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Abstract
Johann Gottfried Wetzstein (1815–1905) brought together several collections of manuscripts while working as the Prussian consul in Damascus (1848–1862). Collecting manuscripts was just one of his numerous activities. Among the Arabic volumes that he gathered, and that are now in the Staatsbibliothek in Berlin, are many manuscripts containing popular stories. In the eighth volume of his catalogue of the Berlin collection (1896), Wilhelm Ahlwardt describes all the stories belonging to the Wetzstein and other collections. This is a rich source for Arabic popular storytelling, but it has been engaged with only infrequently during the long century after the publication of Ahlwardt’s fundamental work. The present essay explores some of Wetzstein’s manuscript storytelling texts and proposes ideas for a formal typology.
Abstract
Johann Gottfried Wetzstein (1815–1905) brought together several collections of manuscripts while working as the Prussian consul in Damascus (1848–1862). Collecting manuscripts was just one of his numerous activities. Among the Arabic volumes that he gathered, and that are now in the Staatsbibliothek in Berlin, are many manuscripts containing popular stories. In the eighth volume of his catalogue of the Berlin collection (1896), Wilhelm Ahlwardt describes all the stories belonging to the Wetzstein and other collections. This is a rich source for Arabic popular storytelling, but it has been engaged with only infrequently during the long century after the publication of Ahlwardt’s fundamental work. The present essay explores some of Wetzstein’s manuscript storytelling texts and proposes ideas for a formal typology.
Abstract
When Christiaan Snouck Hurgronje (1857–1936) was exiled from Mecca and Arabia in August 1885, he had not even begun to think about what he would do with the research materials that he had been collecting. Back at his home base in Leiden he decided to write the book that would bring him instant fame, Mekka. It appeared in two volumes between 1888 and 1889. Snouck Hurgronje’s abrupt departure from Western Arabia made it necessary for him to maintain lines of information on Mecca. When he was chased away by the Turkish authorities he had been on the point of acquiring copies of two major sources for a history of Mecca, the Manāʾiḥ al-Karam by al-Sinǧārī and the Ḫulāṣat al-Kalām by Aḥmad b. Zaynī Daḥlān. Following his involuntary departure he managed to acquire handwritten copies of these two key sources about the history of Mecca. Through a recently discovered letter from his friend and companion Raden Aboe Bakar Djajadiningrat, which was addressed to the Dutch vice-consul in Jeddah, P. N. van der Chijs, we now know more about scribal practices in Mecca in the latter half of the nineteenth century. Not only can these practices be gleaned from the letter, but the two manuscript copies of historical texts that Snouck Hurgronje ordered from Mecca have also been preserved. This gives us unique insights into the theory and practice of text copying in Mecca in 1885–1889. Through an analysis of the content of this letter, which is here edited, translated and commented upon, it is now possible to understand what exactly was meant with the term ‘Abū Šubbāk’.
An incomplete manuscript of Hātifī’s Haft Manẓar (‘The Seven Belvederes’) that is kept in the Linden-Museum in Stuttgart, Germany, shows remarkable features of human intervention. In fact, it has been the object of an invasive make-over. An attempt is made to describe what has been done to the manuscript and to explain why the manuscript was given such a treatment.
Abstract
The article describes the modest collection of Islamic manuscripts in Victoria, B.C. (Western Canada). One manuscript in particular, a remarkable late Ottoman illustrated prayer book, receives attention. The little amount of other Islamic manuscripts that somehow have found their way to Victoria’s University Library are described here for the first time.