First edition of a series of portraits of all thirty-four Sultans that ruled the Ottoman Empire before the end of the 19th century. They are presented in chronological order from Osman I (r. ca. 1299-ca. 1324), the very first Sultan, to Abdul Hamid II (r. 1876-1909). Each portrait is surrounded by a beautiful geometric border, and accompanied by bibliographical information about the Sultan in Arabic/Ottoman Turkish(?) and French. The work is relatively scarce in libraries and on the market, and we have not found any other copies with the present binding.
Selim Faris al-Shidyaq (1826-1906) was the son of Ahmed Faris al-Shidyaq (ca. 1805-1887), who is considered one of the founders of Arabic literature. Due to increased relations with the West, the Ottoman Empire slowly started to westernise in the 19th century. Ahmed resisted this trend and continued to promote Arabic language and culture. In 1861, he founded the newspaper al-Jawa'ib (the news), which became the most popular Arabic publication in the Empire. It contained articles on politics, history, literature, linguistics, and religion, as well as domestic and foreign news. The newspaper was published by the al-Jawa'ib press, which was also founded by Ahmed. It published carefully edited classical Arabic literary works, which played a significant part in the Arab literary and national revival. Selim took over the ownership of the newspaper and the press in 1870, and continued in his father's footsteps. The present work was published by the al-Jawa'ib press and can therefore likely be seen as a part of the Arabic revival in the Ottoman Empire.
The boards are somewhat warped, with white fingerprint marks on the front and back. The versos of the portraits are somewhat browned and foxed, but the portraits themselves are in very good condition. WorldCat 1001523268, 1370651401, 504530315, 1419220008, 1408772901 (9 copies).