You may have to Search all our reviewed books and magazines, click the sign up button below to create a free account.
An unprecedented synthesis and in-depth account of recent scholarship on Arabic typographic history and a concise guide on Arabic typography addressing all key areas.
Arabic is the third most widely used script in the world, and gave rise to one of the richest manuscript cultures of mankind. Its representation in type has engaged printers, engineers, businesses and designers since the 16th century, and today most digital devices render Arabic type. Yet the evolution of the printed form of Arabic, and its development from metal to pixels, has not been charted before. Arabic Type-Making in the Machine Age provides the first comprehensive account of this history using previously undocumented archival sources. In this richly illustrated volume, Titus Nemeth narrates the evolution of Arabic type under the influence of changing technologies from the perspective of a practitioner, combining historical research with applied design considerations.
"Provides a comprehensive overview of every aspect of designing with type"--
Despite the growing interest in the intellectual history of early modern Arabs and Ottomans, many key figures of the period remain unknown. In this unique biographical account, edited and published here for the first time, Muḥammad Kamāl al-Dīn al-Ghazzī (1760-1799), the chief Shafi‘i jurisconcult of Damascus, introduces us to one of the leading figures of early modernity, ‘Abd al-Ghanī al-Nābulusī (1641-1731). Being al-Nābulusī’s great grandson, al-Ghazzī had direct access to the family’s collective memory through his parents and grandparents, as well as to his great grandfather’s scattered memoirs. Written about fifty years after al-Nābulusī’s death, al-Ghazzī’s biography, al-Wird al-Unsī, remains the authoritative account of the great master’s distinguished career, covering many aspects of his life and work in breadth, depth, and sophistication unmatched by any of the competing biographies.
Verse and prose, from the 6th century CE (pre-Islamic) to the early 18th century CE.
This volume explores and calls into question certain commonly held assumptions about writing and technological advancement in the Islamic tradition. In particular, it challenges the idea that mechanical print naturally and inevitably displaces handwritten texts as well as the notion that the so-called transition from manuscript to print is unidirectional. Indeed, rather than distinct technologies that emerge in a progressive series (one naturally following the other), they frequently co-exist in complex and complementary relationships – relationships we are only now starting to recognize and explore. The book brings together essays by internationally recognized scholars from an array of di...
Uncovering the professional secrets of con artists and swindlers in the medieval Middle East The Book of Charlatans is a comprehensive guide to trickery and scams as practiced in the thirteenth century in the cities of the Middle East, especially in Syria and Egypt. The author, al-Jawbarī, was well versed in the practices he describes and may well have been a reformed charlatan himself. Divided into thirty chapters, his book reveals the secrets of everyone from “Those Who Claim to be Prophets” to “Those Who Claim to Have Leprosy” and “Those Who Dye Horses.” The material is informed in part by the author’s own experience with alchemy, astrology, and geomancy, and in part by his extensive research. The work is unique in its systematic, detailed, and inclusive approach to a subject that is by nature arcane and that has relevance not only for social history but also for the history of science. Covering everything from invisible writing to doctoring gemstones and quack medicine, The Book of Charlatans opens a fascinating window into a subculture of beggars’ guilds and professional con artists in the medieval Arab world. A bilingual Arabic-English edition.
One of the most unusual books in classical Arabic literature, The Epistle of Forgiveness is the lengthy reply by the prolific Syrian poet and prose writer Abu l-'Ala' al-Ma'arri (d. 449/1057), to a letter written by an obscure grammarian, Ibn al-Qarih. With biting irony, The Epistle of Forgiveness mocks Ibn al-Qarih's hypocrisy and sycophancy by imagining he has died and arrived with some difficulty in Heaven, where he meets famous poets and philologists from the past. He also glimpses Hell, and converses with the Devil and various heretics. Al-Ma'arri—a maverick, a vegan, and often branded a heretic himself—seems to mock popular ideas about the Hereafter. This book, the first of two vol...
"An anthology of Arabic hunting poetry from the pre-Islamic and early Islamic eras"--
Ahmad ibn Hanbal (d. 241 H/855 AD), renowned for his profound knowledge of hadith--the reports of the Prophet's sayings and deeds--is a major figure in the history of Islam. Ibn Hanbal was famous for living according to his own strict interpretation of the Prophetic model and for denying himself even the most basic comforts in a city then one of the wealthiest in the word, and despite belonging to a prominent family. His piety and austerity made him a folk hero, especially after his principled resistance to the attempts of two Abbasid caliphs to force him to accept rationalist doctrine. His subsequent imprisonment and flogging became one of the most dramatic episodes of medieval Islamic hist...