crawl, grappling, and sniper positioning. A handful of early photos also give glimpses of political events in the 1930s: two speeches are shown, one of Ben-Gurion, the other of Hapoel leaders with a military guard, and a packed street scene of what appears to be a parade, judging by the rows of onlookers clustered on balconies. - The brass dedication label on the upper cover is engraved in Hebrew "To Samuel, from the commanders of the Hapoel companies. Haifa, Kiryat Haim, 13-30 August 37". Occasional fading to photographs, but quite well preserved.
8vo (125 x 182 mm). (8), 80 pp. Contemporary full red morocco with gilt dentelle borders along both covers. Ottoman Turkish treatise on equestrian anatomy: a translation of the "Traité des articulations du Cheval" (Paris 1827) by the French veterinary surgeon Félix Rigot (1803-47), translated by Muhammad 'Abd al-Fattahh al-Misri and edited by Mustafa Hasan Kassab. - Old ticket inscribed in French "Arabe - Chirurgie" pasted to inside of lower cover. A very good, clean copy. OCLC 56713283.
8vo. 80 pp. Original printed wrappers with English title on the lower cover. An academic lecture delivered in 1950 by Havard history professor George Sarton (1884-1956), translated into Arabic by Dr. Omar A. Farrukh, a prolific academic translator and member of the Islamic Research Association, Bombay. George Sarton was considered the founder of the history of science as an independent discipline, and was a proponent of indisciplinary approaches, including not only the combination of scientists and historians, but historians of both Latin and Arabic scientific literature, two traditionally independent disciplines. The topic of the lecture, the so-called "incubation" of Western culture, refers to the Islamic Golden Age, during which Muslim scientists studied Ancient Greek mathematics and natural philosophy and made many of their own interpretations and additions. It was the resulting plethora of Arabic scientific texts which then went on, when translated into Latin, to spark the Italian Renaissance and the "re-birth" of Greek learning (though it was by that time as much Muslim as Greek) in the West. Sarton was among the first modern Westerners to make this connection and to highlight the importance of Arabic literature, making this particular lecture an important building block of the history of science as a discipline. - Light wear and toning, in good condition. OCLC 30183109.