Thesaurus Arabico-Syro-Latinus
by ELIAS BAR SHINAYA OF NISIBIS, edited by OBICINI,Thomas
- Used
- good
- Condition
- Good
- Seller
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Norwich, Norfolk, United Kingdom
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About This Item
Octavo, contemporary vellum; pp. (6), 447, pp. (44), Syriac, Arabic and Latin text throughout, woodcut printers device to title, woodcuts to chapter endings, some paper browning throughout, a good copy.
FIRST EDITION of the Syriac-Arabic dictionary arranged according to subjects originally compiled in the 11th century by Elias bar Shinaya, Metropolitan of Nisibis, edited with a Latin translation by Obicini. It was published by Obicini's pupil Germanus de Silesia, author of an Arabic Grammar and an Italian-Arabic dictionary. It is dedicated by Achilles Venerius to Cardinal Barbarini. The Syriac types are the 20pt Maronite types and the Arabic of the text Granjon's arabe du kitãb al-Bustãn.
Thomas Obicini (1585-1632) from Novara, was abbot of the Franciscan convent at Aleppo. In 1621 he returned to Rome and became first lector of Arabic in the St Peter Convent. He was responsible for the supervision of the type designs of Oriental types at the Propaganda Press. The author warns the reader against irregularities in the text, owing to the difficulties in printing Arabic texts, and the new type. The Propaganda Press was founded in 1622 and in 1626 a true printing house was established together with a foundry named after the Congregatio. To its stock were added exotic types from the Stamperia Vaticana. The Press printed missals, grammars, dictionaries and Alphabeta.
Schnurrer, Bibliotheca Arabica, pp.38-39.See Graf IV 175. Brill, Philologia Orientalis, II, 223. British Library, Catalogue of Arabic Books, II,506, 448.
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Details
- Bookseller
- Hamish Riley-Smith Rare Books (GB)
- Bookseller's Inventory #
- biblio38
- Title
- Thesaurus Arabico-Syro-Latinus
- Author
- ELIAS BAR SHINAYA OF NISIBIS, edited by OBICINI,Thomas
- Book Condition
- Used - Good
- Quantity Available
- 1
- Publisher
- Congregationis de Propag.Fide
- Place of Publication
- Rome
- Date Published
- 1636
- Keywords
- Obicini
Terms of Sale
Hamish Riley-Smith Rare Books
About the Seller
Hamish Riley-Smith Rare Books
About Hamish Riley-Smith Rare Books
Rare book specialist Hamish Riley-Smith, who died on August 10, did not originally intend to become a dealer.
He went to Trinity College Dublin, where he read economics and met our mother Brigitta (Gita) von Wagner. He planned to work in the family brewing business, John Smith's, and spent seven years learning the craft at Whitbread's. But after all the family interest in John Smith's was sold in 1972, he looked for a new career.
In 1974 he started Hamish Riley-Smith Rare Books. He had no formal training in the book business, other than an acute awareness of business and a degree in economics. He started, in his own words, as a runner, taking one book to another dealer and making a small margin.
Hamish quickly realised this was not for him and started to focus on Arabic and economic books and the social sciences. Through knowledge and research he built up a strong and friendly working relationship with the Japanese, travelling to Japan often. He also traded in Arabia, the US and Europe.
Sacks of catalogues
We can remember how sacks of catalogues would leave the house and go off to museums and institutions across the world, and answers would come back via telex. This was a world before the internet, mobile phones and faxes and computers were only just coming in.
Among his proudest sales were the 14th century Qur'an manuscript of Mameluk Sultan Al Malik Al Nasir Muhammad (pictured here); The Papers of Sir Roy Harrod; The library of Sir John Hicks; The Betjeman Library; typescript/manuscript of Ludwig Wittgenstein's Tractus Logico Philosophicus; The Felibriges Library of Musée Theodore Aubanel, Avignon; as well as collections of Isaac Newton; John Locke; Thomas Hobbes; Shakespeare; William Petty; Robert Owen and Adam Smith.
He was resolute in his independence and had many friends and colleagues in the book business, but he never did a book fair ("I am not a book fairy") and refused to join any trade associations.
He will be remembered by the family as a loving husband, father and grandfather, and a great source of fun and interest; for Hamish, above all, family came first. His business will continue to be run by his wife Gita and two sons, Damian, director of Paragraph Publishing, and Crispian, director of Crispian Riley-Smith Fine Arts Ltd.
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