Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Arnoud Vrolijk
Leiden University
VOLUME 4
Edited by
Geoffrey Roper
Leidenboston
2014
Cover illustration: Case layout for Arabic ligature sorts, used at the Imprimerie Nationale, Paris,
in the 19th century. Reproduced by courtesy of the Houghton Library, Harvard University, USA
Symposium on the History of Printing and Publishing in the Languages and Countries of the
Middle East (3rd : 2008 : Universitt Leipzig)
Historical aspects of printing and publishing in languages of the Middle East : papers from
the Third Symposium on the History of Printing and Publishing in the Languages and
Countries of the Middle East, University of Leipzig, September 2008 / edited by Geoffrey Roper.
pages cm. (Islamic manuscripts and books ; volume 4)
This volume contains revised and edited versions of papers presented at the Third Interna-
tional Symposium on the History of Printing and Publishing in the Languages and Countries of
the Middle East, held at the University of Leipzig, 24-27 September 2008, in conjunction with
the 24th Congress of the Union Europeenne des Arabisants et Islamisants (UEAI) and in coop-
eration with the Oriental Institute, University of LeipzigPreface.
Papers chiefly in English; one paper each in French and German.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-90-04-25505-0 (hardback : acid-free paper) ISBN 978-90-04-25597-5 (e-book)
1.PrintingMiddle EastHistoryCongresses. 2.Publishers and publishingMiddle East
HistoryCongresses. 3.Printing, ArabicHistoryCongresses. 4. Middle Eastern literature
PublishingHistoryCongresses. I.Roper, Geoffrey, editor of compilation. II.Title.
Z186.M628S96 2013
686.20956dc23
2013029648
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Index.................................................................................................................... 317
List of Illustrations
Schaefer
Liebrenz
Marzolph
Bruckmayr
Mansour
1 Papers published in History of Printing and Publishing in the Languages and Countries
of the Middle East, ed. P. Sadgrove (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004).
2Papers published in Printing and Publishing in the Middle East, ed. P. Sadgrove (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2008).
3Papers to be published by them in a forthcoming volume.
xii preface
Geoffrey Roper
October 2012
Medival Arabic Block Printing: State of the Field*
Karl Schaefer
* This project has been supported in part by the Center for the Humanities at Drake
University.
2 karl schaefer
Fig. 1.Block Print from Almera, Spain dated 750 Hira (134950 AD)
and arguably it is not even printing as we might define it. The technique
used to create this stampengraving or carving alphabetic characters in
reverse on a matrix in order to create texthad been employed already
for a long time in carving signet rings and in striking coins; these latter
two practices were in use from the earliest days of Islam. However, nei-
ther of these applications is considered printing, except in the strictest
sense. Both were functional in nature and their texts, characteristically,
very brief. They were a far cry from the mass production of literary works
with which we now tend to associate the process of printing. However, if
printing is defined as the creation of images or texts through mechanical
means, then the stamp published by Hammer-Purgstall, however quotid-
ian, would seem to be valid evidence for such an activity.
Moreover, if this were the only example of text created in the medival
Islamic world in this manner, then one might argue that it was either an
experiment that bore no fruit, or that the technology was never put to any
purpose other than marking personal belongings or meeting some mun-
dane bureaucratic need. In the event, however, other examples of Arabic
block printing came to light in the nineteenth century. Among documents
4 karl schaefer
4Papyrus Erzherzog Rainer. Fhrer durch die Ausstellung (Vienna: Hlder, 1894).
5Now in the Papyrussammlung of the Austrian National Library (sterreichische
Nationalbibliothek).
medival arabic block printing: state of the field 5
hiatus between this exhibition and the next publication dealing with
the subject. In the 1920s, Thomas Carter (18821925), a young American
returning across Asia and Europe from a protracted stay in China, where
he had developed an interest in printing history, stopped in Vienna to
look at the block prints there. He took advantage of this sojourn to speak
with a number of scholars in Europe about the transmission of printing
technology and they encouraged him to pursue a deeper study of the sub-
ject. This prodding resulted in the publication of his landmark work, The
History of Printing in China and its Spread Westward.6 His was the first
work in English to place medival Arabic block printing into a historical
context and to suggest possible connections with that activity in other
cultures, particularly Chinese.
As time went on, a gradually increasing number of scholars (and some
collectors), including several prominent scholars of the Middle East and
the Arabic language, did begin to show interest in Arabic block printing.
Adolf Grohmann, who based his major work on Arabic manuscripts on
6Thomas Francis Carter, The Invention of Printing in China and Its Spread Westward
(New York, 1925; 2nd ed. 1955). Carter taught Chinese at Columbia University and was
head of the Chinese Department for a brief time after his return from China, but died
prematurely, at the age of forty-three, just as his book rolled off the presses.
6 karl schaefer
the Vienna collection,7 is known also to have studied the small number
of examples of Arabic block printing in the library at Universitt Heidel-
berg in the years leading up to World War II. It is more than likely that
his knowledge of the Vienna block prints allowed him to identify the
six examples held in Heidelberg at that time.8 Again, however, since
Grohmanns primary concern was with manuscript texts and the material
on which they were composed, the block prints were accorded secondary
importance as a mode of cultural production.
About a decade later, the block print baton was picked up by the noted
Iranologist Karl Jahn, whose 1938 article on a section of Vafs Tar-i
Vaf dealt with the attempt to introduce paper money into the thir-
teenth-century economy of Tabriz.9 That paper money, like the Chinese
currency upon which it was modelled, was printed. Here, then, was fur-
ther evidence for printing activity in the medival Islamic world. Not only
was printing being carried out (albeit for a very brief time) in a different
part of the Islamic world, but it had been put to a different purpose as
well. In fact, Jahn himself seems to have been unaware of other kinds of
block printing in the Islamic medival period, for he says at the end of
his article, Gaykhats currency notes are extremely remarkable as being
almost the only known examples of the use of block printing in the Near East10
(emphasis mine). It appears that no examples of this currency survive, so
it is impossible to draw conclusions about the manner of its production,
but given the fact that it was a Chingisid ruler who produced it, it is logical
to assume that a Chinese influence was involved.
Scarcely a decade later, Giorgio Levi della Vida published a brief article
about another amulet, this belonging to the University of Pennsylvania
11 Giorgio Levi della Vida, An Arabic Block Print, Scientific Monthly 59, no. 6 (1944):
473474.
12T. W. Arnold and A. Grohmann, The Islamic Book (Paris, 1929), 29; plate 15.
13A. Demeerseman, Limprimerie en Orient et au Maghreb (Tunis, 1954), 22.
14Paul Lunde, A Missing Link, ARAMCO World 32, no. 2 (1981): 2627.
15Richard W. Bulliet, Medieval Arabic arsh: A Forgotten Chapter in the History of
Arabic Printing, Journal of the American Oriental Society 107 (1987): 427438. It would be
remiss of me not to mention also the article by Miroslav Krek, Arabic Block Printing as
the Precursor of Printing in Europe: Preliminary Report, ARCE [American Research Center
in Egypt] Newsletter 129 (1985): 1216. This article, while important for the wealth of infor-
mation it contains, did not have a wide circulation and thus had little influence on the
course of subsequent scholarship in the field, at least until relatively recently. Nonethe-
less, Mr. Krek, who was a librarian and bibliographer (at Brandeis University), was very
interested in Arabic block printing and also, for a time, planned to compile a descriptive
bibliography of all the Arabic manuscripts held in American libraries. (Elements of that
project appeared intermittently, most notably in MELA Notes, the journal of the Middle
East Librarians Association.) He dutifully noted Arabic block prints wherever he found
them in the course of his project. It is through his writings that I became aware of the
locations of several previously unknown examples.
16Karl R. Schaefer, The Scheide Tarsh, Princeton University Library Chronicle 56,
no. 3 (1995): 400430. This impression was not quickly altered. When I began to conduct
research on the topic, I was quite surprised at the paucity (since then only moderately
relieved) of substantive scholarship on the matter.
8 karl schaefer
17The piece cited immediately above, a second article by the same author, Karl R.
Schaefer, Eleven Medieval Arabic Block Prints in the Cambridge University Library, Ara-
bica 48, no. 2 (2001): 210239, and Paul B. Fenton, Un xylographie arabe mdivale la
Bibliothque Nationale et Universitaire de Strasbourg, Arabica 50, no. 1 (2003): 114117.
18Wadysaw Kubiak and George T. Scanlon, Fu Expedition Final Report, vol. 2:
Fu-C. (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1989), 6970; Li Guo, Commerce, Culture, and
Community in a Red Sea Port in the Thirteenth Century (Leiden: Brill, 2004).
19For example, Sothebys, Arts of the Islamic World: London, Thursday 25 April 2002, and
Sam Fogg, Ltd., Islamic Calligraphy, Catalogue 27 (London, 2003).
20See above, pp. 46. Another example of an owners stamp is to be found in Cam-
bridge University Librarys Taylor-Schechter collection. T-S AS 181.228. See my Enigmatic
Charms, 94; plate 12.
medival arabic block printing: state of the field 9
26This collection has now been published. The library at the University of Utah holds
seven block-printed amulets. See Mark Muehlhaeusler, Eight Arabic Block Prints from the
Collection of Aziz S. Atiya, Arabica 55, nos. 56 (Oct. 2008): 528582. The eighth block
print in the title of this article is held by the Lilly Library at the University of Indiana and
was also published in Schaefer, Enigmatic Charms.
27William Barron Stevenson, Some Specimens of Moslem Charms, in Studia Semitica
et Orientalia (Glasgow: Glasgow University Oriental Society, 1920): 84114.
medival arabic block printing: state of the field 11
Fig. 4.Arabic printing block 1919.80.e, source: Glasgow Museum Resource Center
ing the text and found in the very first paragraph this statement: The
engraving of the characters is reversed, so that it would seem to be a stamp
or matrix for the stamping or printing of charms (emphasis mine).28 The
image of the disc, clearly, had itself been reversed in the process of publica-
tion and showed the text as a positive, with the wording in the proper ori-
entation. Anyone simply leafing through the book, then, would not grasp
the importance of this artefact for the history of Arabic block printing. In
addition, the fact that this piece has lain in the Kelvingrove Museum29 in
Glasgow for nearly a century with its importance only tangentially noted
points up a further difficulty in the study of Arabic block printing: that the
28Stevenson, Some Specimens of Moslem Charms, 84. The matrix bears the accession
number 1919.80.e. Little is apparently known about its provenance beyond the fact that it
was acquired in 1919.
29Currently housed in the Glasgow Museum Resource Centre, 200 Woodhead Road,
Nitshill, Glasgow.
12 karl schaefer
30Ibn al-Nadm, al-Fihrist (Cairo, 1960), 1:623. The references in the following section
may be found in the chapter The (Re)discovery of Arabic Block Printing in my work,
Enigmatic Charms, 2140.
31 C. E. Bosworth, The Mediaeval Islamic Underworld: The Ban Ssn in Arabic Litera-
ture and Society (Leiden: Brill, 1976).
medival arabic block printing: state of the field 13
work entitled Tuaf al-aw f uraf al-aw. One version of this work,
now published in a critical edition,38 contains a brief account of print-
ing or a printing device. Taken in conjunction with the evidence of the
printing block from Almera, these texts offer strong circumstantial evi-
dence for at least two applications of printing technology which involved
the governmental and commercial realms in thirteenth- and fourteenth-
century Islamic Spain.
Physical evidence in the documents themselves provides more valu-
able information about the history of block printing by medival Mus-
lims. That vellum was used as a print medium for two amulets suggests
that the practice of block printing in the Islamic realms began quite early,
predating the introduction of paper, at least in parts of the region. While it
is true that the use of materials other than paper (e.g., vellum, parchment,
papyrus) continued in certain areas after the introduction of paper, the
rapid adoption of the new material everywhere but Egypt argues for a rela-
tively early date for the inception of block printing in the Islamic world.
In sum, it would seem clear that if block printing was not a prevalent
activity in medival Islam, neither was it uncommon. It was put to a vari-
ety of purposes and appears to have continued over quite a long period of
time. This is not to say that block printing was used for the same purpose
in every time and in every place; the existence of block-printed amulets
from Egypt and Iraq, the attempt to produce paper money in Persia, the
production of pilgrimage certificates in Syria, and accounts of govern-
mental and commercial applications in Andalus would suggest that dif-
ferent people at different times exploited the technology in a variety of
applications.
That the Andalusian printing block illustrated in the 1852 Hammer-
Purgstall article39 was of wood and the Kelvingrove matrix of bronze sug-
gests further that there was either a variety of materials used for creating
the printing blocks or that there was at some point a technical advance
made somewhere in the medival Arabic-speaking world. The use of metal
may have been a local practice, since af al-Dn al-ill (12781348?), the
Iraqi poet cited by Bosworth,40 mentions the fashioning of arshes from
tin. Except for the wooden block from Almera, no wooden printing blocks
seem to have survived,41 and the use of relatively less durable wood would
explain in part why no matrices for amulets have been found. Needless to
say, the discovery of even one such object would be extremely valuable
for our knowledge of the craft.
Many questions remain to be answered and many more will no doubt
arise as research into medival Arabic block printing goes forward. There
has been a great deal of progress toward a more holistic understanding
of this phenomenon in the recent past, advanced in no small measure by
the inauguration of the triennial symposia on the history of Middle East-
ern printing, some papers from the third of which are published in this
volume. These gatherings have not only raised awareness of the topic, but
have also served as forums for exchanging information about sources and
additional examples of the craft. As in all such gatherings, questions posed
during presentations of research papers have also spurred investigators
in new directions and prompted re-evaluations of accepted knowledge.
Moreover, by raising awareness about block printing among a large num-
ber of interested scholars, there is a greater chance that important new
information will be uncovered.
Bibliography
41The only piece of indirect evidence we have that wood may have been used to
make printing blocks is the testimony of Vaf who, according to Jahn (Das Iranische
Papiergeld, 335; Paper Currency in Iran, 131), says that when the population of Tabriz
finally prevailed upon the government to withdraw the paper currency, they destroyed (by
fire) all the scrip and the device used to make it.
16 karl schaefer
Boris Liebrenz
1Johann Jacob Reiske, Briefe, hrsg. Richard Foerster (Leipzig, 1897): 556.
18 boris liebrenz
I.Chronologischer Abri
1.Vor Reiske
Es ist allerdings richtig, dass eigenstndige Publikationen mit arabischen
Lettern erst verhltnismig spt in Leipzig erschienen, besonders im
Hinblick auf die essentielle Bedeutung dieser Stadt als eines fhrenden,
manchmal sogar des fhrenden Zentrums des europischen Buchdruc-
kes. Freilich verlegte Hieronymus Megiser (15541619)2 hier bereits 1612
seine Pionierarbeit einer Trkisch-Grammatik, die Institutiones Linguae
Turcicae. Aber dieses Werk des Kurschsischen Hofhistoriographen blieb
nicht nur ohne direkte Nachfolger, es ist sogar fraglich, inwieweit hier der
Beginn des Leipziger Druckes in arabischer Schrift zu suchen ist. Megiser
hatte sich mangels einheimischer Produktion an Peter Kirstens (1577
1640) aus Breslau,3 einen ehemaligen Leipziger Studenten, gewandt und
zumindest im ersten von vier Bnden dessen berhmte arabische Typen
fr seine trkischen Beispiele benutzen knnen. Ein Hinweis auf Leip-
zig als Verlagsort findet sich aber erst am Ende des IV. Buches. Buch I
ist eindeutig separat vom Rest des Werkes gedruckt. Eine Vorrede Kir-
stens zum I. Buch scheint dagegen nahezulegen, dass er selbst den Druck
besorgte, und er wird dies wohl in Breslau getan haben.4 Leider muss man
zudem konstatieren, dass diese fr ihre Zeit beeindruckenden Typen Kir-
stens bei allen Schwchen die sthetisch und qualitativ hochwertigsten
waren, die in Leipzig bis zum Ende des 18. Jahrhunderts zum Einsatz
kamen. Ihnen folgten fast acht Jahrzehnte ohne eine Spur von Drucken
mit beweglichen arabischen Lettern.
Im Jahre 1625 aber wurde ein Kupferstich benutzt, um ein kleines arabi-
sches Gedicht aus der Feder Johannes Zechendorffs (15801662)5 wie-
derzugeben, was man neben sthetischen Grnden wohl mit dem Fehlen
6Die Kenntnis dieses seltenen Werkes verdanke ich dem freundlichen Hinweis von
Geoffrey Roper.
7Zechendorff schreibt in Zeile 4: y karma mualliman anstatt y muallimun
al-karm; Zeile 5: li-anna al-qawlaka anstelle von li-anna qawlaka um nur die offensicht-
lichsten grammatischen Fehler zu nennen und die krude Syntax auen vor zu lassen.
8Die Schriftgieerei Johann Erich Hahns. Gener: Die so nthig als ntzliche
Buchdruckerkunst und Schriftgieerey, I (Leipzig, 1740): 117.
9Vgl. Eva Hanebutt-Benz: Schriftproben (2002): 23 u. Abb. 9.
20 boris liebrenz
war zumindest das Modell fr die Drucke der kommenden hundert Jahre.
Aber Janson war Schriftgieer, brachte also kein Buch eigenstndig her-
aus, sondern gab seine Schriftstze an Autoren und Verlage weiter. Ob
diese seiner Dienste jeweils gedachten entscheidet darber, was wir ber
sein Wirken und das seiner arabischen Typen wissen. Zu Lebzeiten ist
deren Benutzung nicht dokumentiert, doch stellt sich die Frage, wer die
umfangreichen orientalischen Typenstze nach seinem Tod bernommen
haben knnte.
Erst mit dem Auftreten von Andreas Acoluthus (16541704)10 und der
damit einhergehenden Belebung der orientalischen Studien an der Alma
Mater Lipsiensis bekamen die lokalen Pressen berhaupt neues Material.
Acoluthus blieb zwar nur kurze Zeit in Leipzig (ab 16751681), publizierte
hier aber auch nach dem Weggang in seine Heimatstadt Breslau weiter,
wohl auch weil die Typen Peter Kirstens inzwischen nach Uppsala gelangt
waren.11 Der Drucker seiner Wahl war Justin Brand (in Leipzig nachge-
wiesen 16781688).12 Die beiden begannen ihre Zusammenarbeit gleich
nach Brands Ankunft im Jahr 1680 mit der berhmten ersten Edition eines
zusammenhngenden armenischen Textes in Deutschland, dem Obadias
Armenus.13 Acoluthus vertraute auch zwei Jahre spter wieder auf Brand,
als er seinen Aquis Amaris herausgab, eine alttestamentliche Studie, die
zur Erklrung einer Bibelstelle Quellen aus der gesamten Bandbreite von
Acoluthus breiter Sprachkenntnis heranzog, darunter auch oft arabi-
sche Texte, die aber nur gelegentlich im Originalalphabet wiedergegeben
wurden.
Der Aquis Amaris enthielt auch eine Passage, welche sehr an eine
Schriftprobe im Sinne derjenigen Anton Jansons denken lsst. Auch hier
wird ein Bibelvers in dutzenden bersetzungen orientalischer und euro-
pischer Sprachen und Alphabete wiederholt, darunter Arabisch und
Persisch (insgesamt 14 Wrter).14 Brand hatte also eine groe Auswahl
an orientalischen Schriften anzubieten. Nach einer Quelle war seine
10M. L. H. Trommler: Leben und Schriften des Hrn. Andreas Akoluth (1761); Preiler:
Orientalische Studien (2005): 2628; Boris Liebrenz: Arabische, persische und trkische
Handschriften in Leipzig (Leipzig, 2008): 1315.
11Johannes O. Alnander: Historiola artis typographicae in Svecia (Rostock / Leipzig,
1725): 96.
12Gener: Die so nthig als ntzliche Buchdruckerkunst, I (1740): 119 u. III (1741): 304305;
Christoph Reske: Die Buchdrucker des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts (Wiesbaden, 2007): 543.
13Vgl. Boris Liebrenz: Andreas Acoluthus und der Beginn des armenischen Druckes
(2009): 4648.
14Andreas Acoluthus: Aquis Amaris (Leipzig, 1682): 197198.
frher druck mit arabischen typen in leipzig 21
15Zu Herrn Justinus Brandt ist anzumercken, da dessen Buchdruckerey aus lauter
orientalischen Schriften bestanden. Gener: Die so nthig als ntzliche Buchdruckerkunst,
III (1741): 305.
16Preiler: Orientalische Studien (2005): 26.
17Jahr=Opffer/ Welches dem Durchleuchtigsten / (...) / Herrn Johann Georgen dem
Andern / (...) / durch einen unterthnigsten Glckwunsch / in funfzehen Haupt= und aus-
wertigen Sprachen / Demtigst und allergehorsamst abstattet M. Augustus Pfeiffer (...).
Wittenberg, In der Fincelischen Druckerey / drucks Elias Fiebig Anno 1670.
18Im selben Jahr ist in Leipzig auch die Wiedergabe einiger Koranzitate in hebrischer
Schrift zu verzeichnen; vgl. Martini, Raymundus: Pugio fidei adversus Mauros et Judaeos.
Hrsg. von J.B. Carpzov. Leipzig 1687; arabisch und Koranzitate: Pars II, cap. VIII, art. IX
(S. 365f.); pars III, dist. III, Cap. VII, art. XIV (S. 749750).
22 boris liebrenz
Leipzigs verbunden. Gleditsch war auch der Besitzer einer der wertvoll-
sten und prchtigsten Koranhandschriften, die jemals angefertigt wurden,
nmlich eines Teils des Prachtkorans des mongolischen lniden-Sultans
lyt. Er vermachte diesen Schatz im Jahr 1692 der Leipziger Ratsbiblio-
thek. Auch sonst handelte er mit orientalischen Handschriften und die
Ratsbibliothek kaufte von ihm.21
Der Druck mit arabischen Lettern war also eine weitere orientalische
Facette dieses vielseitig interessierten Verlegers. Neben August Pfeiffers
Arbeiten sind es die seiner verlegerischen Initiative zu verdankenden
berhmten Acta Eruditorum, ein seinerzeit bahnbrechendes und fcher-
bergreifendes Rezensionsorgan, die in ihren einschlgigen Beitrgen zu
orientalistischen Fragen auch ab und an arabische, trkische oder persi-
sche Wrter im Original druckten.22 Die dafr verwendeten Typen sind
nun wieder in der Tradition Jansons und nach den Regeln der Zeit gefl-
lig. Doch erst lange nach dem Tod des Verlagsgrnders machte man sich
auch an die Verffentlichung grerer Texte mit einem hheren Bedarf
an Typen. Das renommierte Haus verlegte Werke von Reiske und hatte
auch sonst gelegentlich Bedarf, kleinere Passagen in Originalschriften zu
setzen, wie weiter unten zu zeigen sein wird.
Aber waren Gleditsch und sein Verlag auch verantwortlich fr die Her-
stellung der orientalischen Alphabete? Es scheint eher der Fall zu sein,
dass man sich zu diesem Zweck jeweils der Expertise von Spezialisten
bediente. Gleditsch verlegte zwar 1683 August Pfeiffers alttestament-
liche Studie Prophetia Obadiae, lie den Druck aber von Justin Brand
besorgen. Fr die oben genannte Theologiae (...) Judaicae atque Mohamme-
dicae (...) principia von 1687 war es der sonst kaum bekannte Christoph
Fleischer,23 welcher als Drucker genannt wird. Damit brachte Gleditsch
wohl zum einzigen Mal dessen kurzlebige arabische Type ans Licht. Es
knnte hier spekuliert werden, dass der Tod Anton Jansons in diesem Jahr
einen kurzfristigen und misslungenen Versuch notwendig machte,
schnellstmglich Ersatz zu schaffen. Dass der Verlag selbst wohl trotz ver-
schiedener in den Acta Eruditorum benutzter Alphabete ber keine derar-
tigen Typen im Bestand verfgte, scheinen auch die spteren Drucke bis
hin zu Reiskes Abil Walidi von 1755 nahezulegen. Orientalische Themen
24Gener: Die so nthig als ntzliche Buchdruckerkunst I (1740): 118119; Reske: Buch-
drucker (2007): 543.
25Preiler: Orientalische Studien (2005): 2829.
frher druck mit arabischen typen in leipzig 25
Bibeltexte aufzeigen wollte, erschien bei den Erben von Johannes Gross
in Frankfurt und Leipzig. Kromayers Werk drfte durch seine schiere
Gre den bis dahin umfangreichsten arabischen Textbestand in einem
Leipziger Buch aufgewiesen haben, doch sind es auch hier jeweils nur ein
paar vereinzelte Worte auf jeder Seite. Erst 1720 schob Johann Christoph
Clodius in das Vorwort und den Kommentar zu seiner Liturgiae Syria-
cae wieder ganze 14 arabische Worte ein, gedruckt zum ersten Mal mit
den Schriften Bernhard Christoph Breitkopfs (16951777, in Leipzig
seit 1719).
Die bisher behandelten neun Werke aus mehr als einem Jahrhundert
bentigten keine allzu groe Menge an arabischen Typen, meist handelte
es sich nur um einzelne oder wenige Worte. Auch die explizit auf Sprach-
erwerb und Textarbeit angelegten Arbeiten wie Schieferdecker mit sei-
nem Fructus oder Kromayers Filia haben keinen zusammenhngenden
Text greren Umfanges abgedruckt. Das jedoch sollte sich mit einem
Schlag ndern durch das kurze Auftreten Georg Wallins (16861760).26
Dieser schwedische Priester begann im Jahr 1720 eine Bildungsreise
durch ganz Europa, die ihn auch nach Paris fhren sollte. Dort arbeitete
er sich durch die Bibliotheken und Buchhndler und lernte Arabisch bei
einem Muttersprachler. Als Frucht dieser Studien edierte er ein christ-
lich-arabisches Manuskript aus Paris, das einen apokryphen Text ber
das Leben Josephs, des Vaters Jesu enthielt. Das Buch trug den Titel
Sive Historia Josephi Fabri Lignarii.
Die editorische Arbeit hat Wallin aber nicht aus der Ferne gesteuert.
Vielmehr ist er 1722 in Leipzig nachweisbar. Er besuchte die Stadt in
Begleitung von Jacob Svedelius und dessen zwei adligen Schlern und
die Gruppe besichtigte hier auch die Ratsbibliothek damals bereits
im Besitz von mehr als 300 orientalischen Handschriften27 wo einer
synagoga Judaica besondere Aufmerksamkeit geschenkt wurde.28 Des
Weiteren informiert ein Brief vom 18. Juli 1722 den berhmten Gelehr-
ten Mathurin Veyssire de LaCroze (16611739) ber Wallins Absicht, die
Historia Josephi Fabri Lignarii herauszugeben und stellt die Arbeit daran
29Johann Ludwig Uhl (Hg.): Thesavri Epistolici Lacroziani I (Leipzig, 1742): 344.
30Gener: Die so nthig als ntzliche Buchdruckerkunst I (1740): 121; Reske: Buchdrucker
(2007): 545.
31 Georg Wallin: Qiat Ysuf al-Nar (Leipzig, 1722): 47, n. g.
frher druck mit arabischen typen in leipzig 27
Kontakte Wallins nach Leipzig bis zu seinem ersten Aufenthalt als Stu-
dent im Jahr 1709 zurckreichen, als auch Andreas Zeidler hier bereits
aktiv war.
Whrend also der Grund fr die Wahl Andreas Zeidlers im Dunkeln
bleibt, steht doch fest, dass er seinen Auftraggeber nicht enttuscht hat.
Dabei blieben die Unzulnglichkeiten der Jansonschen Tradition prinzi-
piell bestehen, dennoch gelingt dem Drucker eine bis dahin unerreichte
bersichtlichkeit des Schriftbildes, die Verbindungen der Buchstaben
untereinander sind sauber ausgefhrt, die ganze Anlage macht nicht den
unbeholfenen Eindruck frherer Drucke [Abb. 2]. Auch die Einfhrung
oder vermehrte Nutzung einiger Ligaturen nimmt dem Schriftbild teil-
weise das statische und gibt ihm einen flssigeren Charakter. Schlielich
ist auch das rechtsgeneigte lm von Janson bei Zeidler zumindest in
dieser Edition gar nicht mehr zu finden. Interessanterweise wird es in
seinen spteren Drucken aber doch wieder auftauchen.
Das relativ hohe Niveau dieser Produktion hat allerdings nicht dazu
gefhrt, dass Zeidler sein Geschick nun vermehrt htte anwenden knnen.
Mir sind keine weiteren orientalischen Drucke Zeidlers bekannt, bevor im
Jahr 1730 gleich zwei Titel von Clodius mit seinen Schriften erschienen.
Danach wurde es wiederum still um diese arabische Presse.
Wallins kurzer Aufenthalt fiel zusammen mit dem Beginn einer uerst
fruchtbaren Phase der Orientalistik in Leipzig. Reiskes Lehrer Johan
Christian Clodius (16761745) verffentlichte bereits 1720 mit der Edi-
tion einer syrischen Handschrift aus der Ratsbibliothek seine erste ma-
gebliche Arbeit bei Breitkopf, in welcher auch einige wenige arabische
Wrter vorkamen. Seine Bibliographie weist dann in den Jahren 1723 bis
1744 neun Werke mit arabischem, persischem oder trkischem Bezug auf.
Die Mehrzahl davon waren schmale Heftchen ohne groen Rckgriff auf
das Zitieren von Originalquellen, daneben stehen aber auch eine Gram-
matik und ein voluminses Trkisch-Lexikon von 1730. Whrend er fr
seine orientalischen Schriftzeichen zuerst Breitkopfs Offizin in Anspruch
nimmt, ab 1723 aber vor allem bei Tacke drucken lsst, dessen vielfltige
orientalische Typen sein Vater Johannes Clodius 1722 in Leipzig einge-
fhrt hatte, nutzte er spter auch die Dienste von Zeidler.
Ein weiterer herausragender Orientalist im Leipzig der 1720er Jahre
war Georg Jacob Kehr (16921740).32 Unter seinen vielen innovativen
32Vgl. Preiler: Orientalische Studien (2005): 2930; Liebrenz: Arabische, persische und
trkische Handschriften (2008): 3849.
28
boris liebrenz
drei Werke in acht Jahren. Von Tacke berichtet Gener hingegen: Abson-
derlich mu man anmercken, da in dieser Druckerey die meisten Orien-
talischen Schriften anzutreffen sind, dergleichen man so hufig in wenig
Druckereyen finden wird.36 Diese Behauptung wird illustriert durch
die spte Verffentlichung eines Vaterunsers in 100 Sprachen (Orationis
Dominicae Versiones), welche Tackes Druckerei auf dem Hhepunkt ihrer
Leistungsfhigkeit, gleichzeitig aber auch am Ende ihrer Existenz zeigt.
Dieses Heftchen liest sich wie ein Verkaufskatalog fr Tackes Schriftstze
und verwendete arabische Schrift fr die arabische, persische, trkische
und tartarische Version. Der Markt war freilich immer noch ein kleiner.
An Nicht-Leipzigern hat einzig der Marburger, spter Grninger Alttesta-
mentler und Orientalist Nikolaus Wilhelm Schroeder (17211798)37 im
Jahr 1739 fr eine Ausgabe der ersten vier Kapitel des Buches Genesis in
einer trkischen Version auf den Leipziger Drucker zurckgegriffen. Diese
Edition war mit 40 Seiten freilich beachtlich und seit Wallins Qiat Ysuf
al-Nar von 1722 das grte editorische Projekt dieser Art in Leipzig.
Die Wahl Tackes kam allerdings nicht von ungefhr. Schroeder war in
diesem Jahr auf einer Bibliotheks- und Bildungsreise durch Sachsen unter-
wegs.38 Er knnte in Leipzig bereits Bekanntschaft mit Reiske gemacht
haben, der seinen Charakter und Gelehrsamkeit in spteren Briefen mehr-
mals lobend hervorhebt39 und fr seine Edition eines Kapitels aus arrs
Maqmt bereits 1737 ebenfalls mit Tacke gearbeitet hatte. Zumindest
Clodius, dem er seine Schrift widmet, hat er jedenfalls gekannt. Tackes
Schriften wurden also von den drei bestimmenden Arabisten Leipzigs
Kehr, Clodius und Reiske benutzt, fanden darber hinaus allerdings
kaum Verwendung.
Tacke war der Stammdrucker von Clodius, neben fnf dort gedruck-
ten Werken hat dieser aber auch andere Huser herangezogen. So hat er
ein Buch (das Chronicon Peregrinantis von 1731) bei Gleditsch verlegen
lassen, und zwar beim gleichnamigen Sohn des oben bereits behandelten
Johann Friedrich Gleditsch. Hierfr wurden jedoch keine beweglichen
Typen verwendet, sondern nur ein Kupferstich fr den Titel. Fr seine
Theoria & Praxis Linguae Arabicae von 1729 reaktivierte Clodius den seit
Kromayers Filia matri obstetricans von 1707 nicht mehr hervorgetretenen
Verlag der Erben von Johannes Grosse. Fr dieses Haus sollte es nun
36Ibid.
37Anon: Geschichte des Herrn Nicolaus Wilhelm Schroeder (1760).
38Ibid., 732.
39Reiske: Briefe (1897): 147.
32 boris liebrenz
40Reiske: Lebensbeschreibung (Leipzig, 1783): 116: Nun hatte mein hiesiger Buchdrucker
keine arabische Schrift; ich lie also alle diese arabische Stellen, in der Grundsprache, auf
einen besondern Bogen, zu Halle in der callenbergischen Druckerey des Instituti Iudaici
drucken.
frher druck mit arabischen typen in leipzig 33
41 Vgl. n. 1.
42Heinrich Wohlrath Rehkopf: Leben meines Vaters (1790): 305; Johann Christoph
Adelung et al.: Fortsetzung und Ergnzungen zu Christian Gottlieb Joechers allgemeinem
Gelehrten-Lexicon 3 (Leipzig, 1810): 909.
43Just Friedrich Froriep: Arabische Bibliothek (Leipzig, 1771): 174175.
34 boris liebrenz
44Catalogus Bibliothecae Io. Augusti Dathii (Leipzig, 1791): 17. Die drei Wrter sollten
al-Kitb al-adt arban und in dieser Form bereits syntaktisch fehlerhaft gelesen
werden, wurden stattdessen aber als verdruckt.
45Vielleicht Johann Christian Langenheim (1697?), vgl. Gener: Die so nthig als
ntzliche Buchdruckerkunst I (1740): 135136; oder der spter bezeugte Johann Friedrich
Langenheim, der vielleicht dessen Sohn gewesen sein knnte?
frher druck mit arabischen typen in leipzig 35
46Johann Bernhard Khler: Abulfedae Tabvla Syriae (Leipzig, 1766): Prooemium, III.
47Froriep: Arabische Bibliothek (Leipzig, 1771): 158159: (...), da der Herr Prof. Khler
in Kiel, des Abulfedae Tabulam Syriae auf seine Kosten habe drucken lassen. Er konnte zu
diesem ntzlichen Werke keinen Verleger bekommen, und war Patriot genug, um es mit
seinem Schaden selbst zu bernehmen.
48Reiske: Briefe (1897): 700 (5. Februar 1766).
49Ibid., 700701 (15. Februar 1766).
36 boris liebrenz
3.Nach Reiske
Nach Reiskes Tod vernderte sich der Markt arabischer Drucke in Leipzig
abrupt. Es gab fr einige Zeit keine aktiven lokalen Autoren mehr und kein
Verlag hatte wohl ein so geschrftes Profil fr orientalische Drucke, dass
er von sich aus versucht htte, diesen Bereich auch berregional weiter zu
bedienen. Impulse kamen noch in den 1770er Jahren mit zwei englischen
Klassikern ber Jena. Zum einen die bahnbrechende Arbeit Poeseos Asiati-
cae commentariorum libri sex von William Jones (17461794), verlegt 1777
beim Leipziger Haus Weidmann und Reich durch den Jenenser Professor
J.G. Eichhorn (17521827).50 Wie man nicht auf dem Titel, sondern nur
auf einer Notiz am Ende des Buches erfhrt, erfolgte der Druck allerdings
ebenfalls in Jena, bei Fickelscherr. Warum man hier nicht auf Lper
zurckgriff lsst sich vielleicht mit der Notwendigkeit des Korrekturlesens
vor Ort erklren. Zum anderen verlegte Weygand zwei Jahre spter eine
bersetzung von John Richardsons (17411811) A dissertation on the lan-
guages, literatures, and manners of Eastern nations, wobei auch hier wie-
der Eichhorn seine Finger im Spiel hatte. Beide Werke sind voller langer
Originalzitate in verschiedenen orientalischen Sprachen, aus sthetischen
Grnden teilweise im Kupferstich wiedergegeben.
Seit 1777 verffentlichte Eichhorn auch sein Repertorium fr Biblische
und Morgenlndische Litteratur mit einer Vielzahl an arabistischen Arti-
keln (darin 1782 postum Reiskes Briefe ber das Arabische Mnzwesen)
bei Weidmanns Erben und Reich in Leipzig, gefolgt 17911796 von des-
sen Jenenser Lehrstuhlnachfolger Heinrich Eberhard Gottlob Paulus
(17611851) und dessen Memorabilien.
Mit Samuel Friedrich Gnther Wahl (17601834), der 1784 und 1791
grere Werke mit vielen Originalzitaten in Leipzig herausgab, war es
wieder eine Leipziger Verbindung, denn der gebrtige Erfurter hatte hier
bis 1784 als Privatdozent gewirkt. Ebenfalls 1791 edierte der Knigsberger
Theologe Friedrich Theodor Rinck (17701821) einen groen Auszug
II.Typengeschichte
Die in Leipzig gebruchliche Schrift war seit dem 17. Jahrhundert prinzi-
piell dieselbe durchbrochen nur 1687 mit einem misslungenen Versuch
Fleischers und 1766, als Schnermark eine kleinere Schriftart fr Fu-
noten einfhrte. Es ist nicht festzustellen, wer dabei der Urheber dieser
Typen war, wer die Stempel besessen, wer nur Matrizen erworben oder
ausgeliehen hat. Erschwerend kommt hinzu, dass sich die exakt gleiche
Schrift seit dem 17. Jahrhundert in einigen weiteren deutschen Druckor-
ten findet, etwa Berlin, Frankfurt a.M., Hamburg, Halle oder Jena. Stili-
stisch gehrt sie zu einer Schrift-Familie, die in ganz Nordeuropa teilweise
bis in das 19. Jahrhundert Anwendung fand. In der Tabelle Abb. 4 wird
versucht, die Entwicklung einiger aufflliger Buchstaben dieser Leip-
ziger Schrifttradition nachzuzeichnen. Dabei werden durchaus nde-
rungen im Detail sichtbar. Das unglckliche isolierte kf Jansons etwa
wurde nach ihm nie wieder gebraucht. Und Lpers Schrift zeichnet sich
durch eine charakteristische lm-alif-Ligatur aus, die sich tatschlich nur
bei ihm findet [vgl. Abb. 5]. Daraus kann man vielleicht schlieen, dass
verschiedene Drucker ihre Schriftstze jeweils neu gegossen haben und
Buchstaben-
formen
38
Janson
ca. 1675?
Acoluthus
1682 (Brand)
Drechsler 1689
(Wolfahrt)
Kromayer 1707
(Gross)
Clodius 1720
boris liebrenz
(Breitkopf)
Wallin 1722
(Zeidler)
Reiske 1737
(Tacke)
Longverve
1750
(Gleditsch)
Reiske 1755
(Lper)
Rehkopf
1758-1759
(Langenheim)
Krger 1763
(Lper)
Khler 1766
(Schnermark)
Jones 1777
frher druck mit arabischen typen in leipzig
(Weidmann)
39
Abb. 4.Die Entwicklung der dominanten arabischen Druckschrift in Leipzig an ausgewhlten Buchstaben
40 boris liebrenz
Verbindung
zum
1682
Brand
1707
Gross
1722
Zeidler
1723
Breitkopf
1737
Tacke
1750
Gleditsch
1755
Lper
1758
Langenheim
Schnermark
1777
Weidmann
Abb. 5.Ligaturen
frher druck mit arabischen typen in leipzig 41
53Nach Milo arbeiteten die europischen Wissenschaftler bei der Suche nach typogra-
phischen Lsungen in einer bubble of ignorance for Arabic scripts.
54Vgl. etwa Geoffrey Roper: The history of the book in the Muslim world (2010): 331.
55Johann Jacob Reiske: Proben der arabischen Dichtkunst (Leipzig, 1765): 89.
44 boris liebrenz
quod summa est librorum Arabicorum typis editorum paucitas, et quod horum etiam
lectio maiori certe ex parte crebris librariorum et typothetarum vitiis est impeditissima.
60Johann Jacob Reiske: Gedanken, wie man der arabischen Literatur aufhelfen knne,
und solle (1757): 160. Auch Michaelis gibt 1776 einen kleinen Auszug aus der Geographie
Abulfedas heraus, von dem zehn Jahre danach erst 309 Exemplare verkauft waren; vgl.
Johann David Michaelis: Reiskens Leben (1786): 146.
61Reiske: Gedanken: 162.
46 boris liebrenz
phori Takkii.
Clodius, Johann Christian: sive compendium
grammaticae Arabicae, una cum appendice de vulgari hodierna
dialecto Arabica et duobus capitibus versionis Arabicae Geneseos
editum. Lipsiae, typis H. C. Takkii [1725?].62
1729 Clodius, Johann Christian: Theoria & Praxis Linguae Arabicae
h[oc] e[st] Grammatica Arabica. Lipsiae, Apud heredes Joh.
Grossii.
1730 Clodius, Johann Christian: Excerptum Alcoranicum de Peregri-
natione Sacra. Hoc est Caput Vigesimum Secundum Alcorani
Variantibus Lectionibus Ex Msc. Commentatore Beidavio et Notis
Selectis Illustratum. Lipsiae, Literis Takkianis.
Clodius, Johann Christian: Compendiosum Lexicon Latino-
Turcico-Germanicum. Lipsiae, apud Wolffgangum Deer, Litteris
Zeidlerianis.
62Diesen Titel konnte ich nicht einsehen. Zur Datierung vgl. Christianus Fridericus de
Schnurrer: Bibliotheca Arabica (Halle, 1811): 65.
48 boris liebrenz
teris Zeidlerianis.
Clodius, Johann Christian: Hoc est: Chroni-
1731
con Peregrinantis seu Historia ultimi belli Persarum cum
Aghwanis gesti, a tempore primae eorum in regnum Persi-
cum irruptionis ejusque occupationis , usque ad Eschrefum
Aghwanum, Persiae regem continuata, ex codice Turcico, in
officina typographica recenti Constantinopolitana impresso,
versa ac notis quibusdam illustrate, cum Tabula Impera-
torum Familiae Othmanicae, ex codice manuscripto Turcico,
in fine adjecta. Lipsiae, apud Jo. Frid. Gleditschii B. Filium.
[Nur der arabische Titel im Holzschnitt wiedergegeben.]
1737 Reiske, Johann Jacob: Abi Mohammed El Kasim Bosrensis
vulgo Hariri Consessvs XXVI. Rakda sev variegatvs dictvs.
Lipsiae, literis Takkianis.
1739 Schrder, Nikolaus Wilhelm: Quatuor prima capita Gene-
seos Turcice et Latine. Lipsiae, Literis Takkianis.
1740 / 1741 Orationis Dominicae Versiones fere centum summa qua
fieri potuit cura genuinis cuiuslibet linguae characteribus
typis vel aere expressae. Lipsiae Litteris Takkianis.
[Auch Appendix zu Gener: Buchdruckerkunst. Bd. III.]
1742 Uhl, Johann Ludwig (Hg.): Thesavri Epistolici Lacroziani.
Lipsiae impens. Io. Frid. Gleditschii.
[Wenige Briefe enthalten einige im arabischen Alphabet
gedruckte Wrter.]
1744 Clodius, Johann Christian: Lexicon Hebraicum Selectum
in quo Voces rariores et obscurae Codicis Hebraei Biblici
illustrantur; Radices Nominum deperditae restituuntur, et
simul Loca Biblica varia explicantur. Lipsiae Sumptibus
Wolfgangi Deer.
1748 Reiske, Johann Jacob: De Arabum Epocha vetustissima, Sail
ol Arem, id est, ruptura catarrhactae Marebensis. Lipsiae,
Apud Geo. Wilh. Pouillard. [Halle, Institutum Judaicum].
1750 Longverve, Louis du Four de: (...) Dissertationes de variis
Epochis et Anni forma veterum orientalium; (...) Quibus
adiecta sunt Commercium Literarum Ludovici Picquesii, Tho-
mae Eduardi et Andreae Acoluthui. Hrsg. von Joannes Diete-
ricus Wincklerus. Lipsiae, in taberna Io. Frider. Gleditschii.
[Viele arabische Zitate in den angehngten Briefen.]
frher druck mit arabischen typen in leipzig 49
1755 Reiske, Johann Jacob: Abil Walidi Ibn Zeidvni Risalet sev
Epistolivm. Lipsiae, prostat in Officina Gleditschiana. Lip-
siae, litteris Loeperianis (S. XVI).
1758 Reiske, Johann Jacob: Sammlung einiger arabischer
Sprchwrter die von den Stecken oder Stben hergenom-
men sind. Leipzig. Gedruckt bey Gotthilf Albrecht Fried-
rich Lper.
Bahrdt, Carl Friedrich: Usum linguae Arabicae ex compara-
tione cum Hebraea. Lipsiae, Ex Officina Breitkopfia.
17581759 Rehkopf, Johann Friedrich: Vitae Patriarcharum Alexan-
drinorum quinque. Leipzig, Ex Officina Langenhemiana.
1759 Krger, Johann Christian: De fato Muhammedano. Lipsiae,
Ex Officina Langenhemia.
Reiske, Johann Jacob: De Actamo philosopho Arabico. Lip-
siae, Ex Officina Langenhemia.
1763 Krger, Johann Christian: Als (...) Johann Friedrich Rehkopf
(...) sich ehelich verband mit (...) Christianen Brigitten,
Tochter des Johann Gottfried Wellers (...) sang dieses ara-
bische Gedichte Johann Christian Krger. Leipzig, gedruckt
mir Lperischen Schriften.
Khler, Johann Bernhard: Observationes in sacrum codicem
maxime ex scriptoribus graecis et arabicis. Lipsiae, Loeper.
1765 Reiske, Johann Jacob: Proben der arabischen Dichtkunst
in verliebten und traurigen Gedichten aus dem Motanabbi.
Leipzig, gedruckt mit Lperischen Schriften.
1766 Khler, Johann Bernhard: Abulfedae Tabvla Syriae cvm
excerpto geographico ex Ibn ol Wardii Geographia et Histo-
ria natvrali. Lipsiae: Litteris Schoenermarkii.
[Zwei verschiedene Schriften fr Haupttext und Noten.]
1767 Froriep, Just Friedrich: De utilitate linguae arabicae in
defendendis nonnullis locis tu ketv, specimen primum. Lip-
siae, ex officina Langenhemia.
1768 Froriep, Just Friedrich: Corani caput primum. Lipsiae,
Impensis Hilscheri. Lipsiae, Typis Loeperi (S. 64).
1777 Jones, William: Poeseos Asiaticae commentariorum libri sex
cum appendice. Hrsg. von J. G. Eichhorn. Leipzig, apud haere-
des Weidmanni et Reichium. Jenae, litteris Fickelscherrii.
1779 Richardson, John: Abhandlung ber Sprachen, Litteratur
und Gebruche der morgenlndischen Vlker. (...) Mit einer
Abhandlung von Professor Eichhorn ber die verschiedenen
Mundarten der Arabischen Sprache. Leipzig, Weygand.
50 boris liebrenz
1781 / 1782 Reiske, Johann Jacob: Briefe ber das Arabische Mnzwe-
sen, Repertorium fr Biblische und Morgenlndische Litte-
ratur. Leipzig, Weidmann, Bd. 9 (1781), 197268; 10 (1782),
165240.
1784 Wahl, Samuel Friedrich Gnther: Allgemeine Geschichte
der morgenlndischen Sprachen und Litteratur. Leipzig,
bey Johann Gottlob Immanuel Breitkopf.
1791 Rinck, Friedrich Theodor: Abulfedae tabulae quaedam geo-
graphicae. Lipsiae, in Libraria Weidmannia.
Wahl, Samuel Friedrich Gnther: Neue arabische Antholo-
gie oder auserlesene Sammlung seltener und groentheils
erst neu aus Handschriften ausgehobener Stkke aus ver-
schiedenen Fchern der arabischen Literatur. Leipzig, bei
Johann Friedrich Junius.
Catalogus Bibliothecae Io. Augusti Dathii. Lipsiae, Loeper.
[Nur drei arabische Wrter.]
1792 Rosenmller, Ernst Friedrich Carl: Zohairi carmen templi
Meccani foribus appensum. Lipsiae Ex Officina Breitkopfia.
1796 Rosenmller, Ernst Friedrich Carl: Selecta quaedam Ara-
bum Adagia e Maidanensis Proverbiorum Syntagmate. Lip-
siae, ex typographia Breitkopfii et Hrtelii.
1799 Rosenmller, Ernst Friedrich Carl: Arabisches Elementar-
und Lesebuch. Leipzig, Barth.
Zeitschriften
V.Literatur63
63Werke, die bereits in der obigen chronologischen Liste der Quellen auftauchen, wer-
den hier nur mit einem Verweis auf die Jahreszahl angefhrt, unter der sie zu finden sind.
52 boris liebrenz
id.: Johann Jacob Reiskes Briefe. Hrsg. von Richard Foerster. Leipzig 1897.
Reske, Christoph: Die Buchdrucker des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts im deutschen Sprachgebiet.
Wiesbaden 2007.
Roper, Geoffrey: The History of the book in the Muslim world. The Oxford Companion to
the Book. Ed. Michael F. Suarez & H.R. Woudhuysen. Vol. 1, Oxford 2010, 321339.
Schnurrer, Christianus Fridericus de: Bibliotheca Arabica. Halle 1811.
Schoeps, Hans-Joachim: Philosemitismus im Barock. Tbingen 1952.
Trommler, M. L. H.: Leben und Schriften des Hrn. Andreas Akoluth. Neue Beytrge von
Alten und Neuen Theologischen Sachen, Bchern, Urkunden, Controversien, Anmerkun-
gen, Vorschlgen etc. 4 (1761): 414471.
Uhl (Hg.): Thesavri (s.u. 1742)
Wallin: Qiat Ysuf (s.u. 1722)
Zedler, Johann Heinrich: Grosses vollstndiges Universal-Lexicon aller Wissenschafften und
Knste, welche bihero durch menschlichen Verstand und Witz erfunden und verbessert
worden. 64 Bde., Halle/Leipzig, 17321750.
Enlightenment in the Ottoman Context:
brahm Mteferrka and his Intellectual Landscape1
Vefa Erginba
In recent years, significant advances have been made in the study of the
Enlightenment.2 In the 1960s, Peter Gay, in his influential studies which
aimed to restore the stature of the Enlightenment, defined the philoso-
phes as a family of intellectuals united by a single style of thinking.3 These
philosophes pitted two aspects of their heritage, paganism and Christian-
ity, against each other in order to gain their autonomy and to create, in a
1 I am very grateful to hocam, Jane Hathaway; without her extensive suggestions this
article would not have reached its full potential. I should like also to extend my spe-
cial gratitude to Y. Hakan Erdem of Sabanc University who introduced the wonderful
world of brahim Mteferrika to me, as well as Dale Van Kley of the Ohio State Univer-
sity who opened up my horizons with his courses on the French Revolution and the
Enlightenment.
2For a synopsis of the Enlightenments journey from its origins to the present see Lynn
Hunt and Margaret Jacob, Enlightenment Studies, Encyclopedia of the Enlightenment, ed.
Alan Charles Kors, 4 vols. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003). In this article I used
the electronic version of this encyclopedia, so no page numbers are specified.
3Peter Gay, The Enlightenment: An Interpretation, vol. 1: The Rise of Modern Paganism
(New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1967), x.
54 vefa ergnba
4Ibid., xi.
5Ibid., 373.
6Ibid., 4.
enlightenment in the ottoman context 55
7No one is bolder than J. G. A. Pocock in attacking the definite article in the Enlight-
enment: J. G. A. Pocock, Barbarism and Religion, vol. 1: The Enlightenments of Edward
Gibbon, 17371764 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 7.
8See Roy Porter, The Creation of the Modern World: The Untold Story of the British
Enlightenment (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2001); John Robertson, The Case
for the Enlightenment: Scotland and Naples, 16801760 (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2005).
9David Sorkin, The Religious Enlightenment: Protestants, Jews, and Catholics from Lon-
don to Vienna (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2008), 3. See also his Moses Men-
delssohn and the Religious Enlightenment (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996).
10John Robertson, The Enlightenment above National Context: Political Economy in
18th-century Scotland and Naples, Historical Journal 40, no. 3 (1997), 671. Jonathan Israel
rightly points out that it is more important now than ever before to form a clear picture
of the Enlightenment and what it really entails. Jonathan Israel, Enlightenment! Which
Enlightenment? Journal of the History of Ideas 67, no. 3 (2006): 523545.
56 vefa ergnba
becomes less meaningful. The Ottoman Empire, the villain and sick man
of Europe, was no different from the rest of Europe in the eighteenth cen-
tury. Through the example of the thought and actions of one eighteenth-
century Ottoman intellectual, this study aims to contribute to the multiple
Enlightenments project by exploring how progressive ideas, which could
be deemed as enlightened, were formulated and circulated in the early
eighteenth-century Ottoman Empire.11 Notwithstanding the diversity of
its scope and impact, by including the Ottoman intellectual production
of the eighteenth century in the broader Enlightenments project, one
can find ways to understand how certain ideas became widespread cross-
culturally. Such attempts can also incorporate the Ottoman intellectual
arena into the broader European framework.
11In 1996, in a special issue of Die Welt des Islams, a handful of historians engaged
in a conversation on the possibility of an Islamic Enlightenment. Reinhard Schulze, in
his provocative article Was ist die islamische Aufklrung? found in the Islamic mystical
literature of the eighteenth century an emphasis on anthropocentrism instead of theo-
centrism. He described this change as the basis for the idea of an Islamic Enlightenment.
According to Schulze, mystics of the eighteenth century emphasised the individuals sub-
jective experience on his path to God instead of traditional or theocentric modes. By cre-
ating an alternative story for the modernisation of Islamic thought with an emphasis on
indigenous actors, Schulze challenged the impact of the West paradigm, which attributes
change and renewal in the Islamic world to European influence. In the same issue of the
journal, Rudolph Peters criticised Schulze, claiming that it is not easy to spot the agents
of novelty in the Islamic world in the eighteenth century because our knowledge of the
period is not adequate to prove the existence of an Islamic Enlightenment represented by
local actors. Peters also disapproved of Schulzes use of the term Enlightenment outside
of its specific European context. In his survey of the eighteenth-century Sufi works, Bernd
Radtke, too, rejected the idea of an Islamic Enlightenment. He states that he could not find
any enlightened tendencies in the worldview of the 18th century. These criticisms reflect
the fact that Schulzes aspiration to define an Islamic Enlightenment comparable to its
European counterpart(s) has not really been shared. His argument did not aim at defining
an Islamic Enlightenment conclusively; he wanted simply to include the Islamic world
in discussions surrounding Enlightenments. Schulzes ideas did not create a positive wave
of responses among his colleagues; however, developments in Enlightenment studies in
European historiography in the last decades have proved that Schulze was not completely
wrong in positing an Islamic Enlightenment. See the articles in Islamic Enlightenment in
the 18th century, special issue, Die Welt des Islams, N.S. 36/3 (1996): 276325.
enlightenment in the ottoman context 57
and not as an entry itself. These thinkers pictured the empire as the land
of the impostors and despots;12 few among them recognised it as a place
of tolerance for different religions and as a tool for criticism against the
Catholic faith. Like the Enlightenment thinkers themselves, Ann Thomp-
son and the editors of the Encyclopedia did not also consider the Ottoman
Empire as a country where there could be some sort of an Enlightenment.13
Besides the Enlightenment philosophes attitudes toward the Ottoman
Empire, there is another reason the Ottoman Empire was not considered a
part of the broader Enlightenment project. For these philosophes and also
for the modern scholars who follow their example, the Ottoman Empire,
in a way, represented the anti-Enlightenment with its backward religion
and despotic government. Therefore, the Ottomans could not resemble
the enlightened countries and peoples. According to this view, not only
were they representatives of anti-Enlightenment but they also posited a
real threat to the dissemination of Enlightenment thought. For example,
the internationally renowned historian of early modern Greek culture,
Pachalis Kitromilides, argued once in one of his articles on the dissemi-
nation of Enlightenment ideas in the southeastern Europe: The fact of
Ottoman domination meant that the Enlightenment was faced with insti-
tutions of a theocratic Empire, based on a rigid corporate social organisa-
tion and inspired by an ideology that constituted a complete counterpoint
to all modern liberal values.14 It seems that Kitromilides was inspired
by Gibb and Bowens now badly outdated Islamic Society and the West,15
which was once the epitome of the notion of Ottoman decline.
12For philosophes take on the Ottoman Empire, see Asl rakman, From Tyranny to
Despotism: The Enlightenments Unenlightened Image of the Turks, International Journal
of Middle East Studies 33, no. 1 (2001): 4968; Thomas Kaiser, The Evil Empire? The Debate
on Turkish Despotism in Eighteenth-Century French Political Culture, Journal of Modern
History 71, no. 1 (2000): 634.
13Ann Thompson, Ottoman Empire; Islam, Encyclopedia of the Enlightenment (New
York: Oxford University Press, 2003).
14Paschalis M. Kitromilides, The Enlightenment East and West: A Comparative Per-
spective on the Ideological Origins of the Balkan Political Traditions, in his Enlightenment,
Nationalism, Orthodoxy: Studies in the Culture and Political Thought of Southeastern Europe
(Aldershot, UK: Variorum, 1994), 54. The picture that Kitromilides drew of the Ottoman
Empire is based on nationalist Balkan historiography, which, until now, sees the Ottoman
control in Europe as yoke, and the Ottomans as bearers of the most archaic, most bar-
baric, and most anti-modern worldview.
15H. A. R. Gibb and H. Bowen, Islamic Society and the West: A Study of the Impact of
Western Civilization on Moslem Culture in the Near East (London: Oxford University Press,
195057). For a critical take on this work see Roger Owen, The Middle East in the Eigh-
teenth Centuryan Islamic Society in Decline? A Critique of Gibb and Bowens Islamic
58 vefa ergnba
Society and the West, Bulletin (British Society for Middle Eastern Studies) 3, no. 2 (1976):
110117.
16For an overview of the decline literature see Douglas Howard, Ottoman Historiog-
raphy and the Literature of Decline of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, Journal
of Asian History 22, no. 1 (1988): 5277.
17For a comprehensive survey of the twentieth-century historiography of the eigh-
teenth-century Ottoman Empire, see Jane Hathaway, Rewriting Eighteenth-Century Otto-
man History, Mediterranean Historical Review 19, no. 1 (2004): 2953.
enlightenment in the ottoman context 59
18The Enlightenment in Greece, which was part of the Ottoman Empire until the early
nineteenth century, developed in a similar way to the Ottoman Empire. Religion was an
especially sensitive topic. Even in the later phases, the Greek Enlightenment was anti-
clerical but not anti-religious. Anna Tabaki, Greece, in Encyclopedia of the Enlightenment.
The case in Russia is also similar. Isabel de Madariaga, Russia, ibid.
19See Jeffrey Burson, The Rise and Fall of Theological Enlightenment: Jean-Martin de
Prades and Ideological Polarization in Eighteenth-Century France (Notre Dame, IN: Univer-
sity of Notre Dame Press, 2010).
60 vefa ergnba
20Jonathan Israel insisted on the idea that the Enlightenment that we know is the
Enlightenment of the radical philosophes and not the moderate ones. Jonathan Israel,
Enlightenment Contested: Philosophy, Modernity, and the Emancipation of Man, 16701752
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006).
21 Gay, Enlightenment, 18.
enlightenment in the ottoman context 61
22See various studies of Orlin Sabev (Orhan Salih): I brahim Muteferrika ya da ilk
Osmanl matbaa seruveni, 17261746: yeniden degerlendirme (Istanbul: Yeditepe, 2006);
idem, The First Ottoman Turkish Printing Enterprise: Success or Failure? in Ottoman
Tulips, Ottoman Coffee: Leisure and Lifestyle in the Eighteenth Century, ed. Dana Sajdi (Lon-
don: Tauris Academic Studies, 2007), 6389; idem, Rich Men, Poor Men: Ottoman Printers
and Booksellers Making Fortune or Seeking Survival (Eighteenth-nineteenth centuries),
Oriens 37 (2009): 177190; idem, A Virgin Deserving Paradise or a Whore Deserving Poison:
Manuscript Tradition and Printed Books in Ottoman Turkish Society, in Friars, Nobles
and BurghersSermons, Images and Prints: Studies of Culture and Society in Early-modern
Europe, in memoriam Istvan Gyorgy Toth, ed. Jaroslav Miller, and Laszlo Kontler (Buda-
pest: CEU Press, 2010): 389409; idem, In Search of Lost Time: How Late was the Intro-
duction of Ottoman-Turkish Printing? Europa und die Trkei im 18. Jahrhundert [Europe
and Turkey in the eighteenth century], ed. Barbara Schmidt-Haberkamp (Gttingen: V&R
unipress, 2011): 447456. See also his essay Waiting for Godot: The Formation of Ottoman
Print Culture, in the present volume.
23Imre Karacson, brahim Mteferrika, Tarih-i Osmani Encmeni Mecmuas (TOEM)
1/3 (1328/1910): 178190; Ahmed Refik, Alimler ve Sanatkarlar (Istanbul: Kitabhane-i Hilmi,
1924), 329358.
24Niyazi Berkes, brahim Mteferrika, Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed. [heceforth EI2]
(Leiden: Brill and London: Luzac, 1986), 3:996998; idem, lk Trk Matbaas Kurucusunun
Dini ve Fikri Kimlii, TTK Belleten 26/104 (1962): 715737; Trkiyede adalama (Istan-
bul: YKY, 2004), 5063; T. Halasi Kun, brahim Mteferrika, slam Ansiklopedisi 2:896
900; smail Hakk Uzunarl, Osmanl Tarihi, vol. 4, pt 1 (Ankara: Trk Tarih Kurumu,
1994), 158162; William J. Watson, brahim Mteferrika and Turkish Incunabula, Journal
of the American Oriental Society 88 (1968): 435441; Halil Necatiolu, Matbaac brahim
Mteferrika ve Risale-i slamiye adl eserinin tenkidli metni (Ankara: Elif Matbaaclk, 1982);
ahap Demirel, brahim Mteferrikann Fyuzat- Mknatisiye Adl Kitab, Dil Tarih
Corafya Fakltesi Dergisi (DTCFD) (1982): 265330; Salim Aydz, brahim Mteferrika,
Yaamlaryla ve Yaptlaryla Osmanllar Ansiklopedisi (Istanbul: Yap Kredi Kltr Sanat
62 vefa ergnba
his biography and the impact of his printing venture been scrutinised in
detail.25 These studies have extended our knowledge of this unique figure
of the Ottoman eighteenth century as a printer;26 yet, printer was only
one of the many roles one can attribute to brahim Mteferrikahe was a
man of many parts. The establishment of a printing press by a Muslim for
the first time, not only in the Ottoman lands but also in the wider Islamic
world, was no doubt revolutionary; however, Mteferrikas proposals for
military reform, which were reproduced in the last decades of the eigh-
Yaynclk, 1999): 631633; Mustafa Asm Yediyldz, brahim Mteferrika, Vakflar Der-
gisi 22 (1991): 441447; Rana Temir, lk Trk Matbaasnn Kurucusu brahim Mteferrika
zerine Yeni Bilgiler, Trk Kltr 28/321 (January 1990): 4347; Adil en, brahim Mtefer-
rika ve Usull Hikem fi Nizaml mem (Ankara: TDV, 1995); J. Jozsef Horvath, Osmanlda
ilk Matbaay Kuran brahim Mteferrika, Tarih ve Toplum 215 (November 2001): 5158.
25Erhan Afyoncu, brahim Mteferrika, Diyanet slam Ansiklopedisi (DIA) 22:
324327; idem, lk Trk Matbaasnn Kurucusu Hakknda Yeni Bilgiler, TTK Belleten
45/242244 (2002): 606622; :
(17261746) (Sofia: , 2004). I used the short English
prcis at the end of this work and not the main work itself. Turkish trans.: Orlin Sabev
(Orhan Salih), brahim Mteferrika (2006).
26See the following studies for a discussion of the Mteferrika Press: Giambatista
Toderini, brahim Mteferrika Matbaas ve Trk Matbaacl, ed. evket Rado (Istanbul:
stanbul yaynclk, 1990); Franz Babinger, Mteferrika ve Osmanl Matbaas (Istanbul: Tarih
Vakf Yurt Yayinlari, 2004); Selim Nzhet Gerek, Trk Matbaacl: Mteferrika Matbaas
(Istanbul: Devlet Basmevi 1939); Server skit, Trkiyede Neriyat Hareketleri Tarihine Bir
Bak (Istanbul: Devlet Basimevi, 1939; repr. Ankara: MEB, 2000); Aladar v. Simonffy, brahim
Mteferrika: Trkiyede Matbaacln Banisi, trans. Faruk Yener ([Ankara:] Basbakanlk
Basn ve Yayn Genel Mudurlugu, 1945); Edvard Carleson, brahim Mteferrika Basmevi
ve Bast lk Eserler: brahim Mteferrikas Printing House and its First Printed Books, ed.
Mustafa Akbulut (Ankara: Trk Ktphaneciler Dernei, 1979); smet Binark, Matbaann
Trkiyeye Ge Giriinin Sebepleri, Trk Ktphaneciler Dernei Basm ve Yaynclmzn
250. Yl Bilimsel Toplants, 1011 Aralik 1979, Ankara: Bildiriler (Ankara: Trk Ktphan-
eciler Dernei, 1980), 139174; Sheyl nver, brahim Mteferrikann Bilimsel Yn ve
Yaynlarndaki zellikler, in Trk Ktphaneciler, 17; Osman Ersoy, lk Trk Basmevinde
Baslan Kitaplarn Fiyatlar, in Trk Ktphaneciler, 6983; Hidayet Nuholu, Mtefer-
rika Matbaasnn Kurulmas iin verilen fetva stne, in Trk Ktphaneciler, 119126; Jale
Baysal, II. Rakoczi Ferencin evirmeni Mteferrika brahim ve Osmanl Trklerinin ilk
Bastklar Kitaplar, in Trk-Macar Kltr Mnasebetleri I Altnda II. Rakoczi Ferenc ve
Macar Mltecileri Sempozyumu (Istanbul: Baha Matbaas, 1976), 217225; Alpay Kabacal,
Trk Kitap Tarihi (Istanbul: Cem, 1989), 3155; Alpay Kabacal, Balangcndan Gnmze
Trkiyede Matbaa Basn ve Yayn (Istanbul: Literatr, 2000); Orhan Kololu, Basmevi ve
Basnn Gecikme Sebepleri ve Sonular (Istanbul: Gazeteciler Cemiyeti, 1987); Mustafa
Akbulut, brahim Mteferrika ve ilk Trk Matbaas, in Trkler, vol. 14, ed. Hasan Celal
Gzel, Kemal iek, Salim Koca (Ankara: Yeni Trkiye, 2002), 919926; Hidayet Nuholu,
Osmanl Matbaacl, in Trkler, 14: 927932; idem, Mteferrika Matbaas ve Baz
Mlahazalar, Osmanl, ed. Gler Eren, vol. 7 (Ankara: Yeni Trkiye, 1999): 221229; Yusuf
Kaplan, Osmanllarda Matbaa: Bir Medeniyet Krizi Sorunu, Osmanl, 7:230237; Ahmed
Cevdet Paa, Tarih-i Cevdet, vol. 1 (Istanbul: dal Neriyat, 1994), 6976; Joseph Freiherr
von Hammer-Purgstall, Osmani Devleti Tarihi (Istanbul: dal Neriyat, 1983), 7:356357.
enlightenment in the ottoman context 63
teenth century by a handful of reform writers,27 and his loud call for order
(nizam) in the Ottoman Empire certainly made his impact greater than
that of simply a publisher.
While there is no certain information as to the birth date of brahim
Mteferrika, recent findings confirm that he was born between 1670 and
1674.28 Based on Risale-i slamiye, a work which is attributed to brahim, his
birthplace was the Hungarian town of Kolozsvr, today Cluj in Romania.
The earliest scholarly study of brahim Mteferrika was written by a Hun-
garian priest, Imre Karacson (18631911), in the early twentieth century.
This particular study has greatly influenced perceptions of Mteferrikas
background. Karacson argues that brahim was born into a poor Calvinist
family and later studied to be a minister. Niyazi Berkes challenges this
idea in an article in which he discusses Mteferrikas Unitarian beliefs
as reflected in the latters Risale-i slamiye.29 In this work, Mteferrika
states that he read books prohibited by the Habsburg imperial authori-
ties, which, according to Berkes, would have meant the works of Michael
Servetus, the theoretical founder of Unitarianism.30 Unitarians view God
as one person instead of three and defend non-Trinitarian monotheism.
They also believe that Jesus was a Prophet of God and not a divine being.
The Unitarians insist on the compatibility of reason and revelation and
claim that whatever is false according to reasonwhich for them meant
common sense and natural knowledgecan never be true as revelation.31
Islam also clearly espouses non-Trinitarian monotheism and Muslims
view Jesus as a Prophet of God and reject his divine nature. Unitarianism
and Islam are therefore easily compatible, and, as argued by Berkes, this
similarity played a significant role in brahims conversion to Islam. It is
evident from Mteferrikas thoughts that he also carried over this notion
of the compatibility of reason and faith from his old belief to the new
one. Although it has been argued by Karacson that brahim was enslaved
and forced to convert to Islam, it seems more reasonable to assert, as
27See, for example, the discussion of brahims impact on Koca Sekbanbas reform
treatise by Yusuf Hakan Erdem, The Wise Old Man, Propagandist and Ideologist: Koca
Sekbanba on the Janissaries, 1807, in Individual, Ideologies and Society: Tracing the
Mosaic of Mediterranean History, ed. Kirsi Virtanen (Tampere, Finland: Tampere Peace
Research Institute, 2001), 155177.
28Erhan Afyoncu, brahim Mteferrikann Yeni Yaynlanan Terekesi ve lm Tarihi
zerine, Trklk Aratrmalar Dergisi 15 (2004): 349362.
29Berkes, lk Trk Matbaas.
30Ibid., 729730.
31 Ibid.
64 vefa ergnba
Berkes did, that he took refuge in the Ottoman Empire and converted
voluntarily. Many Protestants, such as Mteferrika, did this, because of
Habsburg pressure on the non-Catholic population of Transylvania. The
Ottomans, indeed, had supported the independence of Protestant Tran-
sylvania in the face of Catholic Habsburg religious persecution from the
time of Sleyman the Magnificent.32 brahim, in his twenties, most prob-
ably moved to the Ottoman Empire with Imre Thkly (16571705), the
Protestant prince of Transylvania who started an uprising against the
Habsburgs and allied with the Ottomans against them.33
In a recent study, Erhan Afyoncu, utilising Ottoman archival documents,
outlines the trajectory of Mteferrikas career. Before being appointed as
mteferrika on 18 April 1716 he was a sipahi in the cavalry branch of the
imperial (Kapkulu) army.34 The mteferrika regiment is a subject that
has yet to be investigated in detail. It was principally an askeri position,
related to the military. They were the special servants of sultans, viziers,
and high-ranking bureaucrats.35 Mehmet Zeki Pakalin, in his acclaimed
inventory of Ottoman historical terms, traces them back to the early
period of the empire, noting that there is a reference to them in Mehmed
IIs (r. 14511481) Kanunname. It seems that the post of mteferrika was
mostly filled to employ (or sponsor) the sons of high-ranking officials,
such as grand viziers, governors of provinces, and chancellors (nianc),
who were not allowed to hold high offices. Mteferrikas fathers were from
32For the relationship between Ottomans and Protestants, see Carl Max Kortepeter,
Ottoman Imperialism during the Reformation (New York: New York University Press, 1972);
lber Ortayl, The Ottoman Empire at the End of the 17th Century, in Ortayl, Studies on
Ottoman Transformation (Istanbul: ISIS Press, 1994), 9.
33Niyazi Berkes, brahim Mteferrika, EI2.
34Afyoncu, lk Trk Matbaasnn Kurucusu Hakknda Yeni Bilgiler, 610. On the sipahis,
see smail Hakk Uzunarl, Osmanl Devleti Tekilatndan Kapukulu Ocaklari, II (Ankara:
TTK, 1988), 190. brahim might have entered the Ottoman army as a volunteer. Beginning
in the sixteenth century, foreigners were also included in times of need, which increased
the armys numbers dramatically. In 1713, when Mteferrika was in their ranks, the number
of sipahis was 10,778, apart from the approximately 12,000 remaining members of the six
divisions of the Kapkulu cavalry (alt blk halk). Uzunarl, Kapukulu Ocaklar, 2:216.
35The Mteferrika corps seems to have had its heyday in Egypt, where it was created
in 155455 as a separate and regular regiment combining both infantry and cavalry. Its
introduction was part of an effort to Ottomanise Egypts administration. See the follow-
ing works for the Mteferrika corps in Egypt in different contexts: Stanford Shaw, The
Financial and Administrative Organization and Development of Ottoman Egypt, 15171798
(Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1962); Jane Hathaway, The Politics of Households
in Ottoman Egypt: The Rise of the Qazdals (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997);
idem, The Mamluk Breaker Who was really a Kul Breaker: A Fresh Look at Kul Kran
Mehmed Pasha, Governor of Egypt 16071611, in The Arab Lands in the Ottoman Era, ed.
Jane Hathaway (Minneapolis, MN: Center for Early Modern History, 2009).
enlightenment in the ottoman context 65
all the main bureaucratic channels of the Empire: askeriye, kalemiye, and
ilmiye. It also seems that during the eighteenth century their composi-
tion changed dramatically; any member of the elite who did not fit in the
established administrative hierarchy was awarded this post and used for
special missions. The existence of the mteferrika class shows how the
Ottoman bureaucratic hierarchy was adapted to diverse needs. In the last
years of the seventeenth century, there were 631 mteferrikas.36 They were
an independent class under the sole authority of the sultan. From the
example of brahim Mteferrika, one can conclude that, in the eighteenth
century, people from outside palace circles, whose usefulness was proved,
were also granted these posts. brahim Mteferrika probably received this
post owing to his extensive knowledge of European languages (looking
at the posts to which he was appointed, he seemed to know German,
French, Hungarian, and Latin besides Turkish and Persian) as well as his
role as an interpreter between the Ottoman sultans and the Transylvanian
prince, Ferenc Rakoczi (r. 17041711).
After his appointment as a mteferrika, brahim was employed in
various diplomatic missions. First, he was sent to Belgrade in 1716 with
a delegation of Hungarians in order to promote their struggle against the
Habsburgs. Belgrade was an extremely important Ottoman provincial
capital and the forward base in campaigns against the Habsburgs. His
long-term job was as a liaison officer to Prince Ferenc Rakoczi, who fled
to Ottoman territory in 1711.37 Although his job became honorary after
the Ottoman plan of controlling Transylvania with proxy princes failed,
Mteferrika occupied this post until the death of Rakoczi in 1735.38 There
is not much information on the friendship between Rakoczi and brahim
Mteferrika, which probably developed greatly over twenty years, besides
the letters that a personal scribe of Rakoczi, Kelemen Mikes, wrote to his
imaginary aunt, in which he mentions brahim sporadically. While the
Hungarian scholar Joseph Horvath insists that Rakoczi supported brahim
Mteferrika in his printing enterprise,39 this claim still needs to be proved.
36Hezarfen Hseyin Efendi, Telhisl Beyan fi Kavanin-i Ali Osman, ed. Sevim lgrel
(Ankara: TTK, 1998): 86.
37Among those who fled with Rakoczi was Andras Tth, the father of Baron de Tott,
the outstanding military advisor to the eighteenth-century Ottoman sultans. It seems Hun-
garians were especially interested in the military. Virginia Aksan, Breaking the Spell of
the Baron de Tott: Reframing the Question of Military Reform in the Ottoman Empire,
17601830, International History Review 24, no. 2 (2002), 256.
38Afyoncu, lk Trk Matbaasnn, 611.
39Joseph Horvath, Osmanlda ilk Matbaay, 55.
66 vefa ergnba
The close relationship between him and his interpreter is evident in a let-
ter which Rakoczi composed before his death. He asks the grand vizier to
look after his faithful translator and asks for the Sultans favour for him
and prays for him in the following manner: May almighty God reward
him with His most precious gifts for his kindness to me.40
brahims long acquaintance with Rakoczi must have provided him
with extensive experience in diplomatic affairs. He was sent to Salonica,
in what is now northeastern Greece, in 1731 to escort the prince Mirza
Safi, claimant to the throne of Irans Safavid Empire, who had fled to Otto-
man territory in the wake of the Afghan invasion of Iran in 1722.41 In 1736,
brahim Mteferrika was sent on a diplomatic mission to Poland in order
to renew the peace treaty between the two states;42 in 1738 he conducted
negotiations on behalf of the Ottoman government and the anti-Habsburg
Hungarians for the surrender of the fortress of Orova (in modern-day
Romania), which changed hands various times in the eighteenth century,
to the Ottomans.43 He also took an active part, together with Comte de
Bonneval (Humbarac Ahmed Paa), in promoting Turkish-Swedish coop-
eration against Russia.44 He was appointed as the scribe of the Ottoman
artillery (Top Arabacilar) in 1738 and stayed in this post until 1743. He was
sent to Dagestan in that year to present an official letter of appointment
(tayin berat) to Asmay Ahmed, who had been nominated to the Kaytak
khanate.45 He was appointed official imperial historian (divan- hmayun
tarihisi) in 1744 and held that position until 1745.46
40Kelemen Mikes, Letters from Turkey, trans. Bernard Adams (London: Kegan Paul,
2000), 176. Kelemen Mikes, Osmanlda bir Macar Konuk: Prens Rakoczi ve Mikesn Trkiye
Mektuplar, trans. Edit Tasnadi (Istanbul: Aksoy Yaynclk, 1999). For a good compilation
of official Ottoman documents on Rakoczi, see Ahmet Refik, Memalik-i Osmaniyede Kral
Rakoci ve Tevabii (Istanbul: Hilal Matbaas, 1333/1917).
41 Ahmed Refik, Onikinci Asr- Hicride stanbul Hayat (Istanbul: Enderun, 1988), 119.
When the Safavid Shah Husayn (r. 16941722) was deposed as a result of the Afghan inva-
sion, at least three pretenders to the Safavid throne emerged. All of them were called
Mirza Safi, all claimed to be the youngest son of Shah Husayn. Although real son of Husayn
is believed to have been massacred with his father, one of those Safis took refuge in the
Ottoman Empire. The Ottomans welcomed him thinking that he might prove useful in
the future affairs of the Persian throne when the things finally settled. J. R. Perry, The Last
Safavids 17221773, Iran 9 (1971), 60.
42Afyoncu, lk Trk Matbaacsnn, 613.
43Berkes, brahim Mteferrika, EI2, 3: 997.
44Ibid., 3: 997.
45From the history of Suphi Mehmed Efendi (d. 1769), quoted in Afyoncu, lk Trk
Matbaacsnn, 615.
46Afyoncu, lk Trk Matbaacsnn, 615.
enlightenment in the ottoman context 67
47For the location of the press and a discussion about it, see Orlin Sabev, brahim
Mteferrika, 156160.
48For details, see Gnay Alpay Kut, Matbaa: In Turkey, EI2.
49Kemal Beydilli, Matbaa, Diyanet slam Ansiklopedisi, 28:106.
50Ibid., 28:107.
51 Ebu Nasr smail Bin Hammad el Cevheri, Tercme-i Sihah-i Cevheri (Vankulu Lgati),
2 vols., trans. Mehmed bin Mustafa el Vani (Istanbul: Dr-i iba-yi mira, 1141 [1729]).
For transcriptions and translations of these important materials, see Refik, Onikinci Asr
Hicride stanbul Hayat; Turgut Kut and Fatma Tre, Yazmadan Basmaya: Mteferrika,
Mhendishane, skdar (Istanbul: Yapi Kredi Kltr Sanat, 1996), 3435; George Atiyeh
(ed.), Appendix: Ottoman Imperial Documents Relating to the History of Books and
Printing, trans. Christopher M. Murphy, The Book in the Islamic World: The Written Word
and Communication in the Middle East (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1995),
283292.
68 vefa ergnba
The books and maps published by the Mteferrika Press reveal the extent
of brahims connoisseurship: before his death (1746/7), he published sev-
enteen books and four maps. The choice and timing of each title shows
his involvement in the process of publication and his extensive interest in
language, history, geography, and the natural and military sciences. The
first publication of the press was Ab Nar Isml b. ammd al-awhars
Arabic dictionary, known in Ottoman Turkish as Sihah-i Cevheri, which
was translated into Turkish by Mehmed bin Mustafa el-Vani and pub-
lished in 1729. Mteferrika included in this publication Sultan Ahmed IIIs
decree permitting the opening of the press, the fetva giving the approval
of the eyhlislam Abdullah Efendi, appraisals supporting the printing
press written by significant scholars of his time, and his own manifesto,
Vesilett Tibaa. The inauguration of the press with a dictionary was a
well-made choice. Mteferrika complained in his introduction about the
laziness of scribes in compiling dictionaries and how difficult it was to
find one. Although the dictionary was ostensibly published for students,
the books extremely high price might have prevented students from buy-
ing it. Thus it seems safe to assert that Mteferrika was targeting a wider
audience. His press was still on shaky ground; therefore, he wanted to
reach bureaucrats, officials, teachers, and scholars with proof of the utility
of printing. Mteferrika returned to dictionaries and linguistics in his last
publication, Hasan uuris Persian dictionary, Lisanl Acem, printed in
1741.55 In between these two dictionaries, he published a Turkish grammar
book in French, Grammaire turque,56 prepared by a Jesuit priest, Jean-
Baptiste Holdermann, in order to teach Turkish to French translators/
interpreters (dragomans). This may have been the first book to provide
Latin equivalents to Arabic letters. Its publication was supported by the
57The Marquis de Villeneuve, French ambassador to the Porte, between the 1710s and
the 1740s seems to have been a most influential person, who increased the friendly rela-
tions between the Ottomans and the French. He was useful in the signing of the Treaty of
Belgrade and as a result of his services the capitulations given to the French were extended.
Mnir Aktepe, Mahmud I, EI2. His memoirs of the treaty of Belgrade, in which he played
a mediating role representing France were later collected by one Marc-Antoine Laugier,
and provide crucial insights into the character and work of the Marquis de Villeneuve, as
well as the actual proceedings of the treaty. Laugier argues that Villeneuve was a perfect
diplomat, who possessed all the qualities of a great negotiator. He also suggests that he
was very much loved and appreciated by the Porte. Upon his return to France he was
offered the ministry of foreign affairs, which he declined because of his old age and sick-
ness. He died in Marseille in 1745. Marc-Antoine Laugier, The History of the Negociations
for the Peace Concluded at Belgrade September 18, 1739, trans. M. labb Laugier (London:
J. Murray, 1770).
58Grald Duverdier, Savary de Brves et Ibrahim Mteferrika: deux drogmans cul-
turels lorigine de limprimerie turque, Bulletin du Bibliophile 3 (1987): 346350; idem, Ilk
Trk Basimevinin Kuruluunda ki Kltr Elisi: Savary de Breves ile brahim Mteferrika,
trans. Trker Acaroglu, Belleten 56/215 (1992): 298.
59Mustafa Naima, Tarih-i Naima, vol. 2 (Istanbul: Dr-i iba-yi mira, 1147 [1734], 15a.
60Gerek, Trk Matbaacl, 7274.
61 Sabev, brahim Mteferrika, 203.
enlightenment in the ottoman context 71
with Katip elebis original plan, which he could not realise because he
lacked access to certain key sources. brahim introduced new findings in
geography, geometry, physics, and cosmography in that appendix and
extended the narrative of the cities, which Katip elebi had left at Van in
eastern Anatolia, to skdar on the Asian side of the Bosphorus. He also
enriched the book with figures and maps.68 The printed Cihannma was
one of the finest works of Ottoman intellectual production. Katip elebis
understanding of geography, which went beyond physical geography to
encompass social and cultural anthropology, as well as history, shaped
Mteferrikas view of this discipline. Geography, along with history, was
the backbone of his project of disseminating knowledge. Although the
ostensible purpose of this publication was to assist holy warriors, it is
doubtful that any holy warrior ever read the Cihannma, which was
priced beyond the average soldiers or sailors means.69 Rather, Mtefer-
rika intended to raise awareness of the world in which he lived by publish-
ing such geographical compendia.
Mteferrika was fond of geography and he practised it as a map-maker
and cartographer; in his attitude toward this science Mteferrika comes
very close to the Enlightenment thinkers. Geography was, at least in many
books of the period [i.e., the eighteenth century], a universalising dis-
course, designed to gather information about the globe.70 Enlightenment
thinkers saw geography as a way to collect and classify various natural
and social phenomena which were traditionally studied by the geogra-
phers. The Encyclopdie, which was published between 1751 and 1772 in
fascicules, and which was one of the signature works of Enlightenment
philosophes in France (17511772), is known to refer to various geographic
representations: the world is depicted as the Tree of Knowledge, or as a
mappe monde, a world map, in which all subjects were situated and con-
nected one to another.71 Whatever use was intended, the Encyclopdistes
aimed to bring together the information about various countries and peo-
ples and to show the relationship between them. The Encyclopdie there-
fore contained various articles on geography. Attaining precise geographic
data seemed crucial in the Enlightenment, to understand nature and the
72Charles W. J. Withers, The Social Nature of Map Making in the Scottish Enlighten-
ment, c. 1682c. 1832, Imago Mundi 54 (2002), 52; Reporting, Mapping, Trusting: Making
Geographical Knowledge in the Late Seventeenth Century, Isis 90, no. 3 (1999): 497521.
See also his books, Placing the Enlightenment: Thinking Geographically about the Age of
Reason (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007) and (with David N. Livingstone, ed.),
Geography and Enlightenment (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999).
73Withers, Social Nature, 47.
74 vefa ergnba
centuries but it was not put to practical use in the way Christians did.
The early Muslims understood the importance of this science, he argues;
the Abbsid caliph al-Mamn had important geographical works trans-
lated into Arabic. Christians dominated the majority of the lands and sea
in the world with the help of this science: Columbus, he adds, discov-
ered the new world and made a great step forward for the Christians by
using cartograms and maps in abundance. However, he strongly advises
against depending on the hands of individual cartographers and recom-
mends printing to provide well-drawn and correct maps. He also argues
that geographical works should be used when reading history to get a bet-
ter sense of the places and peoples described. He advises against com-
pletely abandoning the maps currently available, albeit incomplete and
inaccurate; they still have uses. They should be updated as much as pos-
sible. It is particularly important to use the information of local people in
drawing borders.74
One other publication of brahim Mteferrika, Tarih-i Hind-i Garbi
[History of the West Indies], is difficult to classify in terms of genre, but
he saw it as a work of geography, so it is best to evaluate it as such. This
work, brahim asserts in his introduction, which was presented to the
Ottoman Sultan Murad III (r. 15741595), has information on the discov-
ery of the New World in the year 903 / 14971498 and on the events that
occurred fifty years after its conquest. Mteferrika seems to be referring
to Amerigo Vespuccis first expedition, not that of Columbus. He also says
that he published this work in order to strengthen the sword of Islam and
present America as a new target for the Ottomans.75 Although it has long
been attributed to Katip elebi because of his well-known expertise in
geography, the style of this book bears no resemblance to that of Katip
elebi. It has now become clear that its real author is Mehmed bin Emir
el-Hasan el-Suudi (d. 1591).76 Thomas Goodrich argues that there were no
direct connections of any historical significance between the Ottoman
74brahim Mteferrika, Usull Hikem (Istanbul: Dr-i iba-yi mira, 1144 [1732]),
154162.
75Tarih-i Hind-i Garbi veya Hadis-i Nev (Istanbul: Dr-i iba-yi mira, 1142 [1730]),
2b. This work was translated into English by Thomas D. Goodrich and a facsimile of one
manuscript was published in Turkish along with a summary of the text. See Thomas D.
Goodrich, The Ottoman Turks and the New World: A Study of Tarih-i Hind-i Garbi and
Sixteenth-century Ottoman-Americana (Wiesbaden: Harrasowitz, 1990); the original was
reprinted: Tarih-i Hind-i Garbi veya Hadis-i Nev (Ankara: Ministry of Culture and Tourism
of the Turkish Republic, 1987).
76For his biography and works see Cevat zgi, Mehmed Suudi Efendi, Diyanet slam
Ansiklopedisi, 28.
enlightenment in the ottoman context 75
Empire and the New World during the colonial era nor any indications
of official Ottoman interest beyond the British islands.77 He also argues
that, although there were some bits and pieces of information about the
Americas before the first emergence of this book in the 1580s, in Piri Reiss
Kitab- Bahriye, Seydi Ali Reiss al-Muhit, the geography of Tunuslu Ahmet,
and the mappa mundi of Ali Macar Reis, Tarih-i Hind-i Garbi was the only
major source of Ottoman information about American colonial history
and the great maritime powers after the 1580s.78 The main purpose of
the work seems to be introducing the New World to the Ottomans by
providing information on discoveries and conquests under Spanish aegis
based mainly on Italian sources.79 The passages selected for translation
describe the history, flora and fauna, salient features, and the people of
the newly discovered lands.80 There are also many depictions of animals,
flowers, and humans included in the printed edition, most of them seem-
ingly products of the imagination which are far from any known reality
about the Americas. It is true that after an initial Ottoman interest in the
New World in the sixteenth century, it remained limited, at least in intel-
lectual terms. The reasons Mteferrika chose this work and not a better
text should be sought in the limited availability of works on the Americas,
as well as Mteferrikas genuine interest in the history of the maritime
revolution, which we discuss below.
Mteferrika valued the discipline of history above any other field of
enquiry. As soon as he started his printing venture he published chroni-
cles that were relevant for his time and suited his historical perspective.
Mteferrika clearly expressed in his introduction to the history of Naima
(16551716), the first court historian who wrote the history of the Ottoman
dynasty, that his purpose was to collect and publish the official histories of
the Ottoman Empire in their totality (Osmanl devletine ait vekayiinin bir
kl haline getirilmesi),81 a goal he never realised. He published only Katip
elebis Takvimt Tevarih82 and Naimas history (Ravzatl- Hseyin),83
along with the histories of the court historians Raid Efendi (d. 1735) and
Kkelebizade Asm (16851760).84 He also wished to complete the pic-
ture with a history of Egypt;85 a regional history centred on Baghdad;86 a
history of the collapse in the early eighteenth century of the Ottomans
long-time rival, the Safavids;87 and a history of the medival Turkic con-
queror Tamerlane, or Timur.88 Two patterns emerge in Mteferrikas
choices: first, his choice of Naima instead of another well-known Otto-
man history, such as the Tact Tevarih of Sadeddin, suggests that Mt-
eferrika shared Naimas historical perspective, which is dealt with below.
Second, he chose works on the rivals of the Ottomans, notably the Safa-
vids, Mamluks, Habsburgs, and Timurids, but he attempted to achieve a
historiographical balance by utilising external instead of internal sources.
Tarih-i Seyyah, the work on the Afghan invasion of Iran and collapse
of the Safavids, was written by the Jesuit missionary Judas Thaddaeus
Krusinski (16751756), who served as the translator and scribe of the Isfa-
han episcopate.89 brahim was personally involved in the publication of
this work: he translated it from Latin, and edited it, correcting numer-
ous mistakes.90 It seems Mteferrika took advantage of the interest in the
Afghan invasion and the collapse of the Safavids and printed 1,200 copies,
the highest number among his publications, of this work at an affordable
price. Although Franz Babinger insists that brahim was not proficient
enough in Latin to translate such a work,91 thirty-six Latin titles identified
84Mehmed Raid, Tarih-i Raid, 3 vols. (Istanbul: Dr-i iba-yi mira, 1153 [1741]);
Kkelebizade smail Asm, Tarih-i elebizade (Istanbul: Dr-i iba-yi mira, 1153
[1741]).
85Sheyli, Tarih-i Msr- Kadim ve Msr- Cedid (Istanbul: Dr-i iba-yi mira, 1142
[1730]). This is also available in manuscript as Sheyl Efendi, Tevrh-i Msr [sic] ul-Kadm,
Sleymaniye Library, MS Fatih 4229.
86Nazmizade Murtaza bin Ali, Glen-i Hulefa (Istanbul: Dr-i iba-yi mira, 1143
[1730]).
87Judas Thaddaeus Krusinski, Tarih-i Seyyah der Beyan- Anaviyan ve Sebeb-i Inhidam-
Bina-i Devlet-i ahan- Safaviyan, trans. brahim Mteferrika (Istanbul: Dr-i iba-yi
mira, 1142 [1729]).
88Ahmed bin Muhammed bin Abdullah bn-i Arabah, Tarih-i Timur Grkan li
Nazmizade, trans. Nazmizade Murtaza bin Ali (Istanbul: Dr-i iba-yi mira, 1142
[1730]).
89Babinger, Mteferrika, 20.
90Orlin Sabev argues that this translation was done by Krusinski and not Mteferrika
and he sees it as plagiarism. However, unless we have a clear indication that Krusinski
was sufficiently well-versed in Turkish to translate such a work, it is difficult to settle this
matter. Sabev, brahim Mteferrika, 191.
91 Babinger, Mteferrika, 21.
enlightenment in the ottoman context 77
92: , 396.
93Hugh F. Graham, Latin in Hungary, Classical Journal 63, no. 4 (1968): 163165.
94For a discussion on the authenticity, relevance and importance of gazavat for the
Bosnian war, see Michael Robert Hickok, Ottoman Military Administration in Eighteenth-
century Bosnia (Leiden: Brill, 1997), 110.
95mer Bosnavi, Ahval- Gazavat- der Diyar- Bosna (Istanbul: Dr-i iba-yi mira,
1154 [1741]). There are two modern Turkish translations of this work: mer Bosnavi,
Bosna Tarihi (Tarih-i Bosna der Diyar-i Hekimolu Ali Paa), ed. Kamil Su (Ankara: Kltr
Bakanl Yaynlar, 1979); mer Efendi, Bosna Savalar, ed. Mehmet Akgzl (Istanbul:
tken, 1977).
96Mnir Aktepe, Mahmud I, EI2. In this article the date of the Treaty of Belgrade is
miswritten as 1737: it should be 1739.
78 vefa ergnba
into English by Charles Fraser, the translator of Naima, in 1830 under the
title History of the War in Bosnia during the Years 1737 to 1738 and 1739.97
The first step in Mteferrikas project of publishing official Ottoman
histories was his edition of the Tarih-i Naima, also known as Ravzat el
Hseyin fi hulasat ahbar el Hafikeyn, which traces the history of the Otto-
mans between 1000 (1591) and 1070 (1659). In this work, before launching
into the chronology, Naima summarises his perception of history, which
is based on the civilisational theory of the North African historian Ibn
aldn (13321406).98 Giambattista Toderini, who composed a valuable
study of the literature of the Turks approximately forty years after brahim
Mteferrikas death, asks why brahim did not begin his official historian
project with Sadeddins (15361599) Tact Tevarih, which was very beauti-
ful in style and organisation; he speculated that brahim could not find a
reliable version of this history.99 However, Mteferrikas choice of Naima
was deliberate and well thought out, even though all he says with direct
reference to his choice is that he published Naimas history because it
is very beautifully written, scarce, and priceless.100 Compared to Saded-
din, Naima wrote in simple Turkish, whereas Sadeddin, being the son of a
former Persian refugee, preferred composite Ottoman Turkish. Sadeddin
represented an age in which writing histories based on Persian models
was highly valued. Naima, on the other hand, represented a new wave of
historical composition, which prioritised clarity, simplicity, and meaning
over style and lavishness. Moreover, Naima was a representative of proto-
scientific history-writing, which emphasised the historians integrity, mod-
101 For Naimas views on history, see L. V. Thomas, A Study of Naima, ed. Norman Itz-
kowitz (New York: New York University Press, 1972), 110119.
102Babinger, Mteferrika, 29.
103Mustafa Sami and Hseyin akir, Tevarih-i Sami ve Subhi ve akir (Istanbul: Dr-i
iba-yi mira, 1783/1784).
104Intriguingly, a hero of the European theological Enlightenment, the German Prot-
estant theologian Siegmund Jacob Baumgarten shared Mteferrikas views on the uses of
history. See David Sorkin, Reclaiming Theology for the Enlightenment: the Case of Sieg-
mund Jacob Baumgarten (1706 1757), Central European History 36, no. 4 (2003): 513523.
80 vefa ergnba
105J. Pedersen, Ibn Arabshh, EI2. See also Abdlkadir Yuval, bn-i Arabah, Diya-
net slam Ansiklopedisi, 19:314.
106Babinger, Mteferrika, 23.
107Pedersen, Ibn Arabshh.
108erife Yalnkaya, Sheyli, Ahmed, Diyanet slam Ansiklopedisi, 38:3233.
109For his biography and works see Tahsin zcan, Nazmizade Murtaza Efendi, Diya-
net slam Ansiklopedisi, 38:461463.
110Nazmizade Murtaza, Glen-i Hulefa, 4a4b.
enlightenment in the ottoman context 81
development of the compass and new findings concerning its use in deter-
mining latitude and longitude. By recognising the surprising and strange
behaviour of the compass, the individual affirms the miracles of God,
according to brahim, but it is also a good means of expanding commerce,
a good navigational guide, and a tool for education in geography. The
press likewise published four different maps (of the Sea of Marmara, the
Black Sea, Iran, and Egypt) for the purpose of geographical education.114
Mteferrikas printing venture had a lasting impact on printing in
the Muslim world. In 179495, when the Mhendishane Press opened
in Istanbul, it followed a path similar to that of the Mteferrika Press,
publishing titles in geography, military tactics, and engineering.115 But the
Mhendishane Press preferred religious works to history. The books that
the Mteferrika Press published also gave European intellectuals access
to these works for the first time. As a result, many translations of them
were published by European printing houses during the eighteenth and
nineteenth centuries. These clearly show that Mteferrika was successful
in incorporating the Ottoman corpus into the European one. Thus his goal
of making these works accessible to a wider readership seems to have
been realised. Mteferrika also opened another avenue of innovation in
the Ottoman Empire by urging the Ottoman sultan to open a paper mill
in the city of Yalova. He began working on this project and brought three
skilled workers from Poland for the job.
Mteferrikas printing venture clearly shows that he worked like an
encyclopaedist by critically editing, expanding, and commenting on the
works he published.116 He also publicised works that were significant for
him, such as Katip elebis Cihannma or Naimas history. He made these
authors works accessible and their approaches to geography and history
more credible.
114These maps can be found in Kut and Tre (eds.), Yazmadan Basmaya, 2229. For
further details about these maps, see Vefa Erginba, Forerunner of the Ottoman Enlight-
enment: brahim Mteferrika and his Intellectual Landscape (Masters thesis, Sabanci
University, Istanbul, 2005), 3940.
115For the books published by the Mhendishane Press, see Kemal Beydilli, Trk Bilim
ve Matbaaclk Tarihinde Mhendishane, Mhendishane Matbaas ve Ktphanesi (1776
1826) (Istanbul: Eren, 1995). For an interpretation of the Mteferrika and Mhendishane
presses, see Vefa Erginba, Forerunner, 4041.
116I owe this to Jane Hathaway.
enlightenment in the ottoman context 83
117See Mehmet pirli, Lale Devrinde Tekil Edilen Tercme Heyetine Dair Baz
Gzlemler, Osmanl lmi ve Mesleki Cemiyetleri: 1. Milli Trk Bilim Tarihi Sempozyumu, 3/5
Nisan 1987, ed. Ekmeleddin hsanolu (Istanbul: stanbul niversitesi Edebiyat Fakltesi
slam Konferans Tekilat, slam Tarih Sanat ve Kltr Aratrma Merkezi, 1987), 3339.
118Robert Olson, The Esnaf and the Patrona Halil Rebellion of 1730: A Realignment in
Ottoman Politics? Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 17 (1974): 329
344. See also Faik Reit Unat, 1730 Patrona syan Hakknda bir Eser: Abdi Tarihi (Ankara:
Trk Tarih Kurumu, 1943); Mnir Aktepe, Patrona syan, 1730 (Istanbul: Edebiyat Fakltesi
Basmevi, 1958); Bekir Stk Baykal, Destari Salih tarihi: Patrona Halil Ayaklanmas hakknda
bir kaynak (Ankara: Trk Tarih Kurumu Basmevi, 1962).
119For some of the progressive fetvas of Abdullah Efendi, see Mehmet pirli, Lale
Devrinde Yeniliki Bir Alim: eyhlislam Yeniehirli Abdullah Efendi, stanbul Armaan
(4): Lale Devri, ed. Mustafa Armaan (Istanbul: stanbul Bykehir Belediyesi Kltr leri
Daire Bakanl Yaynlar, 2000): 249259.
84 vefa ergnba
The role of Said Efendi (the son of Mehmed Efendi mentioned above),
a grand vizier in the second half of the eighteenth century, in Mtefer-
rikas venture is obscure. He was given the authority to open a press along
with Mteferrika in the original imperial order (ferman) issued for this
purpose by Sultan Ahmed III (r. 17181730). However, when Mteferrikas
permission was extended by the new Sultan Mahmud I (r. 17301754) in
1732, Said Efendi was not mentioned, while Mteferrika was granted sole
authority.120 It seems that Said Efendi became preoccupied with other
appointments, and did not help Mteferrika as much as expected. How-
ever, Said Efendis initial investment and initiation make clear that he was
one of the enlightened figures in Mteferrikas circle.
Although Mteferrika took pride in editing most works that he pub-
lished, he was assisted in his job by a group of intellectuals. Among those
employed in correction (tashih), roughly equivalent to copy-editing, by
the imperial order which allowed the opening of Mteferrikas printing
press, were the former Salonica judge Mevlana Sahib (Pirizade), also a
former eyhlislam, who translated the first five chapters of Ibn aldns
Muqaddima into Turkish (the sixth was translated a century later by
Ahmed Cevdet Paa); the former Galata judge Mevlana Esad; the sheikh
of the Kasmpaa Mevlevi lodge, Mevlana Musa; and the former Istanbul
judge Mevlana shak.
Mteferrikas enlightened circle was not confined to his friends among
the Ottoman intelligentsia; he also established friendships with foreign
ambassadors in Istanbul, such as the French ambassador Villeneuve, with
whom he exchanged ideas. He took an interest in the religious men of the
non-Muslim communities, such as the Jesuits in Istanbul.121 He worked
with Comte de Bonneval,122 known as Humbarac Ahmet Paa, to pro-
mote an Ottoman-Swedish alliance123 and no doubt exchanged ideas with
him about the military organisation of the Ottoman Empire.
Mteferrikas enlightened circle thus included Muslim as well as non-
Muslim bureaucrats, religious dignitaries, scholars, linguists, command-
ers, soldiers, and scientists. In this enlightened environment, Mteferrika
became the man he was through a syncretic approach: he combined sci-
entism with practicality, Islamic thought with rationality, historical imag-
124brahim Mteferrika, Usull Hikem. Unless specified, Usull Hikem in the footnotes
refers to the transciption of the text printed in Adil en, brahim Mteferrika. There is also
a simplified version of this work: brahim Mteferrika, Milletlerin Dzeninde lmi Usuller,
ed. mer Okutan (Istanbul: MEB, 1990).
125brahim Mteferrika, Usull Hikem, 127.
126Ibid., 128130.
86 vefa ergnba
127Ibn Khaldun, The Muqaddimah, trans. Franz Rosenthal, ed. N. J. Dawood (London:
Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1987): 4243. Ibn aldn summarises this as follows: When
mankind has achieved social organization, as we have stated, and when civilization in the
world has thus become a fact, people need someone to exercise a restraining influence
and keep them apart, for aggressiveness and injustice are in the animal nature of man. The
weapons made for the defence of human beings against the aggressiveness of dumb ani-
mals do not suffice against the aggressiveness of human beings toward each other because
all of them possess these weapons. Thus something else is needed for the defense against
the aggressiveness of human beings toward each other. It could not come from outside
because all the other animals fall short of human perceptions and inspiration. The per-
son who exercises a restraining influence, therefore, must be one of themselves. He must
dominate them and have power and authority over them, so that no one of them will be
able to attack another. Ibid., 47.
128Vefa Erginba, Forerunner.
129Hobbes formulates his theory in the following manner: In the state of nature, there
is in all men a will to do harm, but not for the same reason or with equal culpability...
But the most frequent cause why men want to hurt each other arises when many want
the same thing at the same time, without being able to enjoy it in common or to divide it.
The consequence is that it must go to the stronger. But who is the stronger? Fighting must
decide... Therefore the first foundation of natural right is that each man protect his life
and limbs as much as he can... He has also right to use any means and to do any action
by which he can preserve himself. Thomas Hobbes, On the Citizen, ed. Richard Tuck and
Michael Silverthorne (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 2527.
130brahim Mteferrika, Usull Hikem, 132.
enlightenment in the ottoman context 87
131 Ibid., 130131. In his distinction between these three regimes, he seems to be influ-
enced by Katip elebi, radl Hayara ila tarihl Yunan ven nasara. Katip elebiden
Semeler, ed. Orhan aik Gkyay (Istanbul: MEB, 1968), 16. Niyazi Berkes claims that
brahim implied that democracy is superior to all other regimes. Berkes, Trkiyede
adalama, 53. However, I do not see any such implication in this text. On the con-
trary, brahim describes these three forms of government neutrally. Berkess interpretation
derives from his grand narrative of Turkish history, which according to him has progressed
inexorably toward modernisation/secularism.
132brahim Mteferrika, Usull Hikem, 134137.
133Ibid., 125.
88 vefa ergnba
organisation. Being part of the corps which had a special position in the
Ottoman askeri class, brahim Mteferrika kept a critical eye on the cam-
paigns and the everyday operation of the soldiers. Thanks to his post he
was able to develop his scheme to reorder the Ottoman military structure.
His observations were indeed critical; even late in the eighteenth century,
the Europeans were pointing out the lack of order in the Ottoman army
as the biggest problem.134
He also prescribes the creation of a well-organised army as a cure for
social anarchy. In keeping with his habit of providing parallel examples
from European and world history, he cites the examples of the Roman
Empire and Byzantine Empire. He gives a short background on each, then
argues that both worked exceptionally well until disorder in the military
took the better of both and led to the devastation of their subjects. Both
were finally dominated by a superior force: Frankish kings in the case of
the Romans and the Ottomans in the case of the Byzantines.135 The Otto-
mans not only inherited the Byzantine legacy in Constantinople, but they
also saw themselves as the true heirs to the Roman Empire. By bringing
forth examples closest to the Ottoman mind, Mteferrika attempted to
show the Ottomans what would happen if they did not prevent disorder
in and the collapse of the army. He was well-read in European history, as
he mentions many times throughout the work, though his knowledge was
not always accurate. He also refers to many examples from European his-
tory, such as the French-Spanish war and Russian expansion. It is evident
that in his criticism of the Muslim army, he is referring to the Janissaries,
not to a group of imaginary soldiers. He goes on to make specific recom-
mendations on how the Ottoman army should be organised, based on his
knowledge of European armies, about which he had read from various
sources in Latin, and based on his own observations.
It is apparent that what Mteferrika suggests for the Ottoman army
is the strict application of the organisation of European armies after the
134Virginia Aksan points out that creating an orderly army required more than a
reform. It required a substantial change in the whole system of governance. In parallel
with Aksans argument, there is much reason to believe that change in the Ottoman army
required a systemic change. As early as the sixteenth century, Ottoman reform writers
observed many problems in the army and offered feasible solutions, but they were not put
into practice until the nineteenth century. The Ottomans problem was not diagnosis; the
change required in the army was so systemic that it would bring a complete reversal of
the ideals of the Ottoman enterprise. See Virginia Aksan, Breaking the Spell of the Baron
de Tott, 170.
135brahim Mteferrika, Usull Hikem, 149152.
90 vefa ergnba
military revolution. The books that he suggests should be read were those
concerning the military revolution in Europewar manuals and various
histories that explain the development of new tactics and formations. He
was particularly interested in the role of army officers and believed that the
disorder and the problems in the officer ranks are the main reason behind
the failure of the Ottoman army. He also strongly believed in the benefits
of a meritocratic organisation of the army, and suggested that this would
solve most of the problems between the soldiers and their officers.
136Ibid., 171.
137Mustafa Alis criticisms are evaluated in this context in Cornell Fleischer, Bureacrat
and Intellectual in the Ottoman Empire: The Historian Mustafa Ali (15411600) (Princeton, NJ:
Princeton University Press, 1986).
enlightenment in the ottoman context 91
Ltfi Paa (14881563), Mustafa Ali (15411600), Koi Bey (d. 1654), Katip
elebi (160957), Defterdar Mehmed Paa (d. 1717), Hezarfen Hseyin
Efendi (160078), and Naima (16551716) concentrated on the qualities
of individuals, such as viziers and commanders, or the sultan himself.
According to them, if high government posts were allocated to people
who were talented and deserving, and if bribery and favouritism were
prevented, the problems would be solved. brahim Mteferrika, in con-
trast, recommended a change in the structure of the state, especially in its
military organisation. Unlike Ali or Defterdar Mehmed, he never named
names or used actual officials as examples. Nor did he refer to the past as
a golden period that should be revived; instead, he chose to reckon with
the present, with its vices and virtues.
Mteferrika agreed with the nasihatname authors that social strati-
fication was natural and should be preserved. Like his predecessors, he
divided society into four classesmen of the sword, men of the pen, men
of agriculture, and men of commerceof which the first class was most
important. By listening to the advice brought forth by the men of the
pen, men of the sword should organise and discipline the affairs of the
other two classes. It is especially important to set soldiers and subjects
apart from each other; neither should be asked to undertake each others
responsibilities. Mingling of the classes was a prescription for anarchy,
he believed.138 He likewise adopted other ideas from his predecessors:
the view that soldiers should be few but strong from Ltfi Paa,139 the
anonymous (?) author of Kitab- Mstetab140 and Koi Bey;141 the emphasis
on spies and awareness of the enemys circumstances from Mustafa Ali,142
Hezarfen Hseyin Efendi,143 and Defterdar Mehmed;144 the advocacy of
military uniforms, which would make trouble-makers readily identifiable,
from the author of the Kitab-i Mesalih.145 More than a century and half
earlier, Hasan Kfi Akhisari had emphasised the importance of using the
new military technology of the Christian European powers and pointed
out the ramifications of disorder in the army. In fact, Mteferrika took
the title of his book from him and extensively used the ideas contained
in Akhisaris Usull Hikem fi Nizaml Alem.146
145Kitab- masalih ul-Muslimin ve menafi ul-muminin, ed. Yaar Ycel (Ankara: DTCF,
1980), 93.
146For Hasan Kafis text, see Mehmet pirli, Hasan Kfi El-Akhisari ve Devlet Dze-
nine ait Eseri Usull Hikem fi Nizamil Alem, stanbul niversitesi Edebiyat Fakltesi
Tarih Dergisi 1011 (1979), 239278. Mteferrika also adopted Hasan Kafis organisation
and framework. For the close connection between Mteferrika and Kafi, see Erginba,
Forerunner, 103105.
enlightenment in the ottoman context 93
them in this world and hereafter. He argues that by creation Muslims are
naturally steadfast, courageous, and agile, whereas unbelievers are fear-
ful and weak; they are heavily armoured because of the fear of death.149
Mteferrika finds religious law sufficient for the daily lives of Muslims but
his interpretation opens a door for innovation: he implies that if certain
things are not specified in the religious law, then Muslims should seek
rational solutions. This is why he fits well within the concept of moderate/
conservative Enlightenment. He continues to respect tradition and reli-
gious views, but he also argues that fanaticism was getting the better of
Muslims by pushing them into the depths of ignorance. By using reason
and knowledge, they could understand the cures for their problems and
thrive against their rivals.
Some among them even held strong religious beliefs. Studies by David
Sorkin and others display the importance of religious thinkers and reli-
gion in the making of Enlightenment thought.
In an effort to extend the sphere of the Enlightenment to the Islamic
world, this article has attempted to analyse one of the enlightened think-
ers of the Ottoman eighteenth century. By analysing brahim Mteferri-
kas printing venture, his opinions on Ottoman military organisation, and
his critical take on the Ottoman society of his time, I have tried to make
a case for the Enlightenment in the Ottoman context. I argue that this
developed according to a middle way. The Ottoman intellectuals tried to
incorporate ideas similar to those espoused by the Enlightenment figures
in Europe, but in a peculiar way: they brought these progressive ideas
into a society where religion was still the dominant force, and thus they
adapted these ideas to be successful in this society. I argue that the seeds
of Enlightenment thought circulated in the eighteenth-century Ottoman
Empire and were propounded by members of the intelligentsia, such as
brahim Mteferrika, who hoped to disseminate these ideas to a wider
readership. The ideas defended by Mteferrika were scientism, seeking
the causes of events and rational solutions to problems which were not
specified in religious law, a positive attitude toward change and renewal,
and the dissemination of knowledge, especially humanistic and scientific
knowledge, through printing. These ideas made brahim Mteferrika a man
of the Enlightenment in the Ottoman context. His activities as a printer,
publisher, scientist, and intellectual confirm his adherence to these ideas,
which he promoted in an environment where he was surrounded by an
enlightened elite. Although the Ottoman Enlightenment did not fully
resemble its European counterparts, we can still see the seeds of enlight-
ened thought in the eighteenth-century Ottoman Empire. If there was an
Ottoman Enlightenment, brahim Mteferrika was unquestionably one of
its founding fathers.
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Waiting for Godot:
The Formation of Ottoman Print Culture
One of the hallmarks of the Ottoman eighteenth century is the Tulip Age
(17181730). Historians called it so because of the tulip gardens cultivated
in different parts of Istanbul. Their refined fragrance replaced the smell
of the gunpowder that prevailed during the preceding wars. In addition,
in those years there was a place in the Ottoman capital where, for the first
time, ones nose could sense another kind of smell: the heavy smell of the
oil-based ink, used in the first Ottoman Turkish printing press. In fact, this
aroma existed even earlier, from Jewish, Armenian and Greek Orthodox
printing houses that were established during the sixteenth and seven-
teenth centuries, but it was during the Tulip Age that printing technology
with movable type was introduced to the Ottoman Turks themselves.
The adoption of this technology was closely connected with sociocul-
tural developments during the Tulip Age, and that is why the contextuali-
sation of the first Ottoman printing press within the framework of these
developments is unavoidable. The major trend that started during the
Tulip Age was the so-called Westernisation of the Ottoman Empire, which
was to a great extent sparked by the first long-term Ottoman embassy to
France. The almost one-year long embassy that took place in 172021 pro-
voked among the Ottoman elite a remarkable interest in Western culture,
luxurious lifestyle, architectural styles such as rococo and baroque, and
findings in the fields of geography, astronomy, biology, and medicine.1 The
Western influence, however, did not replace traditional Ottoman culture
immediately and completely. It was adapted rather than merely adopted,2
1 For the Tulip Age see W. Heinz, Die Kultur der Tulpenzeit des Osmanischen Reiches,
Wiener Zeitschrift fr die Kunde des Morgenlandes 61 (1967): 62116; A. . Evin, The Tulip
Age and the Definitions of Westernization, in Social and Economic History of Turkey
(10711920): Papers Presented to the First International Congress on the Social and Economic
History of Turkey (Ankara: Hacettepe University, July 1113, 1977) (Ankara, 1980): 131145;
F. M. Gek, East Encounters West: France and the Ottoman Empire in the Eighteenth Cen-
tury (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987).
2See A. U. Peker, Western Influences on the Ottoman Empire and Occidentalism in
the Architecture of Istanbul, Eighteenth-century Life 26, no. 3 (2002): 139163.
102 orlin sabev (orhan salh)
had printed, were listed in a probate inventory dated 1 April 1747. That
inventory, however, became known only recently.8
brahim Mteferrika became famous both among his contemporaries
and in history not as mteferrika but as the first Ottoman printer. His enor-
mous enthusiasm for printing helped him to overcome some obstacles set
by alleged opponents of printing, such as scribes, manuscript copyists, and
religious men. In order to convince the authorities of the reasonability of
his undertaking, in 1726 brahim wrote a treatise on the utility of print-
ing (Er-Risletl-msemm bi-Veslett-Tba). In it, brahim pleaded in
favour of the printing enterprise and set out its eventual benefits to Mus-
lims and to the future of the Ottoman state.9
Besides this treatise brahim submitted to the grand vizier an appli-
cation for an official permit to run his printing house. The grand vizier
approved the application, then the grand mufti issued an official religious
opinion (fetv) allowing printing as a useful way of multiplying written
materials, and finally, at the beginning of July 1727, the sultan Ahmed III
(17031730) signed a special decree (fermn), giving to brahim and Said
Efendi an official permit to run the printing house.10 Said Efendi, how-
ever, withdrew in the early 1730s, leaving Mteferrika to run the enter-
prise alone.
As Mteferrikas probate inventory shows, the books he printed sold
slowly and with some difficulty. Omne principium difficile! Inevitably,
the unsold copies of the earlier editions were fewer in number than the
later ones, since they were on the market for a longer period of time. By
examining the numbers of unsold copies against the initial print runs of
each of the Mteferrika editions, one is able to establish the degree of
popularity that each title enjoyed. Among Mteferrikas bestsellers were
the Mufti of Istanbul), Ksmet-i Askeriye Mahkemesi, Defter 98, fols. 39a40b. Translitera-
tion into modern Turkish is given in my monograph on the first Ottoman Turkish print-
ing press: O. Sabev, brahim Mteferrika ya da lk Osmanl Matbaa Serveni (17261746):
Yeniden Deerlendirme (Istanbul: Yeditepe Yaynevi, 2006), 350364.
9See the English translation by C. M. Murphy: The Usefulness of Printing, in The
Book in the Islamic World: The Written Word and Communication in the Middle East, ed.
G. N. Atiyeh (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1995), 286292; French transla-
tion by H. Omont, Documents sur limprimerie Constantinople au XVIIIe sicle, Revue
des Bibliothques 5 (1895): 193200.
10Translation into English by Murphy, The Book in the Islamic World, 284285; and into
French by Omont, Documents, 190192.
104 orlin sabev (orhan salh)
11 For more detailed analysis of the commercial success of the Mteferrika press, see
O. Sabev, The First Ottoman Turkish Printing Enterprise: Success or Failure? in Ottoman
Tulips, Ottoman Coffee: Leisure and Lifestyle in the Eighteenth Century, ed. Dana Sajdi (Lon-
don: Tauris Academic Studies, 2007), 6389.
12E. L. Eisenstein, The Printing Press as an Agent of Change: Communications and Cul-
tural Transformations in Early-Modern Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1979); idem, The Fifteenth-century Book Revolution, Some Causes and Consequences of
the formation of ottoman print culture 105
the Advent of Printing in Western Europe, in Le Livre dans les socits pr-industrielles
(Athens, 1982): 5776; idem, From Scriptoria to Printing Shops: Evolution and Revolution
in the Early Printed Book Trade, in Books and Society in History: Papers of the Association of
College and Research Libraries Rare Books and Manuscripts Preconference, 2428 June, 1980,
Boston, ed. K. E. Carpenter (New York, 1983): 2942; See also E. Eisenstein, The Printing
Revolution in Early Modern Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983).
13R. Houston, Literacy in Early Modern Europe: Culture and Education 15001800 (Lon-
don and New York: Longman, 1988), 160163; J. Le Goff, Les intellectuels au Moyen ge
(Paris: Seuil, 1985): 187; B. Richardson, Printing, Writers and Readers in Renaissance Italy
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999); A. Johns, The Nature of the Book: Print and
Knowledge in the Making (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998); D. Raven, Eliza-
beth Eisenstein and the Impact of Printing, European Review of HistoryRevue europene
dHistoire 6, no. 2 (1999): 223234; N. Hudson, Challenging Eisenstein: Recent Studies in
Print Culture, Eighteenth-century Life 26, no. 2 (2002): 8395; A. Briggs and P. Burke, A
Social History of the Media: From Gutenberg to the Internet (Cambridge: Polity, 2002): 1573;
D. McKitterick, Print, Manuscript and the Search for Order, 14501830 (Cambridge: Cam-
bridge University Press, 2003).
14See for example Middle Eastern Languages and the Print Revolution: A Cross-cultural
Encounter / Sprachen des Nahen Ostens und die Druckrevolution: eine interkulturelle Begeg-
nung, ed. E. Hanebutt-Benz, D. Glass, G. Roper / Gutenberg Museum Mainz (Westhofen:
WVA-Verlag Skulima, 2002).
15See A. Demeerseman, Un mmoire clbre qui prfigure lvolution moderne en
Islam, IBLA 18 (1955): 532; W. Gdoura, Le dbut de limprimerie arabe Istanbul et en
Syrie: volution de lenvironnement culturel (17061787) (Tunis: Markaz al-Dirst wa-l-
But al-Utmnya wa-l-Mrskya wa-l-Tawtq, 1985).
106 orlin sabev (orhan salh)
Indeed, the transition from scribal to print culture was a slow, gradual,
and arduous process. In Brian Richardsons words, old habits die hard.16
But at what stage of the development of printing can one claim that a cer-
tain print culture is already formed? We need a definition of print culture
in order to fix definitively the time of its real predominance over scribal
culture. The traditional so-called print-culture scholarship satisfied itself
with pointing out that once printing technology with movable type was
introduced, the spread of printed books caused profound transforma-
tions in all social spheres. But is the existence of a printing press in itself
enough to enable us to speak about print culture? A significant indication
of a developed and predominant print culture is probably the existence
of a social conviction of the necessity of printed agents of knowledge
and information. Thus, the establishment of a printing house is certainly
a starting point in the formation of print culture, but in different social
contexts the latter could overcome the strong traditional scribal culture
in a shorter or longer time.
A good illustration is probably the case of Greek Orthodox printing. It
started in the sixteenth century with various printing houses outside the
borders of the Ottoman Empire, except for one founded by the patriarch
himself (Kyrillos Lukaris) and the monk Nikodemos Metaxas in Istanbul
in 1627. However, until well into the nineteenth century the Greek mon-
asteries, schools, and other cultural institutions continued copying theo-
logical books by hand, since the locals considered the books printed in
Western Europe to be corrupted with Catholic interpretations.17 At the
turn of the nineteenth century Greek intellectuals held conflicting atti-
tudes toward printing. In 1783 D. Katardzis (d. 1807) called on Greek callig-
raphers to resurrect manuscripts and pleaded for their active use, citing
the example of the Ottomans (at that time without a printing house);
while others like Y. Misioadakas (d. c. 1800) and A. Korais (d. 1833) insisted
on printed books.18 So, in view of such conflicting attitudes could one
claim that Greek print culture had established itself around the begin-
ning of the nineteenth century? It seems that one should be much more
22G. Oman, Matbaa, 1. In the Arab World, A. Xylography, EI2, 6:795; R. W. Bulliet,
Medieval Arabic arsh: A Forgotten Chapter in the History of Printing, Journal of the
American Oriental Society 107, no. 3 (1987): 427438. See also the essay by Karl Schaefer in
the present volume, and the sources there cited.
23Gy. Kaldy-Nagy, Beginnings of the Arabic-Letter Printing in the Muslim World, ed.
Gy. Kaldy-Nagy, The Muslim East: Studies in Honour of Julius Germanus (Budapest: Lornd
Etvs University, 1974), 201; Bulliet, Medieval Arabic arsh.
24M. Mahdi, From the Manuscript Age to the Age of Printed Books, The Book in the
Islamic World: The Written Word and Communication in the Middle East, ed. G. N. Atiyeh
(Albany: State University of New York Press, 1995), 12.
25Gdoura, Le dbut, 35.
26A. Galland, stanbula Ait Gnlk Htralar (16721673), trans. Nahid Srr O rik (Ankara:
Trk Tarih Kurumu Basmevi, 1949).
the formation of ottoman print culture 109
27P. Lunde, Arabic and the Art of Printing, Saudi Aramco World 32, no. 2 (1981), online:
http://www.saudiaramcoworld.com/issue/198102/arabic.and.the.art.of.printing-a.special
.section.htm (accessed 23 October 2012).
28A. L. Tibawi, Islamic Education: Its Tradition and Modernization into the Arab National
Systems (London: Luzac, 1972), 24.
29Raven, Elizabeth Eisenstein.
30Tibawi, Islamic Education, 26; C. zgi, Osmanl Medreselerinde lim (Istanbul, 1997),
1:61108.
110 orlin sabev (orhan salh)
31 P. Ricaut, The Present State of the Ottoman Empire (London, 1668), 32.
32Fr. Babinger, Stambuler Buchwesen im 18. Jahrhundert (Leipzig, 1919), 8n1; Turk-
ish translation by N. Kuran-Burolu: 18. Yzylda stanbulda Kitabiyat, Mteferrika ve
Osmanl Matbaas, ed. N. Kuran-Burolu (Istanbul, 2004), 9n12.
33S. C. di Marsigli, Stato militare dellImpero Ottomanno incremento e decremento del
medesimo / LEtat militaire de lEmpire ottoman, ses progrs et sa dcadence (The Hague
and Amsterdam, 1732), 40.
34C. & . , ,
XVIIIXIX / St. Kenderova & Z. Ivanova, From the Collections of Ottoman Libraries in
Bulgaria during the 18th19th Centuries (Sofia, 1999), 95 and 126127.
35. Peevi, Peevi Tarihi (Ankara, 1981), 1:8283.
36O. . Gkyay, Katip elebiden Semeler (Istanbul, 1968), 124.
the formation of ottoman print culture 111
also that during the preparation of his book he had in hand only a few
maps, since the art of printing was not in common use in his country and
therefore it was a matter of difficulty to draw even a page (bu diyarda
basma istimal olunmamak ile bir sahifesini bile resm emr-i asirdir).37
However, as Orhan Kololu points out, Katib elebi did not recommend
that art to the Ottomans themselves.38 brahim Peevi considered print-
ing an odd art and likewise remains completely silent about its eventual
application on Ottoman soil. Katib elebis last work, Mzn work, [Bal-
ance of Truth] (1656), which contains a number of essays on controversial
issues related to Islamic doctrine and practice, is completely silent about
printing, apparently because it was still not on the Ottoman agenda. The
author and obviously his contemporaries were more concerned with the
ignorance of some rational sciences or with the issue of whether to drink
or not to drink coffee, for instance.39 In other words, in the seventeenth-
century Ottoman world, printing was an issue which did not receive any
serious attention. One possible reason for this could be the simple fact
that for the Ottomans, printing did not seem a satisfactory alternative to
manuscript copying. However, Katib elebis explicit complaint about the
lack of printing facilities, particularly for maps, is an implicit indication
that some pre-eighteenth-century Ottoman intellectuals felt the want of
printing. One must recall here that the first Ottoman Turkish printing
efforts in the first half of the eighteenth century were actually related to
cartography.
The lack of such recommendations leaves the impression that, in fact,
the Ottomans did not feel a crucial need for printing. As Rifaat Ali Abou-
el-Haj and Ekmeleddin hsanolu state, the Ottoman elite was in ongoing
contact with Europe and no iron curtain existed to prevent the adoption
of new ideas and cultural patterns from the European counterpart, but
they were adopted only when really needed.40
41 . , : -
VIVIII (Sofia, 2004): 216; French translation: R. Zamova, Voyager vers
l autre Europe: images franaises des Balkans ottomans, XVIeXVIIIe sicles (Istanbul: Isis,
2007).
42E. Abesci, tat actuel de lEmpire ottoman (Paris, 1792), 1:151152.
43F. de Tott, Mmoires du Baron de Tott sur les Turcs et les Tartares, Nouvelle dition
revue, corrige & augmente: 1 (Maestricht, 1786), 117118.
44M. labb Toderini, De la Littrature des Turcs (Paris, 1789), 3:212219.
45I. M. dOhsson, Tableau gnral de lEmpire Othoman (Paris, 1787), 1:301.
46Toderini, Littrature des Turcs, 3:19.
47H. A. R. Gibb and H. Bowen, Islamic Society and the West, vol. 1, pt.2: Islamic Society
in the Eighteenth Century (Oxford, 1962), 1:153.
48C. Niebuhr, Beschreibung von Arabien (Copenhagen, 1772), 215216, quoted by
O. Kololu, Basmevi ve Basnn Gecikme Sebepleri ve Sonular, 42.
49L. M. J. Garnett, The Turkish People: Their Social Life, Religious Beliefs and Institutions
and Domestic Life (London, 1909), 180181; cf. Y. Erdem, Sahhaflar ve Seyyahlar: Osmanlda
Kitaplk, in Osmanl, ed. G. Eren (Ankara, 1999), 11:728.
the formation of ottoman print culture 113
54See U. Derman and N. etin, The Art of Calligraphy in the Islamic Heritage (Istanbul,
1998).
55F. Robinson, Technology and Religious Change: Islam and the Impact of Print, Mod-
ern Asian Studies 27, no. 1 (1993): 229251.
56E. Kuran, Avrupada Osmanl kmet Eliliklerinin Kuruluu ve lk Elilerin Siys Fali-
yetleri (17931821) (Ankara, 1988).
the formation of ottoman print culture 115
prepared to have its holy text in printed form, rather they were waiting to
be persuaded of the advantages of printing. In his Tarih, the prominent
nineteenth-century Ottoman intellectual Ahmed Cevdet Pasha (18221895)
provides an insight into the reasons for these developments; he points
out that brahim Mteferrika and Said Efendi obtained a permit to print
books, but not religious texts. According to him, the printing of religious
texts was considered a threat to their sacredness, as the above-mentioned
Busbecq related in the sixteenth century, because of the pressure applied
to the sheets themselves. However, Ahmed Cevdet Pasha adds that the
bookbinders bind the Qurn in exactly the same way, by pressing the
codex, and putting an ornamental stamp over the cover by striking it. So
if this was not considered a blasphemy, and in this process the sacred text
was well preserved, then printing religious books could not be considered
a blasphemy either. Thus the printing of religious texts, first treatises for
students in Muslim theology and jurisprudence, began.62 It seems that
indeed in the 1870s Ottoman print culture was sufficiently developed and
the Muslim reading public accepted the first Ottoman printed versions
of the Qurn more readily than the earlier Western printed Qurns. At
least, the 1878 probate inventory of a certain Hadice, daughter of Hac
mer Aa, from Salonica, including two printed Qurns,63 suggests that
printing was not considered advocatis diaboli anymore, as it still had
been in 1844, for example, when Charles White reported that the Istan-
bul booksellers considered that manuscript copyists deserved to go to
heaven, whereas the printing press was made from the poisonous and
hellish plant zakkum.64
Yet there is another striking marker, showing that the 1870s were indeed
a turning point in the development of Ottoman print culture. Intellec-
tuals like Mnif Pasha (18301910) and Celal Nuri were concerned that
printing with movable type did not quite fit the specificities of the Arabic
script.65 But this did not mean that Ottomans should desist from print-
ing with movable type. Quite the contrary, in 1879 the Council of Public
Education (Meclis-i Marif-i Ummiye) appointed a special committee
to reform the Arabic script by making it non-cursive in order to facilitate
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Printing and the Abuse of Texts in
al-abarts History of Egypt
Sarah Mirza
In June 1798, Napoleon landed from a fleet of French ships on the coast of
Alexandria, accompanied by a host, not only of soldiers, but also French
scientists, intellectuals, and interpreters who were prepared to make an
archaeological, anthropological, and scientific study of Egypt. The occu-
pation of Egypt lasted three influential years, ending with the evacuation
of French forces in 1801 and the return of Ottoman overrule to a country
that had been, before the arrival of Napoleon, under the control of local
Mamluk military households.
Edward Said argues that the French occupation betrayed a textual
and schematic1 attitude toward Egypt from its inception. As part of his
colonising mission, Napoleons scholars established the Institute of Egypt
in Cairo, where they set up a number of printing presses, under the direc-
torship of Jean-Joseph Marcel. These instruments were new to the major-
ity of Egyptians. What Said sees as the dawn of Orientalist discourse on
the Middle East, as initiated by Napoleons project to textualise Egypt and
epitomised in the publication of the Institutes research in the twenty-
three volume Description de lEgypte, found resistance in at least one
native Egyptian writer. A witness to the French invasion, Abd al-Ramn
al-abart (17561826), was a historian, biographer, and al-Azhar scholar.
As a member of the educated religious elite, the ulam, al-abart chose
to counter Napoleons claims to authority through the traditional arts of
grammatical and literary criticism. He wrote three different versions of
his account of the French occupation, based on public documents, infor-
mants, and eyewitness accounts. His first chronicle, entitled Tar mud-
dat al-Faranss bi-Mir [The history of the period of the French in Egypt],
was written in 1798 from al-abarts initial impression of the French, and
covers the first seven months of the occupation. The second chronicle,
Mahar al-taqds bi-zawl dawlat al-Faranss [The sacred aspect of the fall
of the French], covers June to December 1801 of the occupation, and was
presented to the Ottoman general Yusuf Paa upon the Ottoman reoc-
cupation of Egypt.
Comparing al-abarts earlier editions of his history with his final
work, Aib al-r f l-tarim wa-l-abr [The wondrous vestiges in
the biographies and history], a multi-volume chronicle of Egypt from
1688 to 1821, some scholars characterise his initial depiction of the French
as that of a traditional Muslim scholars reaction against infidel occupi-
ers. After his experience of suffering under the Ottoman reoccupation of
Egypt, however, these scholars argue that al-abart came to prefer French
over Ottoman or Mamluk rule. Yet al-abarts reaction to the French and
Ottoman occupations is complex. His livid cursing against the French and
his bitterness toward the Ottomans are instigated by their official procla-
mations, as translated into Arabic from French and Turkish. A compari-
son of his depiction of the French and Ottoman forces reveals al-abarts
insight into the production and dissemination of governmental texts as
tools of oppression.
Al-abarts understanding of the Islamic cosmos includes the concept
of a divinely revealed relationship between human speech, justice, and sal-
vation. In his worldview, written texts have an implicit governing nature.
Al-abart uses the word siysa to express this relationship. In modern
Arabic this term refers to politics, but al-abart uses it in the sense of a
model drawn from sacred texts for the governing of peoples affairs. In his
introduction to Aib, he describes how God created humans weak and
dependent on each other for their livelihoods. He writes, men realised
that they were in need of a just ruler and a wise king who would establish
for them a standard of justice and a law of government [siysa]...God
therefore sent down His Book to bring the truth, and His balance to bring
justice.2 Al-abart organises the strata of society according to this rela-
tionship between Islamic textual and political authority, stating that the
ulam are second only to the prophets and are followed by the kings,
whose role is to establish justice, but only through the guidance of the
religious scholars.
A significant portion of al-abarts first chronicle, Muddat, is devoted to
taking apart each phrase of Napoleons first proclamation to the Egyptian
populace, translated into and printed in Arabic, with the aid of interpreter
2Thomas Philipp, Moshe Perlman, and Guido Schwald, eds., Abd al-Ramn al-Jabarts
History of Egypt: Ajib al-thr f l-tarjim wa-l-akhbr (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag,
1994), 1:9.
the abuse of texts in al-abarts history of egypt 123
3Shmuel Moreh, ed. and trans., Napoleon in Egypt: al-Jabarts Chronicle of the French
Occupation, 1798 (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1993), 27.
4Ibid., 2526.
5Ibid., 28.
6Ibid., 30.
124 sarah mirza
7Ibid., 44.
8Ibid., 6970.
9Philipp, et al., 3:31.
the abuse of texts in al-abarts history of egypt 125
10Moreh, 109.
11 Young officer Niello Sargy recorded that Shay al-Bakr felt there were many works in
Arabic that should be printed. Juan Cole, Napoleons Egypt (New York: Palgrave Macmillan,
2007), 148.
12Philipp, et al., 3:4.
126 sarah mirza
13Ibid., 3:305306.
14Ibid., 3:453.
the abuse of texts in al-abarts history of egypt 127
lower classes, not the notables; or when there was some conflict between
the victim and the scribes.15
Oppressive conditions led, in May of 1805, to a popular protest and demands
for the deposition of the Egyptian governor, Ahmed Hurid Paa.16 The
people turned to an Albanian mercenary named Muammad Al, who a
year earlier had supported them in protesting against the land tax, and
the ulam requested him to become governor so long as he ruled in con-
sultation with them. The Ottoman sultan ratified their choice on 18 June
1805. According to al-abart, this agreement between the viceroy of Egypt
and the religious scholars was not upheld. In fact, owing to its criticism of
Muammad Al, publication of Aib was forbidden in Egypt until 1870,
more than forty years after al-abarts death.
In conclusion, al-abarts chronicle is permeated with concern for the
problematical texts of both the French and Ottoman bureaucracies. As
one of the literate, educated religious elite, he was interested in methods
of transmission and communication, but did not find the printed procla-
mations of the French remarkable, or inherently alien and threatening.
Instead, he depicts the attempt to regulate informal and personalised
modes of social transaction through formal and legal government-issued
documents as common practice under both the French and Ottoman
administrations, in an environment of social upheaval and resistance.
Egyptian citizens were required to fill in these written spaces as opposed
to creating their own textual space. As a witness to these efforts at pub-
lic control, al-abart responded specifically to the textual aspect of the
imperialistic agendas of the French and Ottoman occupations.
Bibliography
Cole, Juan. Napoleons Egypt: Invading the Middle East. New York: Palgrave Macmillan,
2007.
Moreh, Shmuel, ed. and trans. Napoleon in Egypt: al-Jabartis Chronicle of the French Occu-
pation, 1798. Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1993.
Philipp, Thomas, Moshe Perlman, and Guido Schwald, eds. Abd al-Ramn al-Jabarts
History of Egypt: Ajib al-thr f l-tarjim wa-l-akhbr. 4 vols. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner
Verlag, 1994.
Said, Edward W. Orientalism. New York: Pantheon Books, 1978.
15Ibid., 3:304.
16Ibid., 3:505506.
Judo-Arabic Printing in North Africa, 18501950
Yosef Tobi
Introduction
For almost four hundred years, since the first book was printed in Hebrew
charactersRashis commentary on the Pentateuch in Reggio di Calabria,
Italy in 1475, nearly all Hebrew printing presses were located in European
cities (Rome, Venice, Krakow, Prague, Amsterdam, Istanbul, Salonica,
Izmir, Livorno, and Warsaw), where the Arabic language was not used by
local Jewish communities. Some Hebrew books were printed in Spain and
Portugal, prior to the expulsion of the Jews in 1492/96. In the sixteenth
century, attempts to establish Hebrew printing presses in Arabic-speaking
countries, namely in Fez (Morocco), Cairo and Safed (Palestine), were car-
ried out by Jews from Spain, Italy, and Poland respectively. However, the
production output of these printing presses, which survived for only a few
years, was very small, not exceeding half a dozen books.1 In any case, none
of them was in Judo-Arabic (henceforth JA).
JA refers to the Arabic language, writtenor, in our case, printed
with Hebrew characters, as was customary among Arabic speakers in Jew-
ish communities of old, a custom already prevalent in pre-Islamic (hil)
Arabia.2 JA was the main literary vehicle by which Jews, scholars as well
as laymen, expressed themselves in mediaeval Arab lands, especially from
the tenth to mid-thirteenth centuries. For reasons that do not fall within
the scope of our present enquiry, the Jewish communities in Arab lands,
save Yemen, almost totally abandoned Arabic as a literary, written lan-
guage, and reverted to Hebrew, in particular, the scholarly writings of
the rabbis.3 This, then, accounts for the lack of printed books published
in JA until the mid-nineteenth century. Prior to this time, JA had been
4E.g., Saadias tafsr of the Pentateuch, which was first printed in Hebrew characters
in the Polyglot of Constantinople, 1546, and was later printed in Arabic characters in the
Polyglots of Paris (16291645) and London (1657).
5Not all Hebrew publishers in NA were privileged to have their publications fully
listed. Many studies have been conducted on this subject, especially by the late Abraham
Attal. The following is a list of the comprehensive bibliographies showing the publications
of these presses, based on the chronological order of their founding: AlgeriaAbraham
Attal and Mera Harosh, Ha-defs ha-ivr be-lgr, Kiryat Sefer 61 (1986/7): 561572;
Robert Attal, Ha-iton ha-yehudi ha-rishon ba-Magreb: lIsralite Algrien (), 1870,
Peamim 17 (1984): 8895; idem, Ha-defs ha-ivr be-Wahrn, Kiryat Sefer 68 (1998):
judaeo-arabic printing in north africa 131
Tunis (1860) in Tunisia, Tangier (1891), Casablanca (1919) and Fez (1926)
in Morocco, and Tripoli (1911) in Libya. The first books printed in Algiers
and Tunis by Jews were, however, in Arabic, using Arabic characters, and
clearly not directed to the Jewish public. Neither of these were printed by
a Hebrew printing press:
any information on Mordechai Ganuna in other sources; it is likely that a certain Joseph
Ganuna was Mordechais son, one of the enlightened leaders of the Jewish community in
Tunis at the end of the nineteenth century and beginning of the twentieth century, and
one of the more active persons involved in JA journalism in that city. Concerning him,
see Yosef Tobi and Zivia Tobi, Ha-Sifrut ha-Arvit-ha-Yehudit be-Tunisyah (18501950) [La
littrature judo-arabe en Tunisie (18501950)] (Lod: Orot Yahadut ha-Maghreb, 2000), 299
(index, s.v. ,) .
8This pamphlet is exceptionally rare. I have seen a copy of it only in the archives of
Alliance Isralite Universelle in Paris. No mention or reference is made in it about the Jew-
ish printing presses in NA, neither is there any historical record in it concerning the Jews
of NA, nor has it been listed in the catalogue of any library, including the Hebrew National
Library of Jerusalem. Nevertheless, it should be noted that an entry was given by Friedberg,
Bet Eked Sepharim I (Tel Aviv: M.A. Bar-Juda, 1951), 167 (letter bet), no. 1393., for the fol-
lowing: ". " (= ) . ,
40 a petition for life and peace, submitted to the ruler of Tunis, with an Arabic translation,
Tunis 1860 40). I do not know Friedbergs source. It should be noted that this was not the
only case of blessings issuing from the Jewish community in Tunisia on the rulers acces-
sion to the throne, but was apparently a common practice with the Jewish community.
From Vassel, La littrature populaire, I have noted another four similar publications, most
of them belonging to R. Juda armon (18121912) who was proficient in classical Arabic.
9Concerning Richard Holt, see G. Zawadowski, Richard Holt, pionnier de la presse
tunisienne, Revue Tunisienne (1939): 127131; Andr Demeerseman, Une page nouvelle de
lhistoire de limprimerie en Tunisie, IBLA 75 (1956): 301.
10Concerning the proliferation of JA literature in Tunisia during this period, and the
openness of the Jews of northern Tunisia toward Arab and European literature during that
same period, see Tobi, Ha-sifrut ha-Arvit-ha-Yehudit be-Tunisyah.
judaeo-arabic printing in north africa 133
leaflets.11 The question which naturally arises is: for whom were these
printed copies made?
Since the JA used in all these printed editions was basically the ver-
nacular that was spoken in each place, and not the classical JA known
throughout the Middle Ages, which is a kind of middle Arabic, we may
undoubtedly conclude that the target was not the narrow social stratum
consisting of the rabbis and other scholars, but rather, the general pub-
lic. We should note here that, in principle, all Jewish males could read
Hebrew characters without any difficulty, as they were extensively edu-
cated for that end from the age of three or four. In any case, the rabbis and
the scholars could certainly understand Hebrew texts. So colloquial JA
was deliberately chosen to answer the needs of the general public.12 This
cultural exercise expressed most pointedly the trend toward democratisa-
tion in education, that is to say, providing literature that was written in
the spoken language used by all members of the community, unlike the
liturgical and rabbinical literature written in Hebrew, which would only
be understood by small circles of religious students.13
The inability of the Algerian Jewish community to make use of the
Hebrew language and their need to resort to books that were composed
in the local dialect of JA to which they were accustomed, was expressly
noted by several authors, as well as those publishers responsible for their
printing, for example, by Rabbi Abraham al-Naqwa, who initiated the
translation project of Dat Yehdt, from Ladino into JA (Algiers 1855, p. 1,
see below).
This leads us to the second most important question: what kinds of
books were being printed in JA? Let us begin with the books printed in the
oldest printing press, which was founded in Algiers. The first book, printed
in 1853, was Yed Davd, novellae on Tractate Nazr of the Babylonian Tal-
mud (29 cm, 160 pp.), written by David Muatt, a local Jewish scholar.14
This Hebrew book, designated for rabbinical scholars, was printed in a
local French printing house, Imprimerie Gueymard, by ayyim Zeev
15Yaari, el ere yisrael (Jerusalem: Mossad Harav Kook, 1951), 860; Attal, Ha-defs
ha-Ivr ba-Magreb, 122123.
16A comparison of the fonts used in printing the first books in Algiers and the fonts
used in printing the Hebrew books in Jerusalem for the same years suggests a striking simi-
larity between them. Certainly, the typefaces used by Akenazi were not like those used
in the Livorno printing presses. ayyim Zeev Akenazi is not mentioned as a publisher
of books, nor in any other context by Shoshanna Halevy, Sifre Yerushalayim ha-rishonim:
ha-sefarim, ha-hovrot eha-dapim she-nidpesu be-otiyot Ivriyot ba-amishim ha-shanim
ha-rishonim li-defus ha-Ivri bi-Yerushalayim, 601650, 18411890 [The first Hebrew books
printed in Jerusalem] (Jerusalem: Ben-Zvi Institute, 1975). Attal, Ha-defs ha-Ivr ba-
Magreb, 123124n8, makes note of the similarity between the decorative artwork on the
title pages and on the other pages of the first books printed in Algiers, Oran, and Tunis,
and books printed in Salonica during the same period, and surmises that Akenazi had
brought the types from Salonica.
17Attal, Ha-defs ha-Ivr ba-Magreb, 124; Attal and Harosh, Ha-defs ha-ivr
be-lgr, 561562.
judaeo-arabic printing in north africa 135
d uring the nineteenth century, and known in particular for its clear-cut
Hebrew typefaces. No wonder, then, that the second part of ay La-Mora
was printed in Livorno (1864), rather than in Algiers, as was the first part
of the book. Actually, sundry and diverse JA texts had been published by
printing presses in Livorno since the beginning of the nineteenth century,
many of them appearing in different liturgical compilations based on the
rites of the several NA Jewish communities: Moroccan, Algerian, Tunisian,
and Libyan.
The first NA Hebrew printing press established after the one in Algiers
was in Oran, or Wahrn, as originally pronounced. It was built in 1856,
but it did not offer any improvements, as it was operated by the same
. Z. Akenazi with the same flawed fonts. The first book printed was
evae lohim, a corpus of religious poems, most of them in Hebrew, but
some also in JA, compiled by Nissim Kresenti. At the end of the said work
is appended Aseret Ha-Devarim, a widespread and highly popular JA com-
position on the Ten Commandments, and one that is recited by all NA
congregations on the Feast of Pentecost. The work has been attributed to
Saadia Gaon.
A major turning point took place in Tunis in 1860. Special fraternal ties
had developed between Livornese Jewry and the Jews of Tunis, owing to
the reputable community of the Livornese Jews who migrated to Tunis at
the end of the seventeenth century, and who were very insistent on living
as a separate and independent community there. This fact, in addition
to the geopolitical location of Tunis as the closest place in NA to France
and to Italy, made the Jewish community of Tunis the most populous one
in NA during the nineteenth century, as well as the one most exposed to
European culture, civilisation, and technology. Therefore, the trend of the
Jewish printers of Algiers, which was to provide the Jewish public at large
with digested, popularised material, was continued in Tunis. However,
its openness to the surrounding, larger Arab population and to European
culture also signified an abrupt change of course. Historically, we have
to connect this new trend with the new constitution published by the
Tunisian Bey, Muammad diq B, in 1857, which granted the Jews, as
well as other minorities, equal rights, bringing to an end the long-standing
discriminatory regulations levelled against non-Muslims. In 1861, two Jews
of the local Livornese community asked Moses (B) emma, one of the
few Jews who could read and write Arabic characters fluently, to translate
the new constitution, Qnn al-dawla al-Tnisya, into JA for the Jewish
public. Since there was no Jewish printing press in the city, they peti-
tioned the help of ayyim Zeev Akenazi of Algiers to provide them with
judaeo-arabic printing in north africa 137
19For a photograph of the title page of this extremely rare booklet, see Attal, Hag-
gadat Algir, vi; Attal, Ha-defs ha-Ivr ba-Magreb, 122123. On the title page is written
the name of the publisher thus: =( in the print-
ing press of Mr. Mansfield, the Englishman). Attal (Haggadat Algir, 8n6; idem, Ha-defs
ha-Ivr ba-Magreb, 123n7) thinks that Richard Holt is meant, but he offers no support for
his assumption. From the Hebrew words referring to Richard Holts printing press, in the
) , it would appear that
booklet ( p. [8]), i.e., printed in the government press by Richard
Holt (same in Arabic, p. 12:
these were two separate printing presses, although both were run and operated by English
craftsmen: the one belonging to Mansfield was privately owned, whereas the one operated
by Holt was government owned.
138 yosef tobi
20The Arabic transliteration is based on its phonetic sound and reflects the pronuncia-
tion of the Jews of Algiers. The spelling, based on classical Arabic, should rather have been:
hdh al-maif min nat maif al-musamm, etc. In the list of Algiers publications in
Attal and Harosh, Ha-defs ha-ivr be-lgr, 563, no. 6, there are errors in the title given
for the book.
21 Sefer Ysfn bi-l-arab, part II (Algiers, 1855): [6][7].
judaeo-arabic printing in north africa 139
remembered its name? It was rejected outright, not only because of JA,
but also because of French.23 In general, not only did French become pre-
eminent among Jews of NA (with the exception of the inhabitants of small
towns and villages), but also the Latin alphabet usurped the place of the
Hebrew alphabet.24 Furthermore, we see a phenomenon that character-
ises the Jewish communities of northern Tunisia; after World War I, texts
that were printed in JA were accompanied by a transliteration in Latin
characters for those readers in the community who still understood JA,
but who found it hard to read Hebrew characters. Another good example
of this process is the romance novel, Bayn uy Tnis [Among the walls
of Tunis] by Michel Uzan, which was first published in Tunis in 1926, in
its original JA, but whose author, in 1956, had it republished in Tunis, this
time with a French translation: Entre les murs de Tunis.
This natural process resulted in a great decrease in JA publications,
because those who understood JA and who could read the Hebrew
alphabet had, themselves, declined in number. Jewish intellectuals in
NA adopted the French language for written works, and these publica-
tions did not require Hebrew printing presses. This, then, was the state of
affairs, with the one exception of the Hebrew printing presses in Djerba,
where the industry of JA book publication, with its diverse literary genres,
had developed to its greatest extent.25
23Concerning the growing popularity of French among the Jews of northern Tunisia,
see Tobi, Louverture de la littrature judo-arabe tunisienne.
24Attal, Ha-defs ha-Ivr ba-Magreb, 129.
25Fraenkel, LImprimerie hbraique Djerba.
judaeo-arabic printing in north africa 141
26See Tobi, On the Antiquity of the Judeo-Arabic Biblical Translations, Ben Ever
La-Arav 2 (2001), 1727; Tobi, The Orthography of the Pre-Saadianic Judaeo-Arabic, 271
273; cf. Haarman, An Eleventh-century Prcis of Arabic Orthography, Studia Arabica &
Islamica (Beirut: American University of Beirut, 1981). Much has been written in recent
years about Arabic orthography during the first centuries following the rise of Islam, and
its close connection with JA orthography during that period. However, this subject does
not fall within the scope of our present enquiry.
27Tobi, On the Antiquity of the Judeo-Arabic Biblical Translations, 2329.
28The orthography used in JA which preceded Saadia has been described in different
studies. See Tobi, Ha-Shirah, ha-sifrut ha-Arvit-ha-Yehudit veha-Genizah (Tel Aviv: Tel Aviv
University, 2006), 22n53.
142 yosef tobi
29For extravagant Hebrew writing in Tunisia, see Tobi, The Attitude to the Hebrew
Language and its Study in Tunisia, in The Jews in Tunisia (Ramat Gan: Bar-Ilan University
Press, 2009), esp. 273279, 304307. In the year 1885, the Jewish newspaper Al-ams was
published in Paris, the only newspaper belonging to the Jews of Tunisia in which there
were printed Arabic characters (two pages in Arabic characters and two pages in Hebrew
characters). However, the newspaper did not last very long (only thirty-five issues), since
only a few Tunisian Jews took an interest in it. Proof of this can be seen in the renewal
of its printing in 1904 as a weekly journal, but this time, only in Hebrew characters. See
Vassel, La littrature populaire des isralites tunisiens, 28, 4041; Tobi, Louverture de la
littrature judo-arabe tunisienne, 269.
judaeo-arabic printing in north africa 143
As already stated, the first JA printing in this area was at a press owned
and operated by a non-Jew in the city of Algiers in the year 1853, in Rashis
script, using fonts brought either from Jerusalem or from Salonica. These
types were very worn-out, resulting in the print being far from aesthetic.
The first comprehensive book was the aforementioned ay La-Mora
(1854), an expanded JA commentary on the Book of Genesis, intended for
the general Jewish public. Beside the fact that the Arabic reflects the Jew-
ish dialect spoken in eastern Algeria, its orthography is identical to that of
JA manuscripts before the invention of the printing press, aside from one
important matter: the distinction between the phonetic sound of m ) (
and ayn ) ( has been made not by the insertion of a diacritical point
above the Hebrew letter gimal, but rather by a diacritical point beneath
the gimal on account of the m ) ( , while a point is made above it on
account of the ayn ) (, apparently owing to the influence of the diacriti-
cal points in the corresponding Arabic letters. An example is
(p. 65). Even so, it is difficult to say that the printers were sensitive
to orthography, while the JA texts themselves were not always faithful to
phonetics, particularly as concerned the use of the letter aleph as a plene
letter: e.g., ( > p. 169); ( > p. 192); <
(p. 193); ( > p. 227); ( > ibid.); >
(p. 328); as also in the doubling of the letter ww, even at the beginning
of a word: e.g., ( > p. 49); ( > p. 49); >
( p. 142).
The augmentation of the phonetic character is evident in the orthog-
raphy of the book, Dat Yehdt, a different JA composition (Algiers,
1855), which, too, had the Jewish public in mind, but especially women,
whose knowledge of Hebrew was mediocre at best, as Rabbi Abraham
al-Naqwa, who initiated the translation of the book into JA in the dialect
spoken by the Jews of northwest Africa, explained in his introduction (see
above). Rather, in this composition is found a phenomenon that is not
known from earlier JA texts, that is to say, the doubling of the accentuated
consonant when enunciating: ( > p. 1); ( > p. 3);
( > p. 20); ( > p. 57); ( > p. 90);
>
(p. 90);
> (p. 105). This phenomenon is not
known in classical JA scripts from the Middle Ages, neither has it been
seen in JA scripts from an earlier period. It is presumed that this phe-
nomenon was influenced by the transliteration of Arabic texts into Latin
144 yosef tobi
30For meetings between Orientalists of Europe and Jewish scholars of NA, see Joseph
Fenton, He-akham Mordekhai Najjr, Mahut 25 (2002), 116119.
31 The JA texts (pp. 44a52b) are instructions treating the ritual performed on the
night of Passover, interspersed between liturgical passages. Based on the language it can
be determined that the JA dialect of northwest Africa is most likely that of Morocco, the
birth place of Ben Amozeg.
judaeo-arabic printing in north africa 145
32I have not seen any reference to the translator or to the name of his family (Alln) in
other sources. However, the family name Alln is known from the Jewish communities in
Morocco, such as Fez and Meknes (I thank Prof. Moshe Bar-Asher for this information).
In any case, the translation is not indicative of the provincial dialect of any particular com-
munity, although I have found that the translator (having merely checked the Book of Gen-
esis) usually makes use of the provincial Arabic word tuwwa (JA: (, customarily used
by the Jews of Tunisia as a translation for the Hebrew word =( now).
146 yosef tobi
from, ,
wrath and anger, , bathe.33 In every place where you
find it with a dot below it, read it as a dental letter, like in , for camel,
, for he will run, , for he returned.34 Let this general rule be set
before you, that the nature of this dot is genuine and is based on the tongue
of the Ishmaelites and on their writing, which are a principal thing with the
Arabic language.35 In like manner, the ancient Jews in Arab lands had been
accustomed to write in this way, just as everyone can see in the old manu-
scripts that are with me.36
Also, to this very day, they still make use of this pointing in the interior of
the Maghreb, and in the countries of Algiers and its environs.
It should be pointed out that the orthography in this composition is
stable and rigidly applied, in stark contrast to that in the printed works in
Algiers. However, as for the letters yod and waw, although not the letter
aleph, there are times when they serve as matres lectionis also in places
where they would not serve that way in classical Arabic. It is interesting to
note that in the orthography of Hebrew names, the copyist allows himself
to add alephs in plene scriptum in an exaggerated manner, as if they were
matres lectionis: ( > Num. 31:1); ( > ibid.);
and even after the vowels ew na, ere and segol, something which I
cannot explain: e.g., ( > ibid.); ( > ibid.);
> ( ibid., 90a). It is also worth noting how the copyist doubles
the accentuated consonant: e.g., ( > ibid.); >
(ibid., 33a);
>
(ibid., 42a). However, there is no regularity in
this matter: e.g., ( ibid.); ( ibid., 34a); ( ibid., 35a).
Incidentally, I do not know if the doubling of the accentuated consonants
is due to the influence of European transliterations of Arabic texts. In any
case, one sees a very clear trend of scrupulous adherence to the rules of
orthography.
33That is to say, as in the Arabic letter : ,
, .
34That is to say, as in the Arabic letter : , , .
35The diacritical point used for the Arabic letter ayn is found above it: ;
whereas the diacritical point used for the Arabic letter m is found below it: .
36This testimony is inaccurate, seeing that in the Geniza manuscripts, the Arabic letter
is not usually marked by any diacritical point, and certainly not with a point below it.
judaeo-arabic printing in north africa 147
the 1860s, and represents a good example of the provincial dialect of the
Jews of Tunisia, not only from the standpoint of lexicon, morphology, and
syntax, but also from the standpoint of phonetics. Of course, this does not
have any past association or link with the orthography of classical JA from
the Middle Ages. The same can be said about the many compositions of
Youcef Renassia, the rabbi and mentor of the community of Constantine
in eastern Algeria, not far from the Tunisian-Algerian border.37 One may
thus determine unequivocally that the rules governing the JA orthography
in Tunisia were not introduced with the advent of JA literature printed in
the nineteenth century, but, in fact, reflect a tradition that continued from
previous centuries and was formed over a long period of time. This stands
in contrast to the JA literature from the school of Saadia, whose creative
work was deliberate and planned and adhered from the start to the rules
of orthography used in classical Arabic, after these same rules had reached
their final formulation prior to the tenth century; likewise that of Rabbi
Michael Alln in Or Neerav. In my humble opinion, it constitutes a natu-
ral continuation of the orthography that was prevalent in the Middle Ages,
albeit with certain variations, leading by a continuous process of phonetic
adaptability toward the provincial dialect of JA. It is also to be noted that
no small number of the first Jewish intellectuals in Tunisia knew classical
Arabic, some of them being rabbinic figures like the aformentioned Rabbi
Juda armon, besides distinguished Orientalists.38 This fact no doubt influ-
enced the orthography of texts printed in JA.
Without any doubt, the orthographic influence of JA literature printed
in Livorno can be felt in the JA literature printed in Tunisia, as it was there
that the Jews of Tunisia printed their books, until Vittorio Finzi, the son of
a political exile from Livorno, established the first Hebrew printing press
in Tunisia after he had received a licence from the Muslim Bey in 1880.39
It should be noted that Livorno was known as the most important city of
Hebrew book printing in the nineteenth century on account of the Jew-
ish community in NA and in eastern countries, while books printed there
37Concerning him and his publications, see Youssef Charvit, Renassia, Joseph,
Encyclopedia of Jews in the Islamic World (Leiden: Brill, 2010), 4:157159; concerning the
JA orthography in his printed works, see Ofra Tirosh-Becker, A Characterization of the
Judeo-Arabic Language of Constantine, Massorot 2/3 (1989): 285312.
38Such as Isaac Cattan who at the beginning of the twentieth century published many
articles in the Orientalist journal, Revue Tunisienne, but whose work did not attain any
recognition in research literature on the Jews of Tunisia; and like him, many other Jewish
intellectuals of Tunisia during the same period.
39Attal, Ha-defs ha-Ivr ba-Magreb, 23 and n. 11.
148 yosef tobi
40In the book, Sefer maaseh aam (Livorno: Costa Press, 1868), being the first book
published by a Tunisian Jew in Livorno, as also in ay La-Mr, in the Livorno edition of
1888, the Arabic letter is still distinguished by a diacritical point beneath the Hebrew
letter gimal , and the Arabic letter is distinguished by a diacritical point above it
,
just as decided by the editors of Or Neerav, but in Srat al-Aalya which was printed
by the Jews of Tunisia in Livorno (Costa Press, 18851887), the Arabic letter is distin-
guished by a diacritical point above the Hebrew letter gimal , and the Arabic letter
is distinguished by a diacritical point below it , just as had ordinarily been the practice
in the orthography of JA literature printed in Tunisia.
judaeo-arabic printing in north africa 149
French scholars who documented the local Arab dialects and the litera-
ture composed in them, or the enlightened Jews of Eastern Europe with
regard to Yiddish, or the Jewish intellectuals in the Balkans with regard
to Ladino. This view led them, on the one hand, to translate into it many
works taken from Arabic, Hebrew, and French, and even to create in it
original works of different literary genres, including a vibrant and bur-
geoning press; while, on the other hand, they treated it with respect and
were strict in matters of orthography. In fact, the Jewish intellectuals of
Tunisia during the second half of the nineteenth century succeeded in
creating by these very texts printed in JAbased on the old Tunisian
JAa rich literary language full of expression, one set apart also by its
rules of orthography, similar to the classical language.
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561572.
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Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press, 1980.
. Ha-defs ha-Ivr be-Wahrn. Kiryat Sefer 68 (1998): 8592.
. Ha-iton ha-yehudi ha-rishon ba-Magreb: lIsralite Algrien (), 1870. Peamim
17 (1984): 8895.
. Ha-ittnt ha-ivrit be-Marq. Peamim 57 (1994): 125131.
. Ha-sifrut ha-Arvit ha-Yehudit be-Tunisyah: meah shenot yetsirah (18611961): tsiyunim
bibliyografiyim [Un sicle de littrature judo-arabe tunisienne (18611961)]. Jerusalem:
Institut Ben-Zvi, 2007.
. Haggadat Algir: faqsimile sel ha-haggada ha-risona se-nidpesa bi-Zfon-Afriqa, Algir
5615 [La haggada dAlger: facsimil de la premire haggada de Pessa]. Jerusalem, 1975.
. Ittnt yehdt be-Tnsyah. Qeer 5 (1989): 8796.
. Kitve et ve-ittnm yehdiyym bi-fon afrka. Tel Aviv: Tel Aviv University, 1996.
. Les publications judo-arabes du rabbin Chalom Bekache imprimeur et publiciste
Alger. Alei Sefer 2 (1976): 219228.
Charvit, Yossef. Renassia, Joseph, Encyclopedia of Jews in the Islamic World. Vol. 4, edited
by Norman Stillman, 157159. Leiden: Brill, 2010.
Cohen, Pierre. La presse juive dite au Maroc 18701963. Rabat: Bouregreg, 2007.
Demeerseman, Andr. Une page nouvelle de lhistoire de limprimerie en Tunisie. IBLA
19, no. 75 (1956): 275312.
Fenton, Joseph (Yinnon). He-akham Mordekhai Najjr: maskl tnsai me-ha-meah
ha-yd-et. Mahut 25 (2002): 115128.
Fraenkel, Jacqueline. LImprimerie hbraique Djerba: tude bibliographique. Thse du
doctorat, Paris III, 1982.
Friedberg, Ch.B. Bet Eked Sepharim: Bibliographical Lexicon. Tel Aviv: M.A. Bar-Juda, 1951.
Halevy, Shoshanna. Sifre Yerushalayim ha-rishonim: ha-sefarim, ha-hovrot eha-dapim she-
nidpesu be-otiyot Ivriyot ba-amishim ha-shanim ha-rishonim li-defus ha-Ivri bi-Yerush-
alayim, 601650, 18411890 [The first Hebrew books printed in Jerusalem]. Jerusalem:
Ben-Zvi Institute, 1975.
Haarman, Ulrich. An Eleventh-century Prcis of Arabic Orthography. In Studia Arabica &
Islamica: Festschrift for Ihsan Abbas on his Sixtieth Birthday, edited by Wadad al-Qadi,
165182. Beirut: American University of Beirut, 1981.
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Harosh, Mera, Ha-defs ha-ivr bi-rpl e-be-lv. Kiryat Sefer 59 (1984): 625634; 61
(1986): 375376.
Iakerson, Shimon. aalog ha-inunabulim ha-ivriyim me-osef sifriyat Bet ha-midrash le-
Rabanim be-Ameria [Catalogue of Hebrew incunabula from the collection of the library
of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America]. New York: Jewish Theological Seminary
of America, 200405.
Marciano, Eliyyahu. Sefer ben melakhm ve-h tledt ha-sefer ha-ivr be-Marq mi-enat
277749 [15111989]. Jerusalem: Makhon ha-Raam, 1989.
Moreh, Shmuel. The Nineteenth-century Jewish Playwright Abraham Daninos as a Bridge
between Muslim and Jewish Theater. In Judaism and Islam: Boundaries, Communica-
tion, and Interaction: Essays in Honor of William M. Brinner, edited by Benjamin H. Hary,
John L. Hayes, and Fred Astern, 409416. Leiden: Brill, 2000.
and Philip Sadgrove. Jewish Contributions to Nineteenth-century Arabic Literature:
Plays from Algeria and Syria: A Study and Texts. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996.
Tedghi, Joseph. Ha-Sefer eha-defus ha-ivri be-Fas [Le livre et limprimerie hbraques
Fs]. Jerusalem: Institut Ben-Zvi, 1994.
Tirosh-Becker, Ofra. A Characterization of the Judeo-Arabic Language of Constantine.
Massorot 2/3 (1989): 285312.
Tobi, Yosef. The Attitude to the Hebrew Language and its Study in Tunisia from the Late
19th Century to the 20th Century. In The Jews in Tunisia: Heritage, History, Literature,
edited by Ephraim Hazan and Haim Saadun, 269310. Ramat Gan: Bar-Ilan University
Press, 2009.
. Ha-Shirah, ha-sifrut ha-Arvit-ha-Yehudit veha-Genizah [Poetry, Judeo-Arabic Litera-
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1760.
. The Orthography of the Pre-Saadianic Judaeo-Arabic Compared with the Orthog-
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Tanouji-Cohen, 255275. Paris, 2007.
and Zivia Tobi. Ha-Sifrut ha-Arvit-ha-Yehudit be-Tunisyah (18501950) [La littrature
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Vassel, Eusbe. La littrature populaire des isralites tunisiens avec un essai ethnographique
et archologique sur leurs superstitions. Paris: E. Leroux, 190507.
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127131.
Marginal Miniatures: The Tehran Edition of
al-Damrs ayt al-ayawn (1285/1868)
Ulrich Marzolph
The early history of printing in Iran is divided into three distinct periods.1
Printing from movable type was introduced to Iran in or shortly before the
year 1233/1817. During the initial period, for about the first fifteen years,
printing from movable type was the only method of printing practised in
Iran. Next, lithography made its way to Iran. The first item known to have
been produced by this new technique is a Qurn dated 124849/183233,
printed most probably in the city of Tabriz. For almost three decades,
both techniques of printing coexisted, though the number of books
printed from movable typeprobably some 60 items altogether2was
far more modest than the steadily growing production of books printed
by lithography. The last item printed from movable type in this period,
according to present knowledge, was the 1275/1858 edition of awhars
widely read martyrological compilation ufn al-boka.3 During the third
period, books in Iran were exclusively printed by way of lithography. Not
a single item printed from movable type is known to have been published
between 1275/1858 and 1291/1874. The modern mode of printing from mov-
able type was introduced to Iran only with the publication of Nir al-Din
Shhs travelogue to Europe (Safar-nme-ye Ner al-Din Shh be-farang),
in 1291/1874; significantly, this book was published in Istanbul. The new
mode of printing distinguishes the modern history of printing in Iran
from the three phases of the early period. While printing from movable
type and lithography continued to compete for about half a century, the
former soon gained the upper hand and ousted lithographic production
around the middle of the twentieth century.
4See, e.g., Adam Gacek, Arabic Lithographed Books in the Islamic Studies Library, McGill
University: Descriptive Catalogue (Montreal: McGill University Libraries, 1996); Katalog der
Bibliothek des schiitischen Schrifttums im Orientalischen Seminar der Universitt zu Kln.
Zusammengestellt von Kamran Amir Arjomand, herausgegeben von Abdoldjavad Falaturi.
2., erheblich erweiterte Auflage. 6 vols. (Munich, 1996).
5Ulrich Marzolph, Narrative Illustration in Persian Lithographed Books (Leiden: Brill,
2001).
the tehran edition of al-damrs ayt al-ayawn 153
6Michael Camille, Image on the Edge: The Margins of Medieval Art (London: Reaktion,
1992); Margot McIlwain Nishimura, Images in the Margins (London: British Library and Los
Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2009).
7See, e.g., the samples reproduced in Esin Atil, The Brush of the Masters: Drawings from
Iran and India (Washington, DC: Freer Gallery of Art, 1978): nos. 27, 18, 19, 6267, 70.
8G. A. Russell, Damiri, Moammad, Encyclopaedia Iranica Online: http://www
e dition dated 1285/1868 thus constitutes the books third edition.13 While
consciously referring to the two previous editions, in their concluding
remarks the editors of the Tehran edition stereotypically propose to pres-
ent a more reliable text. In this respect and, as will be shown, in several
other respects, the bookeven though presenting an Arabic textis a
typical product of Qajar Iran. The books first printed page (fol. 1a) is rep-
resentative of the nascent state of the title page in Persian books of the
period (plate 1). Headed by the basmala that the Muslim believer is obliged
to pronounce before beginning any action, the first page is crowded in a
somewhat baroque manner with information revealing the books title, the
printing establishment, and the date of publication. The books printer, a
certain Al-Qoli n, ran a printing house in Tehran during the latter
half of the Qajar period.14 The text written inside a central ornament on
the first page describes the circumstances of the books publication. It is
framed by a Qurnic verse (sura 9, verse 111) that advertises constant strife
as the sole means of attaining paradise, a notion proclaimed as common
to the three Abrahamic religions.
The Tehran edition of Damrs ayt al-ayawn consists of two vol-
umes comprising 283 unnumbered folios or 566 printed pages. The size
of the paper is roughly 22 35 cm. The text of 35 lines per page is pre-
sented within a double frame that covers an area of about 15 28 cm.
For the readers easy orientation, the frame is headed by a reference to
the respective chapter, namely, the letter of the alphabet, and the catch-
words of the specific single entries are repeated on the outer margin of the
respective pages. As stated in the colophon of vol. 1 (fol. 134b), the books
calligraphy has been executed by a certain Moammad-Rez b. Al-
Akbar al-vnsri (plate 2).15 The calligraphy of the books first volume
13The 1285 Tehran edition is rarely present in public libraries in the West. Copies have
been located in the Berlin Staatsbibliothek Preussischer Kulturbesitz (shelfmark 2 Lk 3529),
the British Library, London (shelfmark 14533.g.1), the School of Oriental and African Stud-
ies, London (shelfmark ED86.18/18562) and in the Harvard Widener Library (shelfmark OL
22320.15 F). The copy used here originates from a private collection.
14See, e.g., , , 48, 63, 123, 179, 185,
195; idem,
(Moscow, 1975): nos.
160, 163/1, 186, 330, 1009, 1186, 1240, 1552; Gacek, Arabic Lithographed Books, nos. 231, 235.
Al-Qoli n (spelled Ali Gouli Khan) also printed the exquisitely executed 1874 litho-
graphed edition of Johann Schlimmers Terminologie mdico-pharmaceutique et anthro-
pologique franaise-persane in handwritten French with Persian terms in Arabic script.
15The only other book owing its calligraphy to this scribe that has been unambiguously
identified so far is a copy of Bidels Mtamkade published in 1274/1857; see Marzolph, Nar-
rative Illustration, 253.
the tehran edition of al-damrs ayt al-ayawn 155
was completed on the sixth day of the month Rab II, and the second
volume is signed in the following month, umd I, without mentioning
the exact day. It may thus be surmised that the books production might
have taken some three to four months altogether. All of the books pages
are framed by a somewhat less pronounced single line demarcating the
actual margin against the paper size. The margin between this single line
and the double lines framing the text measures about 3 to 3.5 cm on the
top and outer side, and about 2 cm on the lower side. Besides headings,
catchwords, and illustrations, the margin contains occasional corrections
to the text in Arabic and occasional commentaries in Persian added by
two different hands. The books text starts on the inner side of the first
folio (fol. 1b; plate 3). Following the manuscript tradition, this page is
headed by a large ornamental illumination surrounding the books cen-
trally placed title. The books title is placed in a traditional wording
hdh al-kitb al-musamm bi-ayt al-ayawnbelow an image of the
Qajar coat of arms that shows a standing lion facing the viewer with a
glaring sun behind his back; it is interesting to note that the lion is pre-
sented in a somewhat less martial manner than usual, since otherwise
he would regularly hold a drawn sword in his raised right front paw.16 In
the present case, the Qajar coat of arms is particularly suitable, since it
links the Iranian context of the books production to the books text: after
all, the text, disregarding strict alphabetical order, begins with the entry
for Lion (al-asad). The first illustrations to the entries for lion (al-asad;
fol. 1bB6a), camel (al-ibil; fol. 6aB7b), and she-ass (al-atn; fol. 7bB8a),
introduce the respective animals, together with a vague outline of scen-
ery, in a large size. In fact, the images are so large that even though the
animals are represented vertically, the images still cross the line marking
the pages outer margin (plate 4). This is a rare feature, since the great
majority of the following illustrations are contained within the margin,
reducing the depicted animals to a true miniature size. Most animals are
depicted in a manner more or less corresponding to their natural features
(plate5). In particular, horses (al-faras; fol. 207b212b) and dogs (al-kalb;
fol. 233a246b)17 are represented in a variety of positions, and sometimes
16See, e.g., the Qajar coat of arms on the front page of each and every single issue of
the roughly contemporary lithographed Qajar newspaper Ruznme-e vaqye-e ettefqiye
(facs. reproduction in 4 vols., Tehran, 1373/1994), or on the front pages of each volume of
the 127074/185357 Tehran edition of Mirvnds Rawzat al-af: see Marzolph, Narrative
Illustration, fig. 54.
17The entry encompasses a lengthy digression on the legend of the Seven Sleepers,
whose group according to Muslim tradition also included a dog.
156 ulrich marzolph
the animals are even portrayed as acting in a manner typical of their natu-
ral behavioursuch as the falcon (al-bz; fol. 41a) and the chameleon
(al-irb; fol. 84a), which are shown with their prey (plate 6). The rather
strange depiction of some animals such as the rabbit (al-arnab; fol. 9b) or
the crocodile (al-tims) might indicate that the artist was less familiar
with their actual appearance (plate 7; fol. 60a). Meanwhile, he takes great
care to depict even the smallest creatures such as fleas (al-burt; fol. 45a)
or mosquitos (al-ba; fol. 46b) by enlarging their size by way of a virtual
magnifying glass (plate 8). Most of the books pages contain a single or
only a few illustrations, but some pages in connection with the number
or nature of the respective entries are fairly crowded (plate 9)such as
the passage in the entry al-ida (kite; fol. 83b) discussing the animals
that according to the adth may be killed, or the beginning of the entry
al-dbba denoting any animal that walks or crawls or creeps (fol. 115a).
Corresponding with the books text, the illustrations also depict crea-
tures that by modern critical science are regarded as fantastic or fabulous,
but whose potential existence the author had no reason to doubt. Already
the books very first illustration (fol. 2a) depicts the fabulous variety of
lion known as al-ward that according to Aristotle has a human head and
the tail of a scorpion, sometimes even the body of a cow (plate 10). The
array of fabulous creatures depicted (plate 11) also includes various kinds
of demons, such as the insn al-m (waterman; fol. 16b), the l (fol.201b),
and the hairy hobgoblin known as al-ilfa (fol. 39a). Fabulous creatures of
a more friendly appearance (plate 12) comprise the burq, the steed that
carried the Prophet Muammad on his nocturnal journey to the heavens
(fol. 43a),18 the bird with a human head resembling a harpy mentioned in
the entry al-uqb (eagle; fol. 191a), and the creature bint al-m (fol. 57b),
a kind of mermaid or male sexual fantasy thatas the English translation
by Jayakar bashfully veils it in Latinwhen they fall into the hands of
seamen in vessels, hi cum illis ineunt, and then return them to the sea.19
In addition to the world of animals and other living creatures that
constitutes his primary focus, Damrs work also presents a number of
digressions. The longest of these digressions, inspired by an anecdote
in the entry iwazz (goose), concerns the history of the caliphate from
18For other depictions of the burq in Persian lithographed illustration see Marzolph,
Narrative Illustration, fig. 192; Al Budari, Qaz-ye bi zavl: neghi tabiqi be tavir-e p-e
sangi-ye mer-e payambar () (Tehran, 1389/2010), passim.
19Damr, ayt al-ayawn: A Zoological Lexicon, translated by A. S. G. Jayakar (Lon-
don: Luzac, 1906/1908), 1:338.
the tehran edition of al-damrs ayt al-ayawn 157
its beginnings to the authors day (fol. 18b39a).20 The artist has taken
this opportunity to supply, probably for the first time in history, portraits
of potentially each and every caliph from the time of the first Umayyad
caliph Muwiya to the Abbsid al-Mustakf bi-llh, a total of sixty-one
images altogether (plate 13). Since no historical portraits of the caliphs are
available, the artists illustrations are both purely fictional and decidedly
influenced by contemporary perception, particularly in the Qajar-style
furniture and interiors in which the characters are depicted.
Probably the most fascinating features in the Tehran edition of Damrs
ayt al-ayawn are the illustrations relating to the numerous tales and
anecdotes the author quotes at intervals. Because of the books subject
matter, many of these are animal tales or fables (plate 14). Two of the
better known fables, as a matter of fact narratives that enjoy a worldwide
distribution, are the Lions Share, in which the lion requests that the
wolf and fox, one after the other, divide their prey (fol. 64b),21 and
the Sick Lion, in which the cunning fox advises the lion to take the wolfs
brain as a remedy for his illness (fol. 65b).22 Many other entries refer to
traditional tales known in Muslim (and international) tradition (plate 15).
The entry kalb (dog) contains a lengthy digression on the legend of the
Seven Sleepers (ab al-kahf) together with a portrait of the seven men
and their dog (fol. 242b);23 and the small series of folk tales on the wiles of
women, inspired by an anecdote of Jesus meeting the devil, includes a ver-
sion of the tale known in international tradition as the Equivocal Oath,
in which a woman conceals her extramarital sexual activity by hiring her
lover as her guide when about to visit the holy mountain where she is
to swear an oath (fol. 90a).24 Here again, the artists illustration depicts
contemporary Qajar costume, as it does even more convincingly in one
of the tales from Arab tradition (plate 16) in which three men visit three
wise women who are famed for knowing the cure to each and every ail-
ment (fol. 101a). Another tale from ancient Arab tradition tells of the man
who escaped from a lion by climbing a tree, only to find a bear on top of
the tree (fol. 119a). A third category of illustrated tales refers to religious
tradition, much of which is common to the Abrahamic religions (plate 17).
Examples of this category shown here include the story of Moses, whose
staff turns into a snake or a dragon when thrown to the ground before
Pharaoh (fol. 67a), and the angel Gabriel leading Pharaohs army to drown
in the sea (fol. 85b). The only one of the more complex illustrations shown
twice is that of King Solomons court (fols. 80b, 177b), underlining the rul-
ers supreme position in learned as well as popular perception of the Mus-
lim world (plate 18). Even though these illustrations are only permitted
to cover the limited space of the margin, they contain the standard set of
creatures usually surrounding Solomon in Iranian art, and particularly in
the simplified range of lithographic illustration25including the Simorgh
and the hoopoe close to the rulers head, demons and angels holding his
throne, a peaceful array of carnivorous and herbivorous animals, and even
insects such as the ant.
Considered together, the numerous images that have been added to
Damrs text are not just simple illustrations of given facts, but specific
interpretations. On the one hand, they result from the artists perception
of his contemporary context, and on the other they transmit this particu-
lar perception of the Qajar period to the works intended readers in the
Arab worldafter all, the Tehran edition of Damrs ayt al-ayawn
was the only accessible visual interpretation of the popular works text. In
other words, even though the illustrations are placed in the margin, they
are not at all marginal to the works visual perception.
The fact that the Tehran edition of Damrs work was produced not
only in an Iranian, but moreover in a decidedly Shii context, becomes
obvious from the invocations that the proofreader has added to the title
pages of both volumes (plate 19). On the title page of the first volume he
has framed the basmala by the invocation y Al madad (O Al, sup-
port me!) and a set of invocations mentioning God and the panj tan,
the five members of the Muslim holy family, consisting of the Prophet
Muammad, his son-in-law Al, his daughter Fima, and their sons
asan and usayn. To a similar invocation at the top of the second page
the proofreader has moreover added an invocation to the ib al-zamn,
the twelfth Shii Imam who lives in concealment and will only return
on the Day of Judgement.
To conclude the short survey of this fascinating publication, I should like
to mention a last illustration that, although so small as to be almost indis-
tinguishable, expresses the essence of the works specifically Iranian pre-
sentation (plate 20). The illustration to the entry nightingale (al-andalb;
fol. 189b) is one of the rare instances in which an animal is depicted in its
natural habitat. According to the Iranian notion, as vividly expressed in
numerous poems and related illustrations, the nightingales quintessential
partner is the rose bush.26 Consequently, this entry is accompanied by a
miniature illustration depicting two birds inside a bush with blossoming
roses. Even though this image is as marginal as the hundreds of other
images in the 1285/1868 Tehran edition of al-Damrs ayt al-ayawn
illustrating, supporting, and commenting on the authors text, the rooted-
ness of this particular illustration in a decidedly Iranian context is beyond
doubt. Moreover, the charming details visible in the illustrations diligent
execution contradict the obvious decline in both the quantity and quality
of illustrations in the works second volume. In this manner, it once more
adds to the appeal of a highly exceptional visual interpretation of a classic
of Arabic Islamic learning, prepared by an Iranian artist.
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160 ulrich marzolph
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the tehran edition of al-damrs ayt al-ayawn 161
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Plate 17 (fols. 67a, 85b).The staff of Moses turns into a snake; the Pharaohs army
178 ulrich marzolph
Introduction
This paper concerns the printing activities of the Syrian Orthodox Chris-
tians. On this topic, information is available, but scattered in various
sources, and there is no work concentrating solely on this subject. This
paper aims to make good this deficiency.2
There are several works on the printing activities of the non-Muslim
communities in the Near East and Western Asia. For the most part, these
deal with people involved in missionary activities. Concerning the rest,
there exist few extensive research works, and there is little public aware-
ness of them. The printing efforts of the Syrian Orthodox Church have
thus failed to attract attention.
The Syrian Orthodox Church, being based on traditional religious val-
ues, failed to keep abreast of the latest developments in politics, culture,
law and economics. It struggled to survive the demands of the modern
world. The press was one of the efforts that the Church did make, but it
did not arouse much interest and because it was considered unimportant,
no research was undertaken on it.3 This article utilises diverse documents
and sources, including documents from the Ottoman archives, church his-
tories and related documents, biographies of prominent clergymen, travel
books, and memoirs.
1We are grateful to Prof. Dr. Shabo Talay for reading a draft of this paper and correcting
several mistakes. The original Turkish text was translated into English by rem Wedekind
(Heidelberg). All remaining faults and errors are our responsibility.
2For a general overview, see Shabo Talay, Die syrisch-orthodoxe Kirche in der Trkei,
Die Trkei und ihre christlichen Minderheiten: Ausgewhlte Vortrge einer Tagung der Evan-
gelischen Akademie Hofgeismar, 2.4. November 2007, ed. Karl Pinggra (Hofgeismar: Evan-
gelische Akademie, 2008): 1635.
3For evaluations of this subject, see Aziz S. Atiya, A History of Eastern Christianity
(London: Methuen, 1968).
182 ahmet tan and robert langer
Patriarch Petrus IV was the first patriarch to make a long journey abroad,
to Britain and India, in order to find solutions to the problems within the
community. He entered into international negotiations and established
this as a tradition.
Despite the fact that the Patriarch was accompanied by Mor Ignatios
Abd Allh Saf al-adad (later Patriarch Mor Ignatios Abde d-Aloho
II), the Archbishop of Jerusalem, he felt obliged to request an exit per-
mit from the sultan. His wish was granted only after a years delay (1874).
On 14 August 1874, they left Istanbul for Britain. They arrived in Paris on
17 August and London on 24 August.6
The Patriarch and the Archbishop stayed in London for several months,
working intensively. They had meetings with numerous people, including
clergymen and ministers. Their acquaintance with Mrs Elizabeth Finn,
wife of the consul general in Jerusalem, helped them greatly in establish-
ing contact with people in London. Later, they had meetings with people
of higher rank, including the Archbishop of Canterbury (see Fig. 1), which
they had arranged before they left Istanbul. These in turn arranged their
4J. F. Coakley, The Typography of Syriac (New Castle: Oak Knoll Press and London:
British Library, 2006): 122123.
5Apart from that, the lack of agreement among the Syrian Orthodox Community in
India became an important issue. Upon the death of the Patriarch Jacob II, many letters
reporting the turmoil in India were delivered to Patriarch Petrus IV; this informed his
decision to go to India. He planned a trip from Jerusalem to Istanbul and to India, hop-
ing to solve the problems within the community. Accompanied by Abd Allh Saf, the
Archbishop of Jerusalem, he headed for Istanbul. This was followed by journeys to Britain
and India in 1873.
6For relations with the English Church, see William Henry Taylor, Antioch and Can-
terbury: The Syrian Orthodox Church and the Church of England 18741928 (Piscataway, NJ:
Gorgias Press, 2005), 1547.
the syrian orthodox patriarchate press 183
Fig. 1.(right to left:) Patriarch Petrus IV, Archibald Tait (Archbishop of Canter-
bury), and Metropolitan Abd Allh Saf in Canterbury
The Queen gave the Patriarch a medal and a document to facilitate his
work in India. Then the Patriarch and the Archbishop left London and
set off for India. The Patriarch sent the printing press, which he had
acquired in London before his departure, to Anonius zr in Aleppo on
25 August 1874. This was a gift from the Archbishop of Canterbury. On
his visit to Oxford University, the Patriarch saw and admired this press,
and the university bought and gave him a similar one. Canon Liddon had
successfully raised money for the press and the monastery through the
Syrian Patriarchate Education Fund in London, which was later expanded;
it continued to support the Syrian Orthodox Church long afterwards.7
Their ship arrived on 2 April 1875 at Alexandria. While staying in the
Coptic Orthodox Church, the Patriarch had meetings with many people,
including the governor of Egypt. On 23 April 1875, he left Egypt for India,
arriving on 17 May 1875 in Bombay, later visiting the Syrian Community
in India. By 5 July 1875, he had solved all the problems within the com-
munity and returned to Diyarbakr. The Patriarchs arrival was feted in
Diyarbakr. After staying there twenty-five days, he set off for Mardin,
where his arrival was celebrated by a multitude of people.
The Patriarch placed the printing equipment, which he had sent from
England, in the Deyruzafaran Monastery in Mardin in 1881. It remained in
the wing of the monastery about a year and then in 1882 it was moved to
a separate building, especially built for it.
The Patriarch then appointed the Archbishop Mor Ivennis Ilyas
Heluli, the monastic priest Ilys kir, and the priest Mansur Rahipallo
(Rahibolu?), before defining the division of responsibilities among the
employees. After the establishment of the press, a permit for publishing
books in Syriac was requested from the governor of Diyarbakr. This peti-
tion was also sent to the ministry of the interior, whose permission was
also needed for printing activities.8
Fig. 3.Title page of book by Afrm Barm, published at Dayr al-Zafarn, 1917
the syrian orthodox patriarchate press 187
vekili tarafndan vuku bulan istida zerine mugyir-i usl hl ve hareketten mcnebet
eylemek artyla kefl-i irae edenlere matbaa kad iin ruhsat its nizam iktizasndan
bulunduu cihetle orada tesisi istenilen matbaa iin dahi shib-i imtiyznn mahallince
ahvali bi-t-tahkk keflet-i hayriyeye rabt olmak ve Sryan lisan zere baslacak ktb
ve resil evvel-i emirde cnib-i hkmetten muayene edilmek ve matbaa dahi Patrikhane
dahilinde olmayp sair mahallerde olduu gibi memleket derununda bulunmak zere ruh-
sat itsnda bir gn mahzur olmad matbuat idre-i behyesinden b-mzekkire ifade
klnm ve keyfiyet Dire-i Celle-i Hriciyeye dahi bildirilmi olmakla urt- mezkre
dairesinde icr-y cb hususuna himem-i aliye-i dverleri derkr buyurulmak babnda
emir ve irade men-lehl-emrindir. F 22 Cumadelahire sene 294 ve f 22 Haziran 93
(5 Temmuz 1877). Ahmed Cevdet. P. Gabriyel Akyz, Osmanl Devletinde Sryani Kilisesi
(Mardin: Mardin Krklar Kilisesi, 2002), 136, document no. 127.
9On this subject see: (2 Kanunisani 1307 tarihli telgrafname (29 Austos 1889)) Maarif
Nazret-i Cellesine, Londradan Cemiyeti Hayriyeden celb edilen matbaann kurulmasna
hayli mesarifi itibarla cemiyet-i mezkreden usta celbiyle Mardine yarm saat mesafedeki
Deyruz-zafaranda kurdurulmu ehre getirilmesi de imkan haricinde olup umr- mezhe-
biye ibadetimizden baka ktb tab edilmemek zere hkmetten muayenesiyle mdrin-
den muteber kefil ahz tatil edilmemesinin iradeleri msterhamdr. Sryani Patrii Petrus
Babakanlk Osmanl Arivi, Y.PRK. MF. 2/27.
10His interpreter did not like the idea that the Archbishop was learning English and in
order to disparage him, wrote a letter to the Patriarch accusing the Archbishop of a crime
he did not commit: embezzling one hundred dinars from the money that was donated by
the Syrian Patriarchate Education Society. Thereupon the Patriarch wrote a letter to Dr.
Tremlett informing him that he had anathematised and dismissed the Archbishop. How-
ever, Dr. Tremlett wrote back that Abd Allh II. Saf was a man of honour and everything
he did was for the sake of his country. He thus impeded the Archbishops anathema.
11 Patriarch Mor Ignatios Abd Allh II Saf (18331915): He paid a second visit to
London, during which he attended sessions of the 1888 Lambeth Conference, and secured
a second printing press. The Gorgias Encyclopaedic Dictionary of the Syriac Heritage (Pis-
cataway, NJ: Gorgias Press, 2011).
188 ahmet tan and robert langer
Rev. Tremlett advised him to take with him an expert on printing equip-
ment, in case the printing press should malfunction during use. He also
advised the Archbishop to buy another printing press, in case of missing
or malfunctioning parts, and enabled him to acquire it.
The mechanical problems with the press that caused the Archbishops
visit to England were later solved. The mechanic stayed in Diyarbakr for
a while, helping to get the machine working properly. However, an addi-
tional problem arose: with only Arabic printing types, Syriac books could
not be printed; therefore new printing types for the Syriac alphabet were
acquired from London and Oxford.12
At the time of the collapse of the Ottoman Empire and the foundation
of the new Republic of Turkey, printing activities at the monastery were
stopped and carried on only in Jerusalem, where the other printing
machine was located.18
The printing house resumed its activities in the early years of the new
republic. It was even used to print state documents, since it was the only
printing house in the region.19 However, the printing activities again
stopped after a couple of years; it seems that no one had the will and
courage to run the press after the Patriarchate moved to Jerusalem. The
printing press fell into disrepair.20
Only after Hanna Dolabani was appointed Archbishop of Mardin on
4 May 1947 did the printing house resume work. Dolabani moved the
press to the Mor Behnam Church and continued printing there. The peri-
odical Hikmet started publication for the third time under the name z
Hikmet.21
Conclusions
This paper has examined the printing activities of the Syrian Orthodox
Church, drawing on articles, archive documents, diaries, memoirs, church
histories, and the biographies of the patriarchs. Missionary sources, being
relatively easy to access, were the main sources of information; however
given that Syrian Orthodox Christians were not prime targets of the mis-
sions, nor were they much influenced by them, there are not many such
sources. Missionary activities were only a part of the reason they estab-
lished the press and printed their own books.
The Syrian Orthodox Church established the press in Deyruzafaran
Monastery in Mardin, the centre of the Patriarchate, in Petrus IVs time.
In order to establish the press, the Patriarch went to England and bought
a printing machine, apparatus for casting types, and a paper-cutting
machine. An engineer also came from Britain.
The printing house published books in Arabic, Turkish and, most
importantly, Syriac. Later, they produced the newspaper Hikmet (ekm),
issued by the Syrian Orthodox Patriarchate. The publication of this news-
paper was suspended three times. However, at the time of writing, it is
still appearing.
Bibliography
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kk, Murat F. Naum Faik ve Sryani Rnesans. Edited by Mehmet imek. Istanbul: Belge
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Ankara: Orient Yaynlar, 2005.
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LImprimerie Ebzziya et lart dimprimer
dans lEmpire ottoman la fin du XIXe sicle
zgr Tresay*
4Bayram Kodaman, Abdlhamid Devri Eitim Sistemi (Ankara, 1991); Seluk Akin
Somel, The Modernization of Public Education in the Ottoman Empire, 1839-1908: Islamiza-
tion, Autocracy and Discipline (Leiden, 2001).
5Sinan etin, Booksellers and Their Catalogs in Hamidian Istanbul, 1884-1901, mmoire
de DEA non publi, Boazii University, 2010: 77-83.
6Pour un aperu gnral sur lvolution de ldition ottomane, voir Nuri Akbayar,
Osmanl Yayncl, Tanzimattan Cumhuriyete Trkiye Ansiklopedisi, vol. 6 (Istanbul,
1985): 1680-1696. Sur lessor quantitatif de la production dimprim et les activits de tra-
duction lpoque hamidienne, voir mon Censure et production culturelle: le champ
ditorial ottoman lpoque hamidienne (1876-1908), tudes Balkaniques. Cahiers Pierre
Belon 16 (2009): 241-254.
7Franois Georgeon, Le dernier sursaut (1878-1908), Histoire de lEmpire ottoman, d.
Robert Mantran (Paris, 1989): 556-557.
8Franois Georgeon, Abdlhamid II: le sultan calife (1876-1909) (Paris, 2003): 328-329.
9Server R. skit, Trkiyede Neriyat Hareketleri Tarihine Bir Bak (Istanbul, 1939, rp.
Ankara 2000): 84.
lart dimprimer dans lempire ottoman 195
date qui figure sur les diffrents emblmes de son imprimerie. la lumire
de ces informations, on peut dire quil a fond son imprimerie en 1881 mais
na pu la faire fonctionner qu partir de 1882. Il ouvre son imprimerie
Galata, dans la rue Eski Mahkeme ct de la mosque dite Arap camii; il
la dmnage quelques annes plus tard (mais pas avant printemps 1887)
dans un btiment du XVIIe sicle situ au numro 17 la rue Kart nar,
toujours Galata13.
Il est clair que la fondation dune imprimerie moderne dote de machi-
nes importes depuis lAllemagne ncessite un investissement consid-
rable. Nous ne possdons que trs peu dinformations sur les ressources
conomiques dEbzziya Tevfik cette date. Notons cependant quil achte
en 1884, deux maisons contigus Bakrky quil unit ensuite pour les
transformer en une seule grande maison14. Rappelons aussi que sa femme
Adviye Rabia Hanm a des revenus provenants de fondations pieuses de
sa famille15. Apparemment, au dbut des annes 1880, la famille Ebz-
ziya est capable dinvestir des sommes considrables pour lachat de deux
maisons et des machines de presse modernes importes de lAllemagne.
Ebzziya Tevfik crit en 1891 quil avait contract un crdit de 400 livres
ottomanes, cest--dire 40.000 piastres, pour fonder son imprimerie. Si la
somme mentionne est correcte, il sagit dune somme certes considra-
ble, quivalent un an de salaire dun bureaucrate expriment, mais pas
gigantesque non plus.
Soulignons aussi quil y a des indices permettant dtre sr du fait
quune aide matrielle plus ou moins consquente de la part du sultan
Abdlhamid II a probablement facilit les choses. La somme exacte accor-
de par le sultan reste nanmoins inconnue16. Du reste, laide officielle
pouvait se prsenter aprs la fondation de diverses manires, comme la
publication des ouvrages officiels, par exemple. Notons que lImprimerie
Ebzziya publie durant son existence trs peu de manuels scolaires. Les
Tevfik crit quil avait pris un crdit de 400 livres ottomanes pour fonder
son imprimerie et quil valu la valeur totale de son imprimerie en 1900
3.000 livres ottomanes20. Ou encore, ce chiffre daffaire de 11.500 livres
ottomanes correspond au prix de plus de 760.000 exemplaires des bio-
graphies quEbzziya Tevfik allait publier partir de 1883 dans sa Biblio-
thque des hommes illustres 1 piastre et demi. Mme si on ne connat
pas les marges de profit de lImprimerie Ebzziya, cette affaire reprsente
sans doute une norme source de revenus21.
20Ebzziya, Rznme-i haytmdan baz sahif, Mecmua-i Ebzziya 113 (15 septem-
bre 1911): 1105-1112.
21 Si on se rappelle que seulement environ 40% des archives ottomanes, contenant
plus de 200 millions de documents, sont classes lheure actuelle, il est probable que lon
trouve dans lavenir dautres documents officiels pouvant clairer davantage les activits
de lImprimerie Ebzziya.
200 zgr tresay
22Voir Nedret Kuran-Burolu, Osman Zeki Bey and His Printing Office the Matbaa-i
Osmaniye, History of Printing and Publishing in the Languages and Countries of the Middle
East, ed. Philip Sadgrove (Oxford, 2005): 35-57; idem., Saraydan lk Defa Kuran- Kerim
Basma zni Alan Hattat: Matbaac Osman Bey, Tarih ve Toplum 209 (2001): 33-41; idem.,
Matbaac Osman Bey, Journal of Turkish Studies 26 ii (2002): 97-112.
23Ce personnage trs important de lhistoire ditoriale ottomane na pas encore fait
lobjet dune tude comprhensive. Pour linstant, on peut se reporter Bilge Ercilasun,
Ahmet hsan Tokgz (Ankara, 1996). Sur son imprimerie, voir Enver Esenkova, Ahmed
hsan Matbaas, stanbul Ansiklopedisi vol. 1 (Istanbul, 1958): 573-576.
24Sur ce personnage et son imprimerie, voir Hatice Aynur, II. Abdlhamd Dnemi
Basn Yayn Dnyasnn Kt Adam Malmt Baba Thir, Toplumsal Tarih 128 (aot
2004): 62-65.
25Kuntay, Ebzziya Tevfik Bey ve Neredilmemi Mektuplar, 489.
26Voir Halil Halid, Bir Trkn Ruznamesi, trad. Refik Brngz (Istanbul, 2008):
82-84.
27Kou, Ebzziya Matbaas, 4873.
lart dimprimer dans lempire ottoman 201
31 Seyfettin zege, Eski Harflerle Baslm Trke Eserler Katalou, 5 volumes (Istanbul,
1971-1982).
32LImprimerie Kasbar sappelait au dbut des annes 1880 lImprimerie Kasbar et
Karabet. En 1889, ces deux imprimeurs se sont spars et continurent leur carrire tout
seul. Nous avons ajout les publications parues dans leur imprimerie commune avant 1889
celles de lImprimerie Kasbar aprs 1889.
33Ali Birinci, Kitaplk Tarihimizden Bir sim: Kaspar Efendi, dans son Tarihin Gl-
gesinde (Istanbul, 2001): 271.
34On peut trouver quelques informations sur ces imprimeurs dans Baak Ocak, Tc-
carzde brahim Hilmi raan (Istanbul, 2003): 9-20.
lart dimprimer dans lempire ottoman 203
43Voir Christoph K. Neumann, Buch- und Zeitungsdruck auf Trkisch, 18. bis 20. Jah-
rhundert. Book and newspaper printing in Turkish, 18th20th centuries, Middle Eastern
Languages and the Print Revolution: a cross-cultural encounter (Westhofen, 2002): 240;
Johann Strauss, Ktp ve Resail-i Mevkute, 235. Ebzziya Tevfik fut le premier utiliser
la calligraphie kf dans les titres des priodiques (Mecmua-i Ebzziya 21, 2 juin 1882) et
des livres (Cmel-i mntahbe-i Kemal, 1882): voir Alpay Kabacal, Cumhuriyet ncesi ve
Sonras Matbaa ve Basn Sanayii (Istanbul, 1998): 125.
44Sur ce sujet peu explor de lhistoriographie, voir Johann Strauss, Limage moderne
dans lEmpire ottoman: quelques points de repre, La multiplication des images en pays
dIslam (Wrzburg, 2003): 139-176.
45Yldz Salman (d.), Avrupadan stanbula Yeni Sanat. Art Nouveau from Europe to
Istanbul, 1890-1930 (Istanbul, 2005); Ezio Godoli et Diana Barillari, Istanbul 1900. Art Nou-
veau Architecture and Interiors, stanbul, Yap Endstri Merkezi Yaynlar, 1997.
46Voir les commentaires de Fahriye Gndodu, Ebzziya Tevfikin Trk Basmcl...,
49-51.
208 zgr tresay
49Geoffrey Roper, Fris al-Shidyq and the Transition from Scribal to Print Culture
in the Middle East, The Book in the Islamic World: the Written Word and Communication
in the Middle East (Albany, USA, 1995): 219-220.
50La ponctuation fut tardivement et progressivement introduite dans le turc ottoman
partir des annes 1860. Au dbut des annes 1880, le turc ottoman utilisait plusieurs signes
de ponctuation mais cet usage tait encore loin dtre standardis.
51 Notons aussi que par un livre (mer Hulusi [Muallim Naci], erre, 1301/1884) quil a
publi dans son imprimerie en 1884, Ebzziya fut le premier diteur ottoman encadrer le
texte par un cadre en couleur, voir Alpay Kabacal, Cumhuriyet ncesi ve Sonras..., 124.
52Lucien Febvre & Henri-Jean Martin, Lapparition du livre [1958] (Paris, 1999): 111-164.
Pour la priode entre 1729 et 1848, il existe une tude qui porte sur cet aspect de lhistoire
du livre en turc ottoman: Ekmeleddin hsanolu & Hatice Aynur, Yazmadan Basmaya
Gei: Osmanl Basma Kitap Geleneinin Oluumu (1729-1848), Osmanl Aratrmalar
22 (2003): 219-255.
Annexe: La liste des ouvrages publis
par lImprimerie Ebzziya (1881-1928)
Abrviations
Notes
Les numros et les abrviations donns entre les crochets [ ] renvoient aux
catalogues.
Pour faciliter la lecture, nous navons pas indiqu les dimensions et le nombre
de pages du livre. Le lecteur intress pourrait les consulter depuis le catalogue
ZEGE en utilisant le numro de catalogue.
Nous avons aussi choisi de ne pas indiquer le lieu dimpression, qui est not
par le catalogue zege comme Istanbul. En fait, dans toutes les publications
sorties des presses de lImprimerie Ebzziya, le lieu dimpression tait indiqu
comme Kostantiniye.
Les dates de publication taient gnralement donnes jusqu 1908, donc
jusqu 1324 (H.), selon le calendrier lunaire de lHgire. Aprs 1908, elles
taient gnralement donnes selon le calendrier financier ottoman dit rm
(= romain, car le calendrier en question est une variante du calendrier julien)
ou ml. Comme le catalogue ZEGE, nous avons accept donc pour les dates
de publication antrieures 1325, quil sagissait du calendrier lunaire de lH-
gire et pour celles qui taient postrieures, quil sagissait du calendrier finan-
cier ottoman.
La liste est chronologique. Les publications de chaque anne sont prsentes
sous trois catgories: les ouvrages dEbzziya; les ouvrages faisant partie des
bibliothques lances par Ebzziya; les autres ouvrages publis par lImprime-
rie Ebzziya.
Signalons aussi quelques publications non dates qui nont pas t incluses
de ce fait dans la liste: Ebzziya Tevfik, Manzme-i tebrikiye-i bende-i kemte-
lart dimprimer dans lempire ottoman 211
Reb-i marfet. 4. sene. 1301 sene-i kameriyesine msdif 1262 sene-i emsiyesiin
Takvm-i Ebzziya [ZEGE 16539]
Reb-i marfet. 5. sene. 1302 sene-i kameriyesine msdif 1263 sene-i emsiyesiin
Takvm-i Ebzziya [ZEGE 16540]
Zamme-i Reb-i marfet. 1302 sene-i kameriyesine msdif 1263 sene-i emsiyesin
Takvm-i Ebzziya [ZEGE 23629]
eyh nyetullah (trad. Namk Kemal), Bahar- dni, 2e d., KE-98 [ZEGE
1519]
Divn- inasi, 3e d., KE-15/16 [ZEGE 4236]
eyh Sdi-i irz (trad. skdarl Safi), Cidl-i Sdi b mddei, KE-17 [ZEGE
3024]
Mehmed Tahir (trad.), Cizvit cemiyetinin tlmt- hafiyesi, KE-2 [ZEGE
3085]
Ahmed Rd, Hall-i mesele-i tfn, KE-10 [ZEGE 6736]
li bin Ebu Talip (trad. Muallim Naci), Emsl-i li, KE-1 [ZEGE 4896]
Victor Hugo (trad. Selanikli Tevfik), Klod g yani obur Klod, KE-21 [ZEGE 11062]
Koi Bey, Koi Bey rislesi, 2e d., KE-30/31 [ZEGE 11071]
Necib Fazl (trad.), Mebhis-i muhtasara- fenniye, KE-32 [ZEGE 12408]
Mehmed Tahir (trad.), Prusya kral Byk Frederikin emsl-i hikemiyesi,
KE-25/27 [ZEGE 16434]
Ahmed Azmi, Sefretnme-i Ahmed Azmi, KE-22 [ZEGE 17658]
Ahmed Resmi Efendi, Sefretnme-i Ahmed Resmi, KE-14 [ZEGE 17659]
Ahmed Resmi, Viyana sefretnmesi, KE-43 [ZEGE 22756]
Hlid Ziya [Uaklgil], Garbdan arka seyyle-i edebiye, vol. 1 [ZEGE 6042]
Mustafa Reid (d.), sr- mehr [ZEGE 1014]
Muallim Naci, Atepre, 2e d. [ZEGE 1242]
Muallim Naci, Mektblarm [ZEGE 12972]
Muallim Naci (trad.), Snihatl-arab [ZEGE 17539]
Mustafa Reid, Bir iek demeti [ZEGE 2257]
Menemenlizade Mehmed Tahir, Elhn [ZEGE 4746]
Emlk vergisi hakknda...nizmnmedir [ZEGE 4828]
Hkmet-i seniye ile Rumeli demiryollarn iledici kumpanya beyninde...muka-
velenin sretidir [ZEGE 8080]
Lamartine (trad. Halil Edib), Jeniviyev. Bir hizmeti kzn sergzeti [ZEGE 9769]
Edmond Tarb (trad. Selanikli Tevfik), Katil Bernar [ZEGE 10372]
Tepedelenlizade H[seyin] Kmil, Maka yhd muhfaza-i ak [ZEGE 12301]
Mekteb-i sultn tevz-i mkfat cedvelidir [ZEGE 12908]
Henry Liard (trad. Sleyman Nuki), Mhendisin refki [ZEGE 14684]
Hasan efik, Nahv-i trk [ZEGE 15084]
Nezret-i celle-i nfiadan...telgrafnmeler, 3 volumes [ZEGE 15463]
Selnikli Fazl Necib, Seyhat-i muhtasara-i fenniye [ZEGE 17903]
ocuun beden terbiyesi [ML]
Mahmud b. Emir Ahmed, Mevln Nizmkr, Dvn- elbise [ML]
Papatyalar [TBTK 7601]
Usl-i tenkid [ML]
Yorgaki & evket, Usl-i muhkeme-i hukukiye kann- muvakkat erhi, vol. 1
[ZEGE 22252]
Ahmed Fevz Manisav, Fransa matbt nizmnnesi [ZEGE 5876]
S. Vehbi, Ahmed Midhat efendi hazretlerine rzdr [ML]
Muallim Naci (trad.), Kvlcm yhd kadn byle olmal [BDK, ML]
Pikar (trad. Bolandzde Veli), Muhabbet meliki hazret-i snn hayt [ML]
Louis Angeli (trad. Mehmed Tahir), Bir kk sehiv, KE-77 [ZEGE 2354]
Nzhet, Elsine-i garbiye edebiyt ve debs, KE-76/78 [ZEGE 4801]
Ahmed Rasim (trad.), Eski Romallar, vol. 2, KE-79 [ZEGE 5117]
Mustafa Hilmi, Kamere matf istidllt- haviye, KE-75 [ZEGE 9971]
Ktib elebi, Mznl-hakk fi ihtiyrl-ahakk, 3e d., KE-71/72 [ZEGE 13826]
Yirmisekiz Mehmed elebi, Sefretnme-i Mehmed Efendi, 3e d., KE-73/74
[ZEGE 17760]
Fenelon (trad. Yusuf Kamil Paa), Cmel-i hikemiye-i Telemak, KE-18 [ZEGE
3202]
li bin Ebu Talip (trad. Muallim Naci), Emsl-i li, 2e d., KE-1 [ZEGE 4896]
Ahmed Resmi Girid, Hlsatl-itibr, KE-80/81 [ZEGE 7977]
Ahmed Cevdet Paa, Krm ve Kafkas trhesi, 2e d., KE-93 [ZEGE 10693]
Kemalpaazade Said, Sefr ve ehbenderler, KE-83 [ZEGE 17686]
Nb, Hayriye-i Nb, KE-91/92 [ZEGE 7148]
Namk Kemal, Kemal Beyin rfan Paaya bir mektbu, 3e d., KE-57 [ZEGE
10522]
Namk Kemal, Mukaddime-i Cell, 3e d., KE-69 [ZEGE 14356]
Sinan Paa, Tazarrt- Sinan Paa, 2e d., KE-63 [ZEGE 20157]
Ahmed akir Paa, Takvm-i ncm. 1324 sene-i mevld-i emssi. 1311/1312 sene-i
hicr-i kamerisi. 4. sene [ZEGE 14922]
[Kemalpaazade Said], Trh-i hukukdan bir sahfe [ZEGE 19831]
Mnif Paa, Terkib-i bend [ZEGE 20718]
Mekteb-i sultn tevz-i mkfat cedvelidir. 1311 hicr senesi [ZEGE 25201]
Abdurrahman dil [Eren], lmt- temyiziyeden hall-i temyz. Muhkeme-i
temyzin hall eyledii mesili mtemildir [BDK, TBTK 10079]
Marie Robert-Halle (trad. Ali Nusret), Bir ocuun sergzeti [ZEGE 2261]
mile Richebourg (trad. Ali Nusret), Ky muakalar [ZEGE 11237]
Abdurrahman dil [Eren], Mahkeme-i temyz [ZEGE 11940]
Mekteb-i sultn tevz-i mkfat cedvelidir [ZEGE 12917]
Yusuf Paa, Muhtasar kavid-i ilm-i hesb, 6e d. [ZEGE 14234]
Elif, Usl-i muhbere-i ziyiye [ZEGE 22218]
Kemalpaazade Said, Galatt- tercme. 14. defter [ZEGE 6019]
Yusuf, Kavnn-i ticriye. Mukayeseli [BDK]
Mehmed Halis, Telhsl-nahiv [BDK, ML]
lart dimprimer dans lempire ottoman 221
53Le lieu dimpression nest pas indiqu mais il est peu probable quEbzziya Tevfik ait
publi ce livre ailleurs que dans son imprimerie.
lart dimprimer dans lempire ottoman 223
1923: 2 livres
1924: 5 livres
1925: 4 livres
1926: 8 livres
1927: 14 livres
Alfred Hattner (trad. Hamid Sadi [Selen]), Mevzi corfy. Avrupa [ZEGE
13406]
Samsun sahil demiryollar...hesbiyesini hv bilano [ZEGE 17497]
Trkiye cumhriyeti ile svire arasnda mnakid ikamet mukavelenmesi
[ZEGE 21751]
Trkiye-Suriye gmrk itilfnmesi [ZEGE 21858]
Maksim tfenklerine mahss endirekt ltlar tarfnmesi [ZEGE 12038]
Johanna Spyri, Kei oban [ML]
Samsun sahil demiryollar...murakib raporu [MLK]
Trkiye cumhriyeti ile Almanya devleti arasnda ikamet ve ticret mukavelen-
mesi [ML]
Trkiye cumhriyeti ile ekoslovakya arasnda mnakid ticret mukavelenmesi
[ML]
Trkiye ile ekoslovakya cumhriyetleri arasnda mnakid ikamet mukavelen-
mesi [ML]
1928: 19 livres
Bibliographie
Introduction
of the day), decorated with flags, were the first places to which the masses
marched. The press, in targeting the old regime, was marked out as a
motivator of the revolution.3
At the same time, some negative consequences resulted from this
limitlesseven anarchicfreedom of the press which continued for
nearly nine months. Perhaps the most damaging one was the 31 March
Event, largely organised by the counter-revolutionary press.4
The 1908 Revolution of the Young Turks paved the way for a boom in
the press similar to or even more impressive than that of the French Revo-
lution of 1789;5 it enormously increased the variety, quantity, and quality
of periodicals. In the twenty years between 1898 and 1908 only one new
publication on average appeared every year. In the first few months of
1908, fifty-two periodicals were published in Istanbul, of which only six-
teen were in Turkish. The total number of periodicals published in the
entire Ottoman Empire was only 120. However, following the declaration
of freedom, in the first six weeks, over 200 appeared and within seven
months 730 newspapers had applied for licences. In the following six
years, 1,600 periodicals were licensed, not to mention the unlicensed jour-
nals and newspapers.6
This brought about a predictable shortage of printing houses and type-
setters; the customs houses were full of printing presses, many of which
were transported to Anatolia. By the end of 1908, private printing houses
had been set up in almost every Anatolian city.
The boom was observed not only in the number of newspapers, but
also in circulation and readership. Although kdam was printing 60,000
and Sabah 40,000 copies in the first days of the revolution, this did not
suffice. Newspapers were even sold on the black market and the price of
kdam (officially 0.25 kuru) rose to half a lira. The sales of Servet-i Fnun,
3For witnesses of the first days, see Hseyin Cahit Yaln, Siyasal Anlar (Istanbul:
Trkiye Bankas Kltr Yaynlar, 2000), 25, 2941; Ahmet hsan Tokgz, Matbuat
Hatralarm, ed. Alpay Kabacal (Istanbul: letiim Yaynlar, 1993), 120121, 126130; Ahmet
Emin Yalman, Yakn Tarihte Grdklerim Geirdiklerim 1, ed. Erol adi Erdin (Istanbul:
Pera Turizm ve Ticaret, 1997), 6871; Ahmet Emin (Yalman), The Development of Modern
Turkey as Measured by Its Press (New York: Columbia Universtity Press, 1914), 8687.
4Sina Akin, eriat Bir Ayaklanma 31 Mart Olay (Ankara: mge Kitabevi, 1994).
5Palmira Brummett, Image and Imperialism in the Ottoman Revolutionary Press, 1908
1911 (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2000), 3.
6For numbers see Orhan Kololu, Osmanldan 21. Yzyla Basn Tarihi (Istanbul: Pozitif
Yaynlar, 2006), 8788.
234 bora ataman and cem pekman
which was read by intellectuals and used to stand at only 1,000 before the
Constitution, rose steeply to 6,0007,000.7
Periodicals also flourished during the years of the Second Constitution.
Within the general boom, comics, of which Sultan Abdlhamid II had
been especially intolerant, saw a remarkable growth. Between 1908 and
1918, ninety-two comic papers were published.8 Other than comics, peri-
odicals for women, children, current affairs, sports, films, the professions,
academics/universities, literature, the arts, history, economics, science/
philosophy, military/war, advertising, and Turkic, Islamic, socialist, and
Western ideology were published.9 But, in order to understand thoroughly
the capitalisation and professionalisation of the Turkish press, one needs
to consider at the same time the improvements in printing technology
and quality. The relations between the owner, journalist, and the reader
are not only ideological but also, and maybe more crucially, economic
in nature when a state is being modernised and adapting quickly to new
market conditions. However, the patrons of the time were not like the
media moguls of our own era, and did not act solely as capitalists. For
example, ehbals owner, the author Hseyin Saadeddin, was a prominent
figure on the Ottoman cultural scene.
ulema families. When his father was appointed to the post of kad ( judge) in
Izmir, the family moved there. He went to the French college in Izmir and
took his high school diploma. According to ztuna, Hseyin Saadeddins
education in a Catholic school indicates that even though his father was
a member of the ulema, his attitude was liberal.10
In cosmopolitan Izmir, Hseyin started to learn German and English, as
well as French. He also followed the Islamic curriculum of the madrasah
(medrese) while at the French college and finished the middle school
madrasah course. But in 1896, to acquire the highest madrasah qualifica-
tion, his father sent him back to Istanbul.
Though Hseyin Saadeddin was later to become a great scholar of
Turkish classical music, in his youth he became acquainted with Western
music. Over time, his interest in Turkish classical music deepened and
he learned to play the oud, despite his fathers objections. Later he had a
proper musical education in Istanbul.11 In the meantime, he worked with
German, French, and Persian teachers at home and became literate in
these languages.
After graduating from the higher madrasah in Istanbul, he was enrolled
in the law faculty and graduated in 1906 with the top degree. As the best
English-speaking lawyer, he was sent by the government to the 1908 inter-
national congress of law in Washington, and in 1929 was elected to perma-
nent membership of the International Court of Justice at The Hague.
During the occupation of Istanbul, French forces seized his family home
and dispossessed him and his family. After independence, the departing
occupation forces set fire to the house. His famous library, comprising
around ten thousand books and hundreds of manuscripts, was lost in the
blaze. The ehbal collection was also destroyed in this fire. After 1922,
Hseyin Saadeddin started to collect a new library, which was to be the
much richer Arel Library, recognised as a major private library of music
and law.
He retired from state service when he was only thirty-eight, and devoted
the rest of his life mostly to Turkish music. He was the founder and first
president of the Turkish Philharmonic Association and the Turkish Law-
yers Association.12 He wrote many books and articles on Turkish music.
He was not only a theorist, but also a music teacher and composer. With
10Ylmaz ztuna, Saadettin Arel (Ankara: Kltr ve Turizm Bakanl Yaynlar, 1986), 12.
11Ibid., 14.
12Ibid., 64.
236 bora ataman and cem pekman
13eh-bal or ah-bal is a word which came into Ottoman from Persian, meaning the
longest feather of a birds wing. It is also a girls name. Ferit Develiolu, Osmanlca-Trke
Ansiklopedik Lugat (Ankara: Aydn Kitabevi, 2006), 984.
14ehbal, 1 (14 March 1909), 1.
15rfan Dadelen, Fotoraflar ile eh-Bal Dergisi Katalog ve Dizinler (Istanbul: BB Kt-
phane ve Mzeler Mdrl, 2006).
16ehbal, 1 (14 March 1909), 20.
17Referring to an article on ehbal in Sabah. ehbal, 5 (28 May 1909), 82; and ehbal, 20
(28 March 1910), 389. See also Yalman, Development of Modern Turkey, 114.
18ehbal, 3 (14 April 1909), 42.
19ehbal, 9 (14 August 1909), 166.
a champion of printing quality: ehbal journal 237
distant centres such as Diyarbakr, Suez, India, and Java. The readers there
asked for extra time to send their coupons to ehbals office.25
The licence holder of ehbal was Hseyin Saadeddin, who also wrote
articles on music under the pen name of Bedi Mensi (Forgotten Beauty).
The manager was first Ali Rza Bey, than Jacques Sayabalian, Nedimi Bey,
and Ali Rza Bey again. Occasionally, ehbal was published without a des-
ignated manager.
ehbal was bi-weekly, and its 100 issues were published between 14
March 1909 and 23 July 1914. Although there is no apparent reason for
ehbals closing down, World War I likely had an important impact.26
Just before the outbreak of the Trablusgarp War (Libyan War) between
the Ottomans and the Italians, ehbal was awarded first prize in an
international fair in Italy. This, entitled Esposizione Internazionale delle
Industrie e del Lavoro, Torino 1911 (the International Industry and Labour
Fair) had been organised to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Italian
kingdom in Turin;27 and the Ottoman Ministry of Commerce requested
that ehbal send a few of its issues to the organisers. At the end of the
fair, which included thirty-seven participant countries and lasted seven
months, ehbal received a gold medal for excellence and competence.
ehbals managers had forgotten, owing to the pressures of war, that they
had sent copies to the fair, until the consulate in Rome and representative
of the fair in Turin informed them about the medal. The journal published
the medal certificate in its 77th issue.28
Although ehbal was not involved in daily political controversy, through-
out its life it remained loyal to the ideals of the 1908 Revolution and had
friendly relations with ttihat ve Terakki (the Committee of Union and
Progress). The last issue of ehbal was prepared as a special issue, to coin-
cide with the 6th anniversary of the Revolution, and was published on
23 July 1914.
Technical Features
In its first issue, informing its readers about the features of the periodical,
the editors stated that the journals material virtues lay in its volume,
paper, visuals, layout, and print.29 The ones which the journal defined as
moral were those of its content, which are not examined in this article.
ehbal was then the most voluminous journal (i.e., largest in size) ever
published in Istanbul. The size was DIN A3 (280 mm 400 mm after cut-
ting). It was printed on imported papier couch and the covers were
of the same paper (up to the third volume), making 20 pages in total.
In the third volume ehbal began to use cardboard covers which carried
advertisements.
The reason for choosing the very expensive papier couch was cer-
tainly aesthetic. The combination of carefully edited articles and visuals
with paper of such quality resulted in a periodical unlike any that had
been seen in Ottoman printing up to that time. ehbal aimed to reserve
one page for each topic, so it preferred to include all the related articles
and visuals on one topic in a single page, in order not to bore readers with
many pages on the same subject, but to keep their interest alive by mov-
ing to something new on every page. This explains the unusual size of the
journal. However, occasional changes in this policy can be observed, for
instance, extensions to a second page or to the next issue, depending on
the importance of the subject.
ehbal not only contracted the most famous photographers in Istan-
bul, but also the major ones from other cities and other countries. Some
of these were Sabah & Joaillier, Phebus, Cargopoulo (Aydn), Dldlian
(Samsun), Apollon, G. Berger, Simon, Hilal, Sakb-Uskub, Mahruki Mahzar,
Resne, Hsn, Mayr Burton.30 In addition, leading painters were con-
tracted to draw headlines, illustrations to poetry and stories, cartoons, and
diagrams. The photographs and other visuals were engraved in important
European centres. We learn from the announcements made to readers
that the plates were prepared in Italy and Vienna.
The number of lines in a page was 52 with a headline and 62 without.
Normally there were three columns of 70 mm to a page, but this varied
according the arrangement of the photographs.
The journal planned to increase its volume from the outset; however
only its 8th issue, on the first anniversary of Merutiyet, reached 24 pages.
All the remaining issues were 20 pages. But by the first issue of the second
volume (number 25), they could announce that the cover pages would be
used for printing articles, illustrations or advertising and this decision was
put into effect.31
Each volume of the journal was formed of 24 issues. Page numbers were
consecutive in each volume, thus making each volume 484 pages long.
Delays in publishing did not affect this system, which was a useful one
for subscribers, who were guaranteed to receive the promised number of
issues within a year or half year.
The administration of the journal was unusually expensive and the
price of each issue was set at 5 kuru. The newspaper Sabah thought
that this price was very high and suggested a reduction, if a wider read-
ership for such a quality publication was sought. ehbal did not agree
and responded that similar European journals were priced even higher,
although they might have a circulation of 100,000.32 Indeed, ehbal never
changed its price throughout its publishing life.
The price abroad was stated in British and French currencies, as 1 shil-
ling or 1.25 francs. The yearly subscription cost was 1 Ottoman lira.33 Thus
a yearly subscription for 24 issues cost the same as 20 separate issues. The
same rate was valid for foreign subscriptions, but subscribers had to pay
an extra 12 kuru for the cardboard packaging.
Besides sales and subscription revenues, advertising must have contrib-
uted to the journals income. From the 8th issue onward, ehbals covers
were open to advertising. Readers were warned not to take off the covers
when binding the volumes, for two reasons: first, the covers were also
numbered as pages and if they had been torn off these numbers would
have been missing, and second, ehbal wanted the carefully printed
advertisements to be preserved. Unfortunately no information remains
about the financial return to the journal for these carefully protected
advertisements.
ehbal moved to several printing houses during its lifetime, but
was always printed in Istanbul. The first 28 issues were printed in Agop
Matosyan, 29 to 44 in ant, 45 to 75 in Matbaa-i Hayriye and the last
Conclusion
The second Merutiyet era is one of the brightest and most exciting peri-
ods in the history of Turkish journalism. It can be argued that the perma-
nent foundations of the Turkish press were laid in these years. Under the
influence of Westernisation, the field was modernised and transformed
in line with market forces, although the newspapers were more at the
stage of opinion journalism. More specifically, the second Merutiyet con-
stitutes the renaissance of Turkish periodicals.
In terms of aesthetics, ehbal is the unquestioned leader of the rich
periodical market, where form was bound to stay in the background
because of the mentality and financial conditions in those years. ehbal
was far ahead of its timeimporting stocks of paper, plates or binders
from Europe. With such quality challenging the technological, economic,
and sociocultural conditions of the period, its relatively long life of five
and a half years is also remarkable.
ehbal represents in certain ways perhaps the first example of the mass
journalism which would reappear almost half a century later. Thus fur-
ther research on ehbal needs to concentrate not only on its precocious
success, but also on its less well-known features, such as reader profiles,
financial sources, and relations with the political powers.
Bibliography
Primary Source
ehbal journal (published between 14 March 1909 and 23 July 1914), bi-weekly magazine,
publisher, and editor: Hseyin Saadeddin (Arel). Istanbul.
Secondary Sources
Akin, Sina. eriat Bir Ayaklanma 31 Mart Olay. Ankara: mge Kitabevi, 1994.
Ataman, Bora. Trkiyede ilk Basn Yasaklar ve Abdlhamid Sansr. Marmara letiim
14 (2009): 2149.
Brummett, Palmira. Image and Imperialism in the Ottoman Revolutionary Press, 19081911.
Albany: State University of New York Press, 2000.
Bureau International des Expositions. Exposition Information (18511931), Turin 1911.
http://www.bie-paris.org (accessed June 10, 2008).
eviker, Turgut. Geliim Srecinde Trk KarikatrII. Merutiyet Dnemi (19081918).
Istanbul: Adam Yaynlar, 1988.
Dadelen, rfan. Fotoraflar ile eh-Bal Dergisi Katalog ve Dizinler. Istanbul: BB Ktphane
ve Mzeler Mdrl, 2006.
Develiolu, Ferit. Osmanlca-Trke Ansiklopedik Lugat. Ankara: Aydn Kitabevi, 2006.
Grsoy, lk. II. Merutiyet Dnemi Dergileri zerine Bir Deerlendirme. Dou Bat 46
(2008): 207221.
a champion of printing quality: ehbal journal 243
Kabacal, Alpay. Cumhuriyet ncesi ve Sonras Matbaa ve Basn Sanayii. Istanbul: Cem
Ofset, 1998.
Kololu, Orhan. 1908 Basn Patlamas. Istanbul: Bas-Ha, 2005.
. Osmanldan 21. Yzyla Basn Tarihi. Istanbul: Pozitif Yaynlar, 2006.
lmez, Ahmet. ehbal Mecmuas. Sivas: Cumhuriyet niversitesi, SBE, 1988.
ztuna, Ylmaz. Saadettin Arel. Ankara: Kltr ve Turizm Bakanl Yaynlar, 1986.
Prtr, Sabine. ehbalein herausragendes Beispiel frher trkischer Magazinpresse.
Turcica 29 (1997): 433442.
Tokgz, Ahmet hsan. Matbuat Hatralarm. Edited by Alpay Kabacal. Istanbul: letiim
Yaynlar, 1993.
Yaln, Hseyin Cahit. Siyasal Anlar. Istanbul: Trkiye Bankas Kltr Yaynlar, 2000.
Yalman, Ahmet Emin. The Development of Modern Turkey as Measured by its Press. New
York: Columbia University Press, 1914.
. Yakn Tarihte Grdklerim Geirdiklerim, 1: 18881922. Edited by Erol adi Erdin.
Istanbul: Pera Turizm ve Ticaret, 1997.
Arabic and Bilingual Newspapers and Magazines in
Latin America and the Caribbean
Philipp Bruckmayr
The Arab migratory movement from the area of historical Greater Syria
to Latin America and the Caribbean, starting in earnest in the 1880s, coin-
cided with major publishing and printing endeavours in Egypt and the
Lebanon. Emigrants from the latter area, constituting the majority in the
stream of migrants, brought the literary, journalistic, and editorial ambi-
tion prevalent in certain circles of their homeland to the New World. The
first Arabic journal to be published in Latin America appeared in Brazil in
1894, and many more Arabic and bilingual magazines and newspapers fol-
lowed in its steps in a variety of Latin American and Caribbean countries,
with So Paolo, Rio de Janeiro, and Buenos Aires as main centres of the
Arab diasporic literary activity. This contribution is intended to present
an introduction to the subject as well as an overview of, and commentary
on, the different manifestations of Arab literary, journalistic, and editorial
activity in this vast region. Moreover, both its relevance for different local
readerships and, in certain instances, its impact on the countries of origin
will be highlighted.
Introduction
1Robin Ostle, The Literature of the Mahjar, The Lebanese in the World: A Century of
Emigration, ed. Albert Hourani and Nadim Shehadi (London: Centre for Lebanese Studies,
1992), 211223.
246 philipp bruckmayr
organs,6 while in all the other listed countries (except the Dominican
Republic) the numbers of publications continued to increase until 1950.
In the following I provide an overview of the beginnings and the devel-
opment of Arabic and bilingual newspapers and magazines in the states
with which we are concerned.
Brazil
As noted above, Brazil was by far the greatest producer of Arabic news-
papers and magazines in Latin America. This, of course, was primarily
related to the numerical strength of the Arab element in the country.
Official Brazilian statistics indicate the entry of 106,184 Ottoman citizens,
most of whom were certainly Syro-Lebanese, into the country between
1891 and 1916. In the post-war period preceding the depression of the
1930s, the annual rate was between 1,000 and 5,000.7 By the late 1950s the
Lebanese(-descended) population of Brazil was estimated at 350,000.8 It
was accordingly also Brazil where the first Latin American Arabic news-
paper appeared in 1894. Surprisingly, the pioneer of Arab printing in Latin
America was not from one of the two major Brazilian cities, which natu-
rally drew the great majority of Arab settlers, but from the city of Campi-
nas (state of So Paulo): the weekly al-Fay (The Fragrant or The
Vast)9 founded by Salm and Duaybis Bli, natives of Zala in Lebanons
Beqaa plain.10 It was printed by the local al-Ra press with a fine typeface
akin to that of old Parisian Arabic typography.11 Salm Bli soon moved
on to establish al-Brzl in Santos in 1896 together with Ann al-Nar.
At first using a similar typographic style, which was deemed undesirable
by its founders, it soon appeared in beautiful Istambuli letters after a
6Al-Dif al-Arab existed for only a month. Yaqb al-Awdt (al-Badaw al-Mulaam),
al-Niqn bi-l-d f l-Amrik al-anbya (Beirut: Dr al-Rayn, 1956), 2:585.
7Clark S. Knowlton, The Social and Spatial Mobility of the Syrian and Lebanese Com-
munity in Sao Paulo, Brazil, The Lebanese in the World: A Century of Emigration, ed. Albert
Hourani and Nadim Shehadi (London: Centre for Lebanese Studies, 1992), 291ff.
8Safa, Lmigration libanaise, 16. Nowadays parts of the community are (unconvinc-
ingly) claiming that there are 6 to 10 million Syro-Lebanese descendants residing in Brazil.
John Tofik Karam, Another Arabesque: Syrian-Lebanese Ethnicity in Neoliberal Brazil (Phila-
delphia: Temple University Press, 2007), 10ff.
9The name is the epithet of the cities of Damascus and Tripoli (Lebanon). Paulo
Gabriel Hilu da Rocha Pinto, rabes no Rio de Janeiro (Rio de Janeiro: Editora Cidade Viva,
2010), 77.
10Safa, Lmigration libanaise, 65.
11 arrz, Tr, 4:450 (and n. 1).
arabic newspapers and magazines in latin america 249
switch to the local Syrian Printing Press.12 Later that year the first Arabic
newspaper of Rio de Janeiro (capital of Brazil until 1960) emerged from
the joint activities of Asad lid and Nam Labak,13 hailing respectively
from Baabd and Baabdt in Mount Lebanon;14 they began publishing
the liberally-inclined al-Raqb (The Observer).15 As is shown below,
Labak likewise played an important role in the nascent sphere of Ara-
bic publishing in So Paulo. With regard to Rio de Janeiro, al-Raqb was
soon followed by al-awb (Reason, est. 1900) of ay abb al-r and
Ml Murd, a publicist working first in Brazil and then in Argentina,
and ukr iris Anns al-Adl (Justice) in 1901.16 The last two were
significant publications whose longevity stands out among the generally
short-lived majority of diasporic Arabic newspapers. In fact, the former
was continuously published until 1920, whereas al-Adl even remained in
circulation until 1940.17
Prior to 1950 Rio de Janeiro witnessed the emergence of at least 42 Ara-
bic newspapers and 5 magazines.18 Because of its dynamism Rio de Janeiro
was also the first city in the Americas to host an umbrella association of
Arab publicists and journalists, namely the Lebanese Press Association
(Associao da Imprensa Libanesa).19 Most of its newspapers and maga-
zines were founded as a result of individual initiatives. Among the respec-
tive publicists we even find figures displaying truly international activities;
the Beirut-born Munr al-Labbd is a good example. After establishing
Rios al-ima (The Capital) newspaper in 1919, he went on to launch
three other newspapers in Baghdad, Beirut, and Rome between 1924 and
Fig. 2.Page from al-liya newspaper (Sao Paulo, est. 1922) citation: Philip Hitti
Papers, IHRC894, Box 33, Immigration History Research Center, University of
Minnesota
252 philipp bruckmayr
29The label Kiyanist is commonly applied to those politically identifying with the sta-
tus quo and the idea of an entity (kiyn) of Greater Lebanon under the French Mandate,
irrespective of religious group identity. Raghid el-Solh, Lebanon and Arabism: National
Identity and State Formation (Oxford: Centre for Lebanese Studies, 2004), 6.
30He served as speaker of the Executive Committee from 19201922 and as a repre-
sentative of Mount Lebanons Maronites in the first Representative Council of 1922. Solh,
Lebanon and Arabism, 31; Kais M. Firro, Inventing Lebanon: Nationalism and the State under
the French Mandate (London: I.B. Tauris, 2003), 224n38.
31arrz, Tr, 4:442448, 470472. Six of these, however, had started publication
only in 19271929.
32The aforementioned al-Ama is to be found in both the newspaper as well as the
magazine section. Yet, the two different launching dates given seem to suggest a relaunch
in another format, which would thus justify the double counting. Six of the newspapers
and sixteen of the magazines were founded after 1929 (19321955). Al-Awdt, al-Niqn,
2:569571, 580ff.
33Safa, Lmigration libanaise, 65.
34Al-Awdt, al-Niqn, 2:586ff.
35For example, the sn brothers of the al-Fay publishing house (here the name
was most obviously chosen due to their birthplace Tripoli), which was founded in 1922,
arabic newspapers and magazines in latin america 253
In this context the afad press (est. 1947) and its founder aml afad
should be mentioned. The latter penned numerous books in both Arabic
and Portuguese, including Portuguese-language works on the Arab pres-
ence, literature, and publishing in Brazil,36 many of which were published
in his own Editora Comercial Safady.37 The importance of Arab publishing
in the city can also be highlighted by comparing its output with that of
other local immigrant communities. At a certain point in the early years of
Getlio Vargass post-revolutionary Estado Novo (New State, 19301945),
four out of eleven local newspapers not written in Portuguese were Arab.38
Among the longest running were undoubtedly Prof. Sad Ab amras
al-Afkr (Thoughts, est. 1903) and Ab l-Hawl (The Sphinx, est. 1905),
another endeavour of the local (Maronite) pioneer ukr al-r.39 Indeed,
Ab l-Hawl and Fat Lubnn (Youth of Lebanon, est. 1914), another long-
running newspaper founded by the industrious (Orthodox) Rad Aya,40
were reportedly the Latin American Arabic newspapers with the highest
circulation.41
Despite the brevity of its existence, mention must also be made of all
Sadas al-arda (The Newspaper), founded in 1920. An eminent pub-
licist, all had already set up al-Maalla (The Magazine, est. 1915) with
its cultural and political focus in Buenos Aires. This publication is credited
with having been the first to call for independence from the Ottoman
Empire and a free Greater Syria, a tendency which was early on shared by
were likewise involved with the magazine Musmart al-Muhir (Nightly Migrant Con-
versations, est. 1922), as well as with the newspaper al-Ittid (Unity, est. 1935).
36Al-Awdt, al-Niqn, 1:367ff.
37See, for example, Jamil Safady, Panorama da imigrao rabe (So Paulo: Editora
Comercial Safady, [1960]) and his Antologia rabe do Brasil (So Paulo: Editora Comercial
Safady, [1960]).
38Jeff H. Lesser, From Pedlars to Proprietors: Lebanese, Syrian and Jewish Immigrants
in Brazil, in The Lebanese in the World: A Century of Emigration, ed. Albert Hourani and
Nadim Shehadi (London: Centre for Lebanese Studies, 1992), 406.
39arrz, Tr, 4:442.
40Ayah had founded al-Abr al-Itimya wa-l-Adabya (Social and Literary News)
in Rio de Janeiro and the literary magazine al-Riwyt al-Arya (Modern Stories) in
So Paulo the year before. After the ban on non-Portuguese publications (see below) was
lifted, he returned to the scene in 1946 with his new newspaper Brzl-Lubnn. Al-Awdt,
al-Niqn, 2:567, 570ff., 580. It should be noted that, before his relocation to the New
World, Aya had already served as newspaper editor in both Egypt and Lebanon. More-
over, he was himself a prolific author. Ibid., 1:343347.
41 Christoph Schumann, Nationalism, Diaspora and Civilisational Mission: The Case
of Syrian Nationalism in Latin America between World War I and World War II, Nations
and Nationalism 10 (2004), 601.
254 philipp bruckmayr
50Ostle, Literature, 223; al-Awdt, al-Niqn, 2:569. On this personality and his
writings see ayda, Adabun, 221ff. In 1906 he had moved al-Rumz to Buenos Aires.
Al-Awdt, al-Niqn, 2:582.
51 arrz, Tr, 4:442; al-Awdt, al-Niqn, 2:569.
52Al-Awdt, al-Niqn, 2:571.
53arrz, Tr, 4:446; al-Awdt, al-Niqn, 2:571.
54EI, s.v. izb, 3:521.
55For an intra-community perspective on early Syro-Lebanese settlement in the
interior of Brazil see Tanus Jorge Bastani, A emigrao libanesa para o Brasil, Album
da Colnia Srio-Libanesa no Brasil, ed. Salomo Jorge (So Paulo: Sociedade Impressora
Brasileira, [1944]), 121131.
56Al-Awdt, al-Niqn, 2:572ff., 581.
57Born in Yabrd in Syria (not far from the border with Lebanon) into a Syriac Chris-
tian family, he worked initially at Ab l-Hawl before embarking on his own initiative.
arrz, Tr, 4:447n1.
58Safa, Lmigration libanaise, 66. Safa has Brasil-Portugal which is presumably a mis-
take, as that title would have been rather anomalous, and it evidently resumed publication
in Arabic again in 1946 as Brzl-Lubnn. Al-Awdt, al-Niqn, 2:571. One of al-arqs well
known contributors was the Lebanese-born author and educator Tawfq Qurbn. ayda,
Adabun, 283. On his life and works see also al-Awdt, al-Niqn, 1:358361.
256 philipp bruckmayr
newspapers and magazines went into operation until the early 1950s (eight
in So Paulo and the remainder in Rio de Janeiro),59 clearly testifying to
the decreased activity in the field. Naturally, the gradual loss of the Arabic
language by subsequent generations began to be felt in Brazil as elsewhere
in the Americas, thus reducing the demand for local Arabic media.
Argentina
of this period were destined to be among the most successful and long-
lasting. Thus, the second and third new foundations of the century, Wad
amns64 al-Salm (Peace, est. 1902) and Ml Samrs al-Zamn
(Time, est. 1905),65 were both still in circulation in the 1950s.66 Al-Salm
furthermore had its own printing press67 and was the first in the country
to be printed with modern Arabic typography. It was also, apart from New
Yorks al-Hud, the first mahar newspaper to celebrate the 50th anniver-
sary of its existence.68
Less successful was al-liya (The Colony, est. 1910), whose founder
can nevertheless be seen as representative of the truly international
character of the Arabic diasporic press, owing to his personal record of
newspaper production in Paris (Brs, est. 1908), Buenos Aires, and then
So Paulo (al-Brzl, est. 1915).69 But in general longevity seems to have
been easier to achieve in Argentina than in neighbouring Brazil, as can
be inferred from the fact that in the 1950s there were still 17 active Arabic
press outlets in the country, 14 of which (12 in Buenos Aires, the remainder
in Tucumn) had been founded before 1940.70 It has even been claimed
that Argentina saw, until the late 1950s, the coming and going of approxi-
mately 150 Arabic newspapers and magazines,71 thereby reaching more
or less the same number as in the Brazilian case. This claim cannot be
substantiated with reference to al-Awdts seemingly quite comprehen-
sive survey a few years earlier. He lists 83 titles (to which at least two
have to be added),72 mostly based in Buenos Aires, but also including
17 from Tucumn, 5 from Crdoba, 3 from Santiago de Estero and one
from Mendoza.73 In these cities the beginnings of a local Arab press were
marked by the establishment of al-Sriy l-Fat (Young Syria, est. 1914),
al-akm (The Wise Man, est. 1908), al-Falaq (Daybreak, est. after
1929),74 and al-Yaqa (The Awakening, est. 1928), respectively.
As in Brazil, a particular mixture of individual journalistic effort, politi-
cal interest groups, religious and/or nationality-based community build-
ing endeavours, as well as the activities of literary clubs accounted for the
diversity and the flourishing of a lively Argentine Arabic language press. In
the literary sphere the local counterpart to the Andalusian League, albeit
established much later, was al-Rbia al-Adabya (The Literary League,
est. 1949).75 Many of its founding members had by that time been highly
active in the fields of journalism and newspaper publishing for years.
Thus, r Assf was editor-in-chief of al-Salm and awd Ndir of the
eminent bilingual al-arda al-Srya al-Lubnnya / Diario Siriolibans
(The Syro-Lebanese Daily, est. 1929), whereas a few others were owners/
founders of newspapers or magazines such as Ysuf al-rm (al-Mawhib
[The Gifts], est. 1945), Ilys Qunul (al-Manhil [The Springs], est. 1937),
Abd al-Laf al-ain (al-lam al-Arab [The Arab World], est. 1934),
and r awy (Yaqat al-Arab / Accin rabe, est. 1919 and al-Il /
La Renovacin, est. 1929).76 The latter had, earlier, founded Sriy l-adda
(The New Syria) newspaper in Boston77 and was then, as prospective
honorary consul in Beirut, the first Syro-Lebanese recruited into Argen-
tinas foreign service.78
In the political sphere the field was diversified from the outset and
became increasingly so. Al-idq (see n. 70), with the crescent in its logo,79
and al-lam al-Uthmn (The Ottoman World, est. 1917) represented the
Ottoman-loyalist trend. Sayf al-Dn al-Ral, the founder of the latter as
well as of al-arq (The East, est. 1921), ran his own printing press, which
also later put out the first partial Spanish translation of the Qurn to be
published in Argentina (in 1945).80 In contrast, r awys newspapers
clearly reflected his convictions as founder of al-izb al-Waan al-Arab /
Partido Patritico rabe (Arab Patriotic Party) and later on of izb
al-Istiqll al-Aqr al-Arabya (Party for the Independence of the Arab
Regions), which was also the reason his planned posting to Beirut never
materialized in the face of French opposition.81 Of particular interest
is, of course, the newspaper founded by the Druze Emir Amn Arsln
(d. 1943), Consul General of the Ottoman Empire in Argentina from 1910
and a well-established publicist.82 Although initially he was firmly behind
the Young Turk Committee for Union and Progress and then during the
war a supporter of the French, his al-Istiqll (Independence, 19261929)
was one of the main Arabic anti-French organs from Argentina/Brazil.83
Moreover, it represented a particular strand within local pan-Arab/nation-
alist anti-colonial thought and activism. Arslns major political rival at
the other end of the spectrum at that time was clearly the aforementioned
all Sada.84 Subsequently it was the latters son who soughtwith lim-
ited successto make an equally important contribution to Arab politi-
cal publishing in Argentina after the establishment of his Syrian Social
Nationalist Party. As a result of involuntary exile in Latin America from
1939 to 1947, much of which was spent in Tucumn,85 Ann Sada,
who had earlier replicated his fathers al-Maalla in Lebanon from 1933
onwards,86 was forced to become a mahar writer and publisher again.87
Although shortly before his exile he also contributed to Brazils al-arq,88
the prime vehicles for the transmission of the party line were first the
fortnightly al-Zawbaa (The Cyclone, 19391947) in Buenos Aires and
then So Paulos al-Sriy l-adda (The New Syria, est. by the party
in 1950).89 Despite the limited local appeal of the party, it allegedly still
owned the foremost Arabic printing press in Latin America in the early
1990s. Financed through private donations from sympathisers, this is clear
testimony to its prolonged efforts to promote the Arabic language in the
diaspora as one way to lobby for its political goals,90 and this certainly
also contributed to the revival of the party in Lebanon and Syria (where
it was legalised to contest elections in 2003) since the 1990s.91
The true epitome of the Arab press in Argentina, however, and the only
one really to have an appeal to the mainstream was the bilingual daily
al-arda al-Srya al-Lubnnya / Diario Siriolibans.92 Acting as the self-
appointed official organ of the local Arab community, it claimedby way
of gross exaggerationto have a daily circulation of up to 38,000 copies.93
Although the actual numbers allegedly did not exceed 5,0008,000 cop-
ies, it clearly had a far greater readership than its main contenders, which
are estimated to have had a circulation of 1,0001,200 each.94 Among the
latter, the more competitive organs, both economically and in the contest
for readers and subscribers, were al-Awl (The Issues, est. 1935) as well
Mexico
95Akmir, Inmigracin rabe, 101. Whereas Akmir has 1931 as founding date of
al-Awl, al-Awdt (al-Niqn, 2:582) has 1935.
96It eventually ceased publication in 1936. Logroo Narbona, La actividad poltica,
224ff.
97arrz, Tr, 4:420n1.
98According to Safa (Lmigration libanaise, 81) this was a joint enterprise with Sad
Fil Aql (see below).
99arrz, 4:420f. and n. 2. Safa (Lmigration libanaise, 82) lists a different founder/
proprietor for this paper instead.
100Kevin Smullin Brown, The Lebanese of Mexico: Identifications in Aspects of Litera-
ture and Literary Culture (PhD thesis, University of London, 2010), 263.
262 philipp bruckmayr
Chile
In Chile an Arab press emerged almost a decade later than in the Mexi-
can case. As in Argentina, the first Arabic newspaper appeared on the
initiative of a cleric. It was Father Blus al-r who established al-Murid
(The Guide) in Santiago de Chile in 1912. It was soon followed by al-
Minbar (The Pulpit, 19151917) of Ysuf Masad.109 Although all subse-
quent Arabic publications of Chile were (like the two foregoing) based in
the capital, the third of its kind, al-Munr (The Enlightening, est. 1916)
was founded in the city of Concepcin, also by Masad. Later that year the
magazine al-Awif (Feelings) appeared. All in all at least eighteen Arabic
110Al-Awdt (al-Niqn, 2:577, 585) lists fourteen newspapers and two magazines.
Safa (Lmigration libanaise, 101), however, catalogues two additional ones: al-Minbar and
al-Waan al-Awwal (The Original Homeland, est. 19191921).
111 Mari Isabel Lzaro Durn, La prensa del Mahar en Chile: la revista Laiazul (1945),
Miscelnea de estudios rabes y hebraicos 47 (1998), 189. At an unknown date, either before
her return to Cairo or before her arrival in Chile, she was also co-founder of a newspaper
likewise called al-arq wa-l-arb in Santiago del Estero (Argentina). Al-Awdt, al-Niqn,
2:576. As arrz does not include it in his list, it is more likely that it represented a con-
tinuation of the Chilean publication.
112Al-Awdt, al-Niqn, 2:577; arrz, Tr, 4:464.
113Al-Awdt, al-Niqn, 2:577.
114Safa, Lmigration libanaise, 101.
115Lzaro Durn, La prensa, 196.
116Al-Awdt, al-Niqn, 2:587.
264 philipp bruckmayr
Concluding Remarks
Evidently, the field of Arabic and bilingual newspaper and journal pub-
lishing in Latin America and the Caribbean from the latter part of the
nineteenth to the middle of the twentieth century was a lively and diverse
one. Its participants were, to a large degree, first-generation Syro-Lebanese
migrants, many of whom had already been active in the field either in
the Middle East (particularly in Lebanon and Egypt) or at way stations of
their earlier migratory experience in Europe or the United States. Owing
to the often short-lived character of their publications, many publicists
had more than one newspaper or magazine in their eventual or temporary
Latin American or Caribbean home. Especially between Brazil and Argen-
tina (and to a lesser degree between those and Chile) there was a signifi-
cant degree of cross-border activity in the field, with not only publicists
and journalists (such as ukr al-r or the Sadas), but also newspapers
and magazines (such al-awb moving from Brazil to Argentina or al-arq
wa-l-arb from Chile to Argentina) travelling to establish themselves at
different locations. Of course, such exchanges and cross-fertilisation were
even stronger in the sphere of ideas, particularly with regard to political
thought along nationalist, pan-Arab or loyalist (both Ottoman and French)
lines. Similarly, some of the newspapers and magazines themselves were
not only distributed locally but throughout the region and to the home-
lands. In fact, the most complete collection of Arabic press items from
the region is held by the al-Asad National Library in Damascus.122 In this
respect, the transplantation of Arabic newspapers and journals from Latin
America to the Middle East (as was the case with Nam Labaks for-
merly Brazilian al-Munir) or the establishment of Middle Eastern jour-
nals after a mahar model (such as Ann Sadas Lebanese replication of
his fathers Argentine al-Maalla) is certainly noteworthy. Generally, the
emergence of many of the publications presented and discussed above
was driven by the political struggle, not so much in but for the homeland.
The number of newspapers and magazines associated with political par-
ties, interest groups, and thinker-activists is surely impressive. It is never-
theless only comparatively recently that scholarship has started to take
note of the highly important impetuses which the liberation struggles of
Greater Syria, the Arab Nation, Syria, Lebanon, Palestinewhatever the
projected goals and territories werereceived from such Latin America-
based thinker-activist publishers and their efforts.
The main figures among the latter were undoubtedly the Sadas
(Argentina/Brazil) and Labaks (Brazil), Amn Arsln, r awy (both
Argentina) and Ysuf li al-il (Mexico). Yet it was not only Middle
Eastern politics that profited greatly from the Latin American Arab press.
One of its beneficiaries was certainly Arabic literature in general. As we
have seen, the other main actors behind the Arab press in Latin America,
besides the political thinkers, were the mahar literati and their circles
and salons in Buenos Aires, So Paulo, and Mexico City.123 Many of them
wereas indicated abovequite strongly involved, before as well as after
the establishment of their literary leagues, in newspaper and magazine
publishing. The role of Latin American mahar literati was long taken to
be insubstantial compared with that of their US-based counterparts. It
has been noted, however, that, although Arabic literary activity started in
both regions very much at the same time, the South American tradition
in some respects seems to have been longer lasting.124 Moreover, at a
safe (geographical as well as mental) distance from traditionalist attitudes
toward the Arabic language and literature prevailing in the Middle East,
Arabic poetry underwent specific developments in the mahar, making it
difficult to overestimate its contribution to modern Arabic poetry.125 This
said, the influence of Latin American mahar poetry and prose distrib-
uted not only via books, collections, and anthologies, but more particu-
larly through magazines such al-Uba and the many other publications,
either run by mahar literati or according space to their works, was admit-
tedly significant.
One major shared goal was of course the preservation of the Arabic
language in the mahar, despite the existence of bilingual formats right
from the outset and the fact that many of the writers and journalists con-
cerned likewise wrote and published in Spanish or Portuguese. Accord-
ingly, a number of them were also involved in Arabic language instruction
and the establishment of Arabic schools. Nam Labak, who founded the
Madrasat al-Fal in Rio de Janeiro in 1900, similarly established, in the
same year, the Riwq Ab l-Al (Ab l-Als Quarter), another institution
for language learning in So Paulo.126 Nevertheless, gradual language loss
proved to be a largely inevitable diaspora reality. A common tendency
toward a reduction of Arabic content in bilingual publications, as well
as toward the publication of Spanish or Portuguese-language publications
designed to fulfil the demands of the community was, from the late 1930s
123Needless to say, the attributes of political activist or writer and poet/author often
converged in the same person.
124Paul Starkey, Modern Arabic Literature (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press,
2006), 61.
125Ibid., 62.
126Al-Awdt, al-Niqn, 1:241f.
arabic newspapers and magazines in latin america 267
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A Short History of Kurdish Publishing and Prospects
for its Future
Blair Kuntz
The people who call themselves Kurds inhabit an area of Asia known
as Kurdistan, a region that today is divided between Turkey (northern
Kurdistan), Iran (eastern Kurdistan), Iraq (southern Kurdistan), and Syria
(western Kurdistan), with smaller populations in Azerbaijan and Arme-
nia. Over time, Kurds have contributed to the cultures of many civilisa-
tions and empires, but they have also had their own distinct culture and
history which can be attested by the number of Kurdish principalities that
emerged after the first millennium CE.
In the twentieth century, however, history has not been kind to the
Kurds. Although after World War I, the Treaty of Svres promised local
autonomy for the land where the Kurd element predominates,1 the prom-
ise of a Kurdish nation was never formalised and the Kurdish population
was divided between five states. When the 1925 Sheikh Said rebellion
against the new Turkish republic was defeated, the Kurdish people saw
their national aspirations crushed. In subsequent years, the only signifi-
cant manifestation of national self-determination occurred in 1946 with
the creation of the short-lived Republic of Mahabad in Iran, which lasted
less than a year.
In the search for self-determination, what has united the Kurds has
been their language (although, as we shall see, for centuries Kurds have
not been able to communicate using one common language). While a
majority of Kurds have also been united in their embrace of Islam, Kurds
pre-date Islam; and also, since the arrival of Islam, there have always been
minorities of Alevi Muslim, Christian, Jewish, Yezidi, and, in the twentieth
century, secular Kurds. Today, the number of Kurds is estimated at twenty
to twenty-five million, making them the largest ethnic group in the world
not occupying its own nation state. In the twentieth century, the Kurd-
ish language in every country in which the Kurds live has been subject
1M. Hakan Yavuz, Five Stages of the Construction of Kurdish Nationalism in Tur-
key, in Kurdish Identity: Human Rights and Political Status, ed. Charles G. Macdonald and
Carole A. OLeary (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2007), 15.
272 blair kuntz
3David McDowall, A Modern History of the Kurds (3rd ed. London: I.B. Tauris, 2004), 9.
4Hassanpour, Nationalism, 460.
274 blair kuntz
The Kurds who inhabit the area of northern Kurdistan comprise the larg-
est population of Kurds in any of the four major divisions (estimates range
from 10.6 to as high as 15 million) and in total they represent more than
half of the entire Kurdish population in the world. According to one Kurd-
ish researcher, in 1997 the Kurds accounted for 30 per cent of Turkeys
population,5 although other researchers estimate them as 19 per cent.6
Despite their large numbers in Turkey, Kurds in this region have per-
haps suffered more than in any other place. The treaty of Lausanne (1924)
granted ethnic and linguistic rights only to non-Muslim minorities such
as Greeks, Jews, and Armenians. Even before the signing of the treaty, in
March 1924, publications in Kurdish were banned, and in 1925 the law
was expanded to outlaw speaking Kurdish at all. Kurdish names of towns
and cities were changed to Turkish ones, Kurds became Mountain Turks
whose language was supposedly a Turkish dialect, the words Kurd and
Kurdish were erased from maps and books, and Kurdish children who
spoke Kurdish in schools were beaten. As late as 1964 boarding schools
for Kurdish students were established in the hope that studying in a
totally Turkish environment would encourage them to forget their mother
tongue.7
The policy was a marked change from that of the Ottoman Empire,
in which Kurdish newspapers, magazines, and books were allowed to
be published. Many were banned for political reasons, but the language
itself was not prohibited and was permitted as a language of instruction
in schools. In total, during the Ottoman era about thirty Kurdish books
written in different alphabets (including Armenian and, of course, modi-
fied Arabic) were published.8
After the establishment of the Turkish Republic, as already mentioned,
Kurdish was ruthlessly suppressed. A Kurdish national movement came
to the fore in the 1960s and 1970s, and attempts were made to publish
books and periodicals in Kurdish, but every attempt was dealt with
severely. During the entire period from 1923 to 1980 publishing in Kurdish
5M. Malmisanij, The Past and Present of Book Publishing in Kurdish Language in Turkey
and Syria (Istanbul: Vate Yayinevi, [2006?]), 12.
6McDowall, Modern History, 34.
7Hassanpour, Nationalism, 133.
8Malmisanij, Past and Present, 44.
a short history of kurdish publishing 275
was exceedingly difficult; in those years, not more than twenty titles were
published in Turkey.9
The 1982 constitution expressly forbade the spread of ideas via what
it termed banned languages. Publishing houses which printed and dis-
tributed such materials were closed and the publishers imprisoned. From
1980, when a military junta seized power, it was impossible to publish
books in Kurdish: laws were passed punishing people who did so. Even
possessing a Kurdish book was cause for punishment. Kurdish writers
were arrested and tortured, even killed.
The ban on the Kurdish language was officially revoked in 1991, while
Article 28, which forbade publication in prohibited languages, was
rescinded in October 2001. Kurdish was permitted to be taught privately
(an expensive proposition), but there was no provision for offering it in
public schools where it would be most effective. Moreover, the Kurdish
alphabet is still not recognised in Turkey, and use of the Kurdish letters X,
W, Q, which do not exist in the Turkish alphabet, has led to prosecution
and harassment.10 Since 2006, numerous human rights activists and politi-
cians from southeastern Turkey have been prosecuted, including Abdullah
Demirba, mayor of Sur, Diyarbakrs central district, who was dismissed
from his position and faced prosecution for providing Kurdish-language
services to his constituents. In February 2008, the mayor of Diyarbakr,
Osman Baydemir, was acquitted of charges of publishing invitation cards
in Kurdish, Zaza, English, and Armenian, in addition to Turkish;11 however
in March 2008, he went on trial for publishing a storybook in Turkish and
Kurdish. Prosecutors sought jail sentences for Baydemir and three other
defendants.
After 2002, under pressure from the European Union, broadcasting in
Kurdish was permitted, but with severe restrictions and censorship. Kurd-
ish-language materials in both public and academic libraries in Turkey
continue to be extremely rare and not much effort is devoted to collect-
ing them. In reality, it appears that the Turkish government wishes to
ease minority language requirements just enough to join the European
Union, but not enough for the minority languages to flourish (in other
words the Turkish government might be said to be legally illegalising the
9Ibid., 48.
10Publishing a Bilingual Book in Turkey Lands a Kurdish Mayor in Hot Water, online:
www.ekathimerini.com, 15 March 2008.
11 Turkey: Diyarbakr Mayor Acquitted of Publishing Invitation Cards in Kurdish,
online: www.semakurd.net, 9 February 2008.
276 blair kuntz
The Kurds who inhabit what is present-day Iraq are about five to six mil-
lion people, constituting about 17 per cent of the total Kurdish population.
Because the Iraqi constitution offered autonomy to its provinces, Kurdish
cultural rights have been more protected in Iraq than in other countries in
which they live. However, this does not mean that Kurds in Iraq have not
been subjected to attempts at forced Arabisation. Indeed, the history of
the Kurds in Iraq since World War I has been one of missed opportunity
and betrayal, leading to intermittent uprisings, repression, deportations,
and mass killings.
However, because of the generally more autonomous position of the
Kurdish minority vis--vis the Iraqi government, the history of Kurdish
naturally taken a leading place in the areas under Kurdish control. The
autonomous zone acts as a beacon for Kurds in other areas and the Kurds
in Iraqi Kurdistan have attempted to reach out to their Kurdish breth-
ren in the realm of Kurdish cultural affairs. For instance, although Iraqi
Kurdistan still adheres to the modified Arabic script of Sorani Kurdish,
the Kurdish Democratic Party has increasingly come to use Roman script
in an attempt to reach out to Turkish Kurds. Meanwhile, international
book fairs in cities such as Erbil highlight the offerings of Kurdish publish-
ers. The March 2007 Erbil International Book Fair, for example, presented
over 3,000 Kurdish books. Moreover, the Minister of Higher Education
and Scientific Research in Iraqs Kurdistan region announced that the
government had allocated a budget for buying books from the fair for the
regions universities.
The Iraqi autonomous zone has also seen the establishment of two
daily papers and a number of periodicals. For the most part, however,
readership remains low, and it is difficult to obtain funding or advertis-
ing revenues. It has also been hard to overcome the linguistic divisions
between Sorani and Kurmanji.
The situation of the Kurdish language in Iran, and of the Kurds themselves,
differs from that of other countries in several respects. Unlike Turkey,
Iraq, and Syria, for instance, where Kurds are by far the largest linguistic
minority, Iranian Kurds are only one of a number of linguistic minorities.
Indeed, according to the Unrepresented Nations and People Organiza-
tion (UNPO), an international organisation which represents indigenous
people, occupied nations, and occupied states, the number of people for
whom Persian is the mother tongue is not more than one-third.16 Other
sources, however, estimate the number at half.
The largest linguistic minority group in Iran is the Azeri Turkish popu-
lation, which constitutes 20 to 24 per cent of the total. The Kurdish popu-
lation of Iran is about five or six million, representing about seven per
cent of the population of Iran (approximately one-quarter of all Kurds in
the world), and is the third largest linguistic group in Iran after Persian
and Azeri speakers. There are a number of other linguistic minorities.
Irans cultural policy, which gives precedence to Persian, thus affects not
only Kurdish, but all minority languages. While these languages have not
been banned as they were in Turkey, they are prohibited in schools, and
according to the UNPO, no cultural institutions or activities are tolerated
among non-Persian nationalities. Persian history is taught as official Ira-
nian history, while the history of the other national groups is ignored,
even though they represent at least half of the population.
The second factor affecting the condition of Kurds in Iran relates to
the Kurdish language itself (most Kurds in Iran speak the Sorani dialect,
which is written in modified Arabic script like Persian): it is also an Indo-
European language like Persian. So even though Kurdish is not intelligible
to Persian speakers, some believe that the Kurds should be their allies
against alien Turks and Arabs.17 At the same time, however, while claim-
ing to have these historical and racial links with the Kurds, the Persian
establishment does not respect their linguistic rights.
The policy of Persian-language dominance can be traced back to the
first constitution of Iran, which was adopted in 1906. This constitution
made Persian the only official language of the country; however, it was
really only in 1925, with the establishment of the Pahlavi dynasty by Reza
Shah, that the policy of Persian dominance and assimilation of linguis-
tic minorities began in earnest. Only Persian could be taught in schools,
and government offices were instructed to use only Persian in all oral
and written governmental communication. Reza Shah, much like Kemal
Atatrk in Turkey, then attempted to ban Kurdish literature, music, and
dance. These policies continued under the regime of Muhammad Reza
Shah, although he sometimes relaxed the policy when his regime seemed
vulnerable,18 and there was some limited publishing in Kurdish.19
While the Kurds participated in the revolution which overthrew the
Shah in 1979, anticipating autonomy within a federally organised state in
which there would be Kurdish-language education and expanded rights
to publication and mass media, for the most part their hopes have not
been realised.
The Islamic regime has largely continued to pursue a centralised
nation-state which excludes the rights of ethnic minorities. Thus, educa-
tion and administration are still conducted exclusively in Persian and the
17Kaveh Bayat, Iran and the Kurdish Question, Middle East Report 247 (2008), 32.
18Ibid.
19Hassanpour, Nationalism, 130.
280 blair kuntz
20Ibid., 210.
21 Bayat, Iran, 35.
a short history of kurdish publishing 281
The Kurds of Syria are the smallest group of the four major countries
in which Kurds live, and estimates of their number today range from
900,000 to two million. Nevertheless it was in Syria (where for the most
part the Kurmanji dialect is spoken) that the romanised Kurdish alpha-
bet developed. Before this, Kurdish was written in the Arabic script. The
new alphabet was developed by Celadet Bedirxan, who with his brother
Kamiran left northern Kurdistan because of their opposition to the Turk-
ish government. The legacy of Bedirxans Roman alphabet remains prob-
lematic in Syria, because almost all Syrian schoolchildren learn Arabic in
school and are thus less likely to be familiar with the Roman alphabet.
Bedirxan wrote and published Kurdish books in Syria in the 1930s using
his alphabet, and it is still the primary one used in Turkey and Syria. Cela-
det Bedirxan published his books, those of his brother, and other works
(poems, alphabets, and religious books) in Damascus. In the 1940s, five
books were published in Kurdish, including the poems of the beloved poet
Cigerxwin. Under the French mandate which lasted until 1946, publishing
in Kurdish was not prohibited (although learning Kurdish in schools was),
and Kurdish publishers and publishing houses were permitted.
This situation changed with Syrian independence, when the predomi-
nance of Arabic as the majority language was asserted. At this point, many
Kurdish writers began publishing their works in Beirut, and if they were
published in Damascus, the imprint still read Beirut to avoid detection.
The 1950s did witness the publication of a Kurdish grammar book, and in
1957 the Kurdish Democratic Party (PDK), which was founded illegally,
secretly began to publish the newspaper Denge Kurd. From 1946 to 1962,
only fourteen Kurdish books were published in Syria.23
In subsequent years it was almost impossible to publish works in Kurd-
ish. In the 1960s and 1970s, for example, only two works in Kurdish were
published. From 1963, the ruling Baath Party aimed to deprive Kurds who
22NB: This was written before the Syrian uprising and civil war which started in 2011.
23Malmisanij, Past and Present, 109.
282 blair kuntz
did not speak Arabic of their civil rights. In many ways, Syria has empha-
sised its role as the centre of Arab nationalism; as such, Kurds are not
mentioned in the Syrian constitution, and their language, unlike in Iraq,
has never been given official recognition. However, the situation improved
with the government of fi al-Asad, under whom local Kurdish writers
began to be published, and their numbers grew.
Following the ascent to power of Bar al-Asad in 2000, however, pub-
lishing in Kurdish became very difficult, owing to a decree obliging pub-
lishers to complete official forms allowing them to publish and distribute
books. Kurdish books were not granted this privilege, and bookstores
which sold them were closed. Thus, the flowering of Kurdish publishing
of the previous decades was abruptly halted, especially after the violent
clashes of March 2004 between Kurds and Arabs in Qamil. Only four
Kurdish books were allowed to be published in the rest of that year, and
police harassed Kurdish authors. Now, although there is no official policy
to ban Kurdish books, in reality the Ministry of Information almost never
grants permission for them, forcing many to be published illegally.
The current situation for Kurdish publishing remains bleak. It is almost
impossible to find a Kurdish publication in a Syrian library, and the gov-
ernment monitors Internet websites dealing with Kurdish issues and
attempts to block them. However, Kurds in neighbouring countries can
send PDF files of Kurdish books published on Internet sites via e-mail, so
the blockage is not complete.
Given the situation in Kurdistan, where the Kurdish language itself has
often been restricted or limited, it is perhaps not surprising that much of
the impetus for the publication of Kurdish-language materials has come
from Kurds who have migrated, both voluntarily (mostly in search of
employment opportunities or to study) and involuntarily (as refugees) to
other countries. This is true particularly in Europe, where it is estimated
that at least 700,000, and perhaps more than a million Kurds live. Of
these, it is estimated that half live in Germany. In Europe (and to a lesser
extent in Canada, the United States, and Australia), Kurds have formed a
network of political, cultural, and social institutions.24 Compared with
24Bilgin Ayata, Mapping Euro-Kurdistan, Middle East Report 247 (2008), 18.
a short history of kurdish publishing 283
Turkey, for example, where Kurds could be arrested for forming similar
links, Kurds particularly in Europe have pursued with relish political, cul-
tural, and social activities. Moreover, many Kurds who have tasted free-
dom in the diaspora have returned to their respective birthplaces and
attempted to promote similar activities there.
Naturally, such freedoms have had important implications for the
current condition of Kurdish publishing; but in fact Kurdish publica-
tion in the diaspora has had a long tradition. The first Kurdish-language
newspaper, Kurdistan, began publication in the Arabic script in Cairo in
1897. In the modern era, European Kurds established Kurdish institutes
in France, Belgium, Sweden, and Germany, which began teaching and
developing the Kurdish language, publishing books in Kurdish and con-
ducting research into Kurdish syntax and grammar. The Institut Kurde
in Paris, for example, was founded with the specific aim of standardising
the Kurmanji dialect; it has a large library, certainly larger than any in
Turkey. Other Kurdish libraries can be found in Stockholm, Berlin, and
Basel. In Germany, the European Centre for Kurdish Studies also main-
tains a large library and publishes an academic journal. Furthermore, in
spite of the fact that the Kurdish population of the country is not as large
as that found in Germany or France, Swedenwhere immigrant groups
are subsidised to maintain their mother tongueshas emerged as a major
centre for Kurdish cultural activities, and publishes annually about 40 to
50 Kurdish-language books, as well as dozens of journals.25 Furthermore,
in Sweden Kurdish is taught in public schools in the Romanised Kurmanji
dialect.26
The impact of the Internet has also been significant, providing a space
for smaller groups as well as individuals to express themselves more
freely. Because of Europes higher standard of living, Internet access is
more accessible to Kurds living in Europe and elsewhere, so many of
the first websites were started by Kurds in the diaspora. However, with
improved access in Kurdistan itself, the number of websites has grown
astronomically. The Koord portal (www.koord.com), for example, in
May 2007 provided access to over 2,000 websites,27 though many of
these were published in European languages, particularly English, Ger-
man, and French. Still, the opportunity to publish and gain access to
25Ibid., 21.
26This initiative includes an important website: see www.dibistanakurdi.com.
27Jaffer Sheyholislami, Identity, Discourse, and the Media: The Case of the Kurds
(PhD thesis, Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada, 2008), 223.
284 blair kuntz
Conclusion
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Bayat, Kaveh. Iran and the Kurdish Question. Middle East Report 247 (2008): 2835.
Collins Dunn, Michael. The Arab World and the Kurds. In Kurdish Identity: Human Rights
and Political Status, edited by Charles G. Macdonald and Carole A. OLeary, 231236.
Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2007.
Duran, Ragip and Jake Hess. The Kurdish Question in Turkey: Past and Present. Online:
www.zmag.org/znet, 17 May 2007.
Editorial. Middle East Report 247 (2008): 1 and 4849.
Erlich, Rees and Amy Goodman. Report: U.S. Sponsoring Kurdish Guerilla Attacks inside
Iran. Online: www.democracynow.org, 27 March 2007.
Fernandes, Desmond. The Kurdish Genocide in Turkey, 19241998. Armenian Forum 1,
no. 4 (1998): 55107.
Hassanpour, Amir. Nationalism and Language in Kurdistan, 19181985. San Francisco:
Mellen Research University Press, 1992.
Jwaideh, Wadie. The Kurdish National Movement: Its Origins and Development. Syracuse,
NY: Syracuse University Press, 2006.
Malmisanij, M. The Past and Present of Book Publishing in Kurdish Language in Turkey and
Syria. Istanbul: Vate Yayinevi, [2006?].
McDowall, David. A Modern History of the Kurds. 3rd ed. London: I.B. Tauris, 2004.
Publishing a Bilingual Book in Turkey Lands a Kurdish Mayor in Hot Water. Online:
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Sheyholislami, Jaffer. Identity, Discourse, and the Media: The Case of the Kurds. PhD
thesis, Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada, 2008.
Turkey: Diyarbakr Mayor Acquitted of Publishing Invitation Cards in Kurdish. Online:
www.semakurd.net, 9 February 2008.
Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization. UNPO General Assembly Joint Mem-
ber Resolution. Online: www.unpo.org, 16 June 2003.
Yavuz, M. Hakan. Five Stages of the Construction of Kurdish Nationalism in Turkey. In
Kurdish Identity: Human Rights and Political Status, edited by Charles G. Macdonald and
Carole A. OLeary, 5676. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2007.
The Bulaq Press Museum at the Bibliotheca Alexandrina
Ahmed Mansour
Introduction
century, it became part of the international transit trade of Egypt and consequently one
of the major centres of economic activity in Cairo. Its involvement in trade associated it
more closely with the capital, allowing it the use of the patterns and institutions prevalent
in Cairo. In the fifteenth century, and particularly during the second half, which saw the
commercial rise of Bulaq, trade relations with several European nations were enhanced.
Since ships coming from the Mediterranean had to unload in Bulaq, it benefited directly.
The improvement of relations with European mercantile nations, notably Venice, Cata-
lonia, France, and Florence, was signalled by the exchange of embassies and envoys and
the signature of treaties with the Mamluk state. This new activity brought about profound
changes. In addition to the urban adjustment that had to be made to provide facilities for
trade and for a growing population, a structural adjustment was also necessary. As the
trade volume rose, customs systems and transport facilities had to be developed. Involve-
ment in trade was also accompanied by the development of artisan activity and industry.
Of the mosques of Boolack, the large one called Es-Sinaneeyeh, and that of Aboo-l-El,
are the most remarkable; the former, for its size; the latter, for the beauty its madneh.
The principal manufactories are those of cotton and linen cloths, and of striped silks of
the same kind as the Syrian and Indian...A printing-office has also been established at
Boolack, by the present viceroy [Muammad Al]. Many works on military and naval tac-
tics, and others on Arabic grammar, poetry, letter-writing, geometry, astronomy, surgery,
&c. have issued from this press. The printing office contains several lithographic presses,
which are used for printing proclamations, tables illustrative of military and naval tactics,
&c. Edward William Lane, Description of Egypt: Notes and Views in Egypt and Nubia, Made
during the Years 1825, 26, 27, and 28, ed. Jason Thompson (Cairo, 2000), 7273.
3Peter Colvin, Muhammad Ali Pasha, the Great Exhibition of 1851, and the School of
Oriental and African Studies Library, Libraries & Culture 33, no. 3 (1998): 250253.
4Al-Masbik was born at the beginning of the nineteenth century. His family moved
from Syria to Egypt, and settled in Rawa Island in Cairo. He was an intelligent and open-
minded young man, and in 1815 he was selected by Muammad Al for a state scholarship
to Milan to learn the principles of printing. Cf. all bt, Tr al-iba f l-arq al-Arab
(Cairo, 1966), 148150.
the bulaq press museum at the bibliotheca alexandrina 289
A great deal of attention was paid to the Bulaq Press by the Egyptian
government during Muammad Als reign. Updated models of printing
machines were periodically purchased, installed, and operated by efficient,
well-trained engineers and workers. Although the evolution of the Bulaq
Press was initially slow, its importance became evident in 1833, when a
number of social factors came together and led to its cultural apotheosis.
During the 1820s, a number of schools (military as well as civilian) were
founded, the largest of which was the medical school, set up in 1825 at
the suggestion of the French physician Auguste Barthlemy Clot, who had
arrived in Egypt the year before. Schools of veterinary studies, agriculture,
pharmaceutics, mineralogy, engineering and others were established and
required the services of the Bulaq Press. Muammad Al also reformed
the primary and secondary school systems. The production of the Press
became widely varied between textbooks and military education mate-
rial that included scientific, literary, and historical content. In addition,
Muammad Als great interest in imbuing Egypt with European culture
led to the stimulation of the translation movement at that time; this pro-
vided the press with a large amount of material that would later be pre-
sented to the public.
As part of Muammad Als grand plans for Egypt, a number of state-
funded scholarships were set up for the study of mechanical engineering,
fine arts, and printing. This encouraged a great number of students to
study and later join the staff of the Bulaq Press, forming an efficient and
capable workforce.
Abbs ilm I
Sad Pasha
In 1862, the Bulaq Press passed into private hands. Although Sad Pasha
was a promoter of knowledge and scholarship, he was not interested in
disseminating them among his common subjects, believing that an edu-
cated rabble would complicate his rule. In October 1862 (Rab al-n
1279), Sad made over the printing press to Abd al-Ramn Rud.
Khedive Isml
In February 1865, Khedive Isml bought the printing press back from
Abd al-Ramn Rud and affiliated it to the Saniya possessions (the Royal
Family property). The change of the name to the Saniya Press at Bulaq,
marked a new era for the press. In 1869, the presses were renovated and
new ones were acquired, especially for the printing of envelopes. During
Ismls reign, the Bulaq Press participated in two international printing
exhibitions: Paris in 1867 and Vienna in 1873.
Khedive Tawfq
Under Khedive Tawfq, on 20 June 1880, the printing press was re-appro-
priated by the state after eighteen years of private ownership. The occa-
sion was marked by the renovation of the Press building and a new plaque
(fig. 19).
The years between 1881 and 1896 witnessed a recession in the activities of
the Press. No additions or renovations were made to update the machin-
ery or the production process. The Press drastically deteriorated and was
even shut down during the Urb revolution and the onset of the British
occupation.
In 1956, the late President Gamal Abdel Nasser issued a presidential
decree creating the General Authority for Government Printing Affairs,
affiliated to the Ministry of Industry. The Bulaq Press was supplied with
the most advanced printing equipment and new departments were estab-
lished. It continues to provide high-quality printing services within Egypt
and throughout the Arab world (fig. 2).
the bulaq press museum at the bibliotheca alexandrina 291
The Calligraphy Centres plans for the Bulaq Press holdings are twofold:
first, to restore the damaged items and prepare them for exhibition, and
second, to prepare a catalogue documenting the history of the Bulaq Press,
and its evolution over the decades.
Deterioration and lack of spare parts have prevented the operation of
the Intertype, Linotype, and Stanhope machines. The catalogue includes
a detailed account of the mode demploi of the restoration process, which
followed three steps: cleaning the different pieces, replacing broken or
missing parts, and repainting the machines (figs. 313).
5lid Azab and Amad Manr, Mabaat Blq, irf wa-taqdm Isml Sir al-Dn
(Alexandria, 2005).
292 ahmed mansour
The Exhibition
The Bulaq Press museum exhibition is laid out in an open area accessible
to all library visitors (fig. 22). It contains seven machines, two memorial
plaques, the first issue of al-Waqi al-Mirya (fig. 17), the iron safe box of
Muammad Al (fig. 15), the company personnel log, and some publica-
tions. The museum is divided into three sections:
The first section contains original objects dating to the Presss inaugu-
ration in 1820: a large iron safe (fig. 15); wooden movable type characters;
the establishments foundation plaque (fig. 16); the first issue of al-Waqi
al-Mirya, published in 1828 (fig. 17); and a Golding Pearl manual press
(figs. 18a, 18b). The second section displays slug composing machines
(figs. 34); movable metal characters used in the press; and an iron chase,
containing the coat of arms of the United Arab Republic, representing an
the bulaq press museum at the bibliotheca alexandrina 293
eagle. The third section contains different machines used at the Bulaq
Press in various eras. These items include the plaque recording Khedive
Tawfqs restoration of the press in 1880 (fig. 19); a Stanhope machine
(fig. 5); a gilding press (figs. 67); a line machine (figs. 1213); and an enve-
lope printer (figs. 89).
The challenge to identify each machine, track its history, and its mode
demploi was helped by the opening of channels of collaboration with
printing history museums in France, Portugal, Germany, Great Britain,
and the United States. I should like to record my thanks to all those who
contributed information.
A complete narrative of the history of the Bulaq Press can be found on
our website at www.bibalex.org/bulaqpress.
Future Plans
The Calligraphy Centre considers the Bulaq Press Museum the nucleus
of a larger museum relating to the history of printing in modern Egypt.
Our future plans will focus on (1) enlarging the exhibited collection by
receiving more items from the different printing houses inside and out-
side Egypt; (2) undertaking mutual collaboration agreements with local
and international societies, aimed at augmenting the collection; (3) oper-
ating some machines to experiment with obsolete printing techniques;
294 ahmed mansour
and (4) organising workshops for children and adults on the history and
techniques of printing in Egypt and the world.
Collaboration
The Calligraphy Centre invites and welcomes all researchers and scholars
to participate in this project, which requires the collaboration and assis-
tance of institutions and research centres worldwide for it to be realised
on the scale which it merits.
Bibliography
Azab, lid and Amad Manr. Mabaat Blq, irf wa-taqdm Isml Sir al-Dn.
Alexandria, 2005.
Colvin, Peter. Muhammad Ali Pasha, the Great Exhibition of 1851, and the School of Ori-
ental and African Studies Library. Libraries & Culture 33, no. 3 (1998): 250253.
Lane, Edward William. Description of Egypt: Notes and Views in Egypt and Nubia, Made dur-
ing the Years 1825, 26, 27, and 28. Edited by Jason Thompson. Cairo, 2000.
bt, all. Tr al-iba f l-arq al-Arab. Cairo, 1966.
Stipcevic, Aleksandar. Tr al-kitb. Translated by Muhammad M. al-Arn. Kuwait,
1993.
the bulaq press museum at the bibliotheca alexandrina 295
Fig. 1.The old building of the Bulaq Press. The faades overlooking the Nile and
Bulaq district
296 ahmed mansour
Fig. 2.The new building of the Bulaq press established in 1958, on a 30,000 m2
piece of land at Embaba in Cairo
the bulaq press museum at the bibliotheca alexandrina 297
Fig. 8.Envelope printer (before renovation). Used to print all kinds of envelopes.
Made in England, 1902
304 ahmed mansour
Fig. 15.Iron safe. Dates back to Muammad Al Pasha; used to keep the royal
stamps of the Bulaq Press, as well as pens and later gadgets of the casting
machine
Fig. 16.The foundation text of the Bulaq Press in Turkish, 1235 AH (1820 CE)
the bulaq press museum at the bibliotheca alexandrina 309
310 ahmed mansour
Fig. 19.The plaque recording Khedive Tawfqs restoration of the press in 1880
Fig. 21.Srat al-Ftia printed with the Bulaq Press Qurn font
the bulaq press museum at the bibliotheca alexandrina 315
circulation/readership, 59, 68, 73, 82, 85, 95, dictionaries, 67, 6971, 104, 193, 288, 292
131, 139, 194, 233, 240, 245, 249, 25253, diwan, of Napoleon in Egypt, 123
257, 260, 262, 264, 278 Diyarbakr, 185, 188, 238, 275, 276
Clodius, Heinrich Jonathan, 48 Djerba, 140, 142, 148
Clodius, Johann Christian, 26, 27, 29, 31, 32, dOhsson, Mouradgea, 112
38, 4648 Dolabani, Hanna (Yuhanna), 189, 191
Clodius, Johann Christoph, 25, 46 Dominican Republic, 24748, 264
Clodius, Johannes, 26, 27, 46 Donado, Giovanni, 110
codicology, 8 dragomans, 6970
Cohen-olal, ayyim and Jacob, 13435, Drechsler, Wolfgang, 24, 38, 46
138 Drugulin, Druckerei, 37
coins, 3. See also numismatics. Dutch East Indies, 247
Colombia, 247
colophon, 154 Ebubekir Dimaki, 71, 93
colour printing, 207, 208, 209n51 Ebzziya Tevfik, 193229
comics, 234 education, 19, 68, 82, 109, 133, 138, 194, 195,
Committee of Union and Progress (ttihat 276, 277, 287
ve Terakki Cemiyeti), 196, 200, 232, 238, Kurdish, 277, 279
259 military, 289
Constantine (Algeria), 142, 147 Egypt, 4, 80, 124, 127, 153, 185, 245, 261, 263
contents, tables of, 209 block printing in, 14, 108, 287
Coptic Orthodox Church, 185 historiography of, 76, 80, 122
Costa, Israel, 148 modernisation of, 28789
court historians, 70, 7576, 79 occupation of, 12122, 12526
Crusius, Siegfried Lebrecht, 50 paper in, 4, 8, 14
Cuba, 247, 264 printing in, 29194
Cunbur, Mjgn, 201 Eichhorn, J.G., 36, 49
cursive (script/typeface), 113, 11617, 135 Eisenstein, Elizabeth, 1045
Cyrillic script, 113 England/Britain, 36, 182, 183, 187, 191, 200
engraving, of Arabic script, 18, 19, 29, 31, 36,
Dadichi, Karl (Carolus) Rali, 29 44, 45, 47
Damad brahim Paa, 67, 83, 85 Enlightenment(s)
Damascus, 265, 281 and geography, 7273
al-Damr, 152, 154, 156, 15859 Islamic, 56n11
Tehran edition of, 15354, 15759 and Mteferrika, 53, 70, 85, 87, 95
Daninos, Abraham, 131 in national/thematic contexts, 94
armon, Juda, 135, 138, 147 Ottoman, 53, 5960, 9495
Dathe, Johann August, 34 and religion, 5455, 5960, 9495
Dayr al-Zafarn (Deyruzafaran studies of/on, 5356, 59
Monastery), 18283, 186, 188, 191 thinkers/intellectuals, 60, 7173, 95
Deer, Wolfgang, 32, 47, 48 Enver Pasha, 117
Demeerseman, Andr, 7 Esad, Mevlana, 84
Demirba, Abdullah, 275 Ethiopic types/fonts, 19
detective stories, 194 European Centre for Kurdish Studies, 283
Deyruzafaran Monastery (Dayr Europe/European
al-Zafarn), 18283, 186, 188, 191 Arabic newspapers/magazines in, 247
dHerbelot, Barthlemy, 108 Arabic typography in, 42
diacritical points, 33, 143, 146n35, 148 and Egypt, 28889
dialects, 131, 14445, 147, 274 Enlightenment in, 54, 5760, 9495
Arabic, 130, 13839, 141, 143, 14849 Hebrew printing in, 12930
of Judaeo-Arabic, 133, 141, 147 influences of, 13637, 241
Kurdish, 272, 279, 281, 283 Kurds in, 28283
diaspora(s) military forces of, 88, 8990, 92
Arab, 24569 and Ottoman Empire, 5859, 68, 92, 107,
Kurdish, 272, 28283 111, 115
320 index
printing in, 82, 10610, 114, 209 Gener, Christian Friedrich, 31, 48
state organisations/laws in, 59, 79, Gibb, H.A.R., 57, 112
8688, 93 Gibbon, Edward, 71
ibrn all ibrn, 245
faith. See religion ihd, 73
Far, Eliezer, 148 Gleditsch, Johann Friedrich, 2224, 31, 32,
Fris al-idyq, 209 35, 39, 40, 46, 4850
Fatimid dynasty, 108 Gek, Fatma Mge, 102
Faure, Flix, 206 Golius, Jacobus, 42n52, 80
Febvre, Lucien, 209 Goodrich, Thomas, 74
Fres, Assis, 263 Gttingen, 33
ferman (imperial order/decree), 84, 103 grammar
fetva, 69, 103 classical Arabic, 141
Feyli, 273. See also Kurdish Kurdish, 281, 283
Fez (Morocco), 129, 131 Turkish, 69
Fickelscherr, Felix, 36, 49 Granada, 13
Finzi, Vittorio, 147 Greek(s)
Fleischer, Christoph, 22, 23, 37, 46 printing in, 43, 45, 113, 292
Fleischer, Heinrich Leberecht, 37 printing presses of, 67, 101, 1067, 202
France, 136, 206, 247 in Turkey/Ottoman Empire, 202, 274
in Algeria, 130 Grohmann, Adolf, 56, 8
Ottoman embassies to, 69, 1012, 114 Gross(e), Johannes, Erben von, 25, 31, 38,
Franco-Oriental Committee, 263 40, 41, 46, 47
Frankfurt a.M., 37, 46 Gueymard, Imprimerie, 133
Fraser, Charles, 79 Gnther, Christoph, 24, 26, 41, 46
French, 259 Gutenberg-Museum, Mainz, xi
among Jews of North Africa, 140
culture, 137 Habsburgs, 63, 76
invasion/occupation of Egypt, 121, 124, and Ottoman wars, 6466, 77, 83, 87
125, 127, 287, 292 Haik Aa, 200
language, 149, 195 ad, 156, 289
proclamations, 12425 a (pilgrimage) certificates, 9, 12, 14
revolution, 123, 130, 233 halakhic material, 13435, 137
types, 292 Ha-Levi, Isaac, 135
Froriep, Just Friedrich, 3335, 49 lid, Asad, 249
Halid, Halil, 200
al-abart, Abd al-Ramn, 12122, 127 Halle, 29, 32, 37, 41, 48
critique of proclamations, 123, 125 Hamburg, 37
abhat al-abba al-Arabya al-Muttaida Hammer-Purgstall, Joseph, 2, 3, 14
(United Front of the Arab Youth), 263 al-arr, 31, 32, 45, 289
afar Bey, Muammad, 293 Him, Labba, 263
Galland, Antoine, 108 al-ain, Abd al-Laf, 258
aml, Ann, 263 tami, Moammad, 280
aml al-Dn al-Afn, 264 Hawrami, 272. See also Kurdish
Garnett, Lucy, 112 Hebrew, 24, 25, 43, 139, 149
awhar, Muammad Ibrhm, 151 books/text, 13133, 134
al-awhar, Ab Nar Isml b. ammd, 69 characters/script, 32, 67, 113, 129, 133, 135,
Gay, Peter, 5354, 60, 94 140, 141
Gayer-Anderson Museum, Cairo, 10 printing presses, 130, 137, 140, 14142,
Gayat, 6, 13 144, 147
gazavatname (conquest account), 77 rabbinical/canonic literature, 130
geography types/fonts, 19, 21, 24, 13437
discipline of, 59, 68, 69, 70, 7173, 85, 104 Heidelberg, Universittbibliothek, 6, 7
brahim Mteferrika on, 7274, 82 Heluli, Archbishop Mor Ivennis Ilyas, 185
index 321
dHerbelot, Barthlemy, 108 Iran, 14, 80, 114, 154, 271, 272, 273, 277, 280
Hezarfen Hseyin Efendi, 91 Kurds/Kurdish publishing in, 278280,
al-ill, af al-Dn, 14 284
Hilscher, Christian Gottlob, 49 printing in, 151152, 291
al-il, Ysuf li, 261, 262, 265 Iraq, 14, 76, 8081
historiography, 54, 59, 70, 72, 75, 12127 Kurds/Kurdish publishing in, 271, 272,
Hitti, Philip K., 246, 251 273, 27678, 282, 284
izb al-Istiqll al-Aqr al-Arabya (Party shak, Mevlana, 84
for the Independence of the Arab Islam, 21, 63, 71, 74, 79, 102, 105, 109, 122
Regions), 259 and Napoleon, 123
al-izb al-Waan al-Arab/Partido and printing, 111, 114, 125, 287
Patritico rabe (Arab Patriotic Party), Shii, 152, 15859, 280
259 slm Aratrmalar Merkezi (SAM), 203
Hobbes, Thomas, 86 Islamic Charitable Society, 255
Holdermann, Jean-Baptiste, 69 Islamic Enlightenment(s), 56n11, 59, 95
Holt, Richard, 132 Isml, Khedive, 290
Honduras, 247 Israel, 137, 141, 280
Horvath, Joseph, 65 Istanbul, 67, 68, 71, 83, 110, 112, 115, 151, 195,
Hucho, Melchior, 24, 46 23233, 239, 247
Humbarac Ahmet Paa (Comte de printing houses in, 82, 125, 130, 182,
Bonneval), 84, 114 193229, 240, 276
al-r, Blus, 262 stepan Matbaas, 2002
al-r, Rad, 254 ttihat ve Terakki Cemiyeti (Committee of
al-r, ay abb, 249 Union and Progress), 196, 200, 232, 238,
al-r, ukr, 250, 253, 256, 265 259
Hurid Paa, Ahmed, 127
usayn, addm, 277 Jacob II, Patriarch, 182
al-vnsri, Moammad-Rez b. Jahn, Karl, 6, 15n41
Al-Akbar, 154 Janissaries, 88, 89
Janson, Anton, 1921, 23, 24, 27, 37, 38
Ibn al-Abbr, 108 Jena, 36, 37, 49
Ibn Arabh, 7980 Jerusalem, 134, 143, 182, 189, 191
Ibn aldn, 78, 79, 84, 86, 292 Jews/Jewish communities, 134, 149, 274
Ibn al-ab, 13 and Arabic language, 12950
Ibn al-Nadm, 12 in Arab lands, 12930, 141, 146
Ibn Sn, 108, 110, 292 literacy of, 133, 143
Ibn Zaydn, 32 in North Africa, 131, 13334, 13637,
identity cards, 198 13840, 142, 147, 148
al-Idrs, 1089 publishing in Ottoman Empire, 67, 101, 107
itihd, 125 Johann Georg II, Kurfrst, 21
hsan, Ahmed, 198, 200, 203, 208 Jones, William, 36, 39, 42n52, 49
hsanolu, Ekmeleddin, 111 journalism/ists
kdm Matbaas, 203 Arabic, 24569, 292
Ilnids, 23 Kurdish, 280
illumination, 152, 155, 207 Turkish, 195, 196, 231, 232, 234, 242
illustrations, 151160, 207, 208, 239, 240 journals. See periodicals
imla, 144 Judaeo-Arabic (JA), 12950
India, 182, 183, 185, 238 classical, 133, 143
Indonesia (Dutch East Indies), 247 colloquial, 13335, 142
Institut dEgypte (of Napoleon), 121, 125 genres of, 140
Institut Kurde (Paris), 283 orthography, 141, 142, 144
Institutum Judaicum (Halle), Druckerei, translations, 145
32, 48 Judaeo-Spanish (Ladino), 133, 135, 149
Internet, 272, 276, 282, 283, 284 Junius, Johann Friedrich, 50
322 index
Naima, Mustafa, 70, 7576, 7879, 82, 86, 91 in decline/decline paradigm, 5658, 87,
Napoleon, 121, 123, 287, 292 9091
al-Naqwa, Rabbi Abraham, 133, 135, 138, in eighteenth century, 56, 58, 95
143 in nineteenth century, 193229
al-Naqwa, Rabbi Jacob, 135, 138 in twentieth century, 208
nas script, 293 histories of, 75, 78
al-Nir, Abd al-Ramn (of Andalusia), introduction of printing in, 59, 1013
108 military reform, 89, 194
Nir al-Din Shh, 151 Second Constitutional era, 234, 24142
Nasser, Gamal Abdel, 290 Tulip Age, 101, 114
nationalism, 255, 265 Westernisation of, 101, 195
Arab, 250, 259, 263, 265, 282 Ottoman(s)
Armenian, 284 book design, 207, 209
Kurdish, 272, 274 census, 198
Lebanese, 250 copyists and calligraphers, 103, 107,
Syrian, 250 10910, 112, 116
Turkish, 231 decrees (fermans), 126
Nazmizade Murtaza, 79, 8081 Enlightenment, 53, 59, 60
Nedimi Bey, 238 first printing enterprise, 59, 1013
Negri, Salomon, 29 intellectual movements, 58, 207
Netherlands, 42 in Latin America, 248
newspapers, 139, 191, 193, 195, 205, 23133, loyalists, 258
236, 242, 247, 252, 258, 266, 272, 27477, military failure/organisation, 8788,
279, 28183, 292. See also magazines; 9091
periodicals parliament, 196, 200
Arabic, 24750, 253, 25557, 26165 print culture, 101120, 208, 209
Kurdish, 274, 278, 281, 283 reoccupation of Egypt, 122, 12526, 127
New World. See Americas Turkish script, 113
Niebuhr, Carsten, 112 yearbooks, 198
North Africa, 130, 136, 142, 145, 146 Ottoman Scientific Society (Cemiyet-i
Hebrew printing in, 130, 132, 13536, 141 lmiye-i Osmnye), 195
Jewish communities of, 136, 140, 142, 147 zege, Seyfettin, 202, 204, 205
North America, 247
novellae (commentary), 134 page-numbering, 209
numismatics, 29 Pahlavi dynasty, 27980
Nr al-Dn, Uthmn, 288 Pakalin, Mehmet Zeki, 64
Nuremberg, 26 Palache, Moshe and Israel, 144
Nuri, Celal, 116 palaeography, 8
Palestine, 129, 247, 265
dOhsson, Mouradgea, 112 Panoyotidis, Yuvanaki, 202
mer Efendi, 77 pan-Islamic unity, 73
Opitz, Heinrich, 24, 41, 46 paper, 14, 198, 241, 288
Oran (Wahrn), 130, 136, 142, 144, 148 coloured, 207
Orientalists, 1750, 147 currency, 6, 1314, 15n41
Orthodox Slavs, 107 -cutting machine, 188, 191
orthography, 1089, 113, 14344, 149, 273 history of, 4, 8
of classical Arabic, 22, 108, 141, 147 mills, 82, 102
of Hebrew names, 146 papyrology, 8
of Judaeo-Arabic, 14142, 14448 papyrus, 14
of Turkish, 117 parchment, 14
Osman Zeki Bey / Matbaa-i Osmniye, 200, Paris, xi, 17, 25, 26, 115, 132n8, 142n29, 182,
203, 205 248, 257, 259n82, 264, 283, 290
sterreichische Nationalbibliothek, 4 Partido Patritico rabe/al-izb al-Waan
Ottoman Empire, 189, 253, 274, 287 al-Arab (Arab Patriotic Party), 259
index 325