Early work of the famous French orientalist Silvestre de Sacy (1758-1838), printed in a collection of articles by members of the French Académie Royale des Inscriptions et Belles-lettres. In his article, read before an audience in 1785, Sacy describes the early history of the Arab people and the birth of Islam, based on ancient Arabic sources which are added to his text both in French translation and in the original Arabic. Also added are a genealogical table of the ancestors of the Prophet Muhammad and chronological tables of the kings of Yemen, the rulers of the Banu Khuza'ah over Mecca, the kings of al-Hirah and the kings of the Ghassanids.
The articles in this collection were printed by the Imprimerie Impériale, which owned one of the world's best collections of Arabic types, including several that Napoleon had confiscated from the Propaganda Fide in Rome. The printing process was overseen by Jean-Joseph Marcel (1776-1854), who in 1798 had overseen the printing of the first books ever printed in Egypt (Hebrew presses excepted).
Silvestre De Sacy was the first professor of Arabic at the École Spéciale des Langues Orientales Vivantes in Paris on its establishment in 1795. He produced an 1810 Arabic grammar that finally replaced Erpenius's as the scholarly standard and several carefully edited editions of Arabic and other oriental manuscripts from the collections of the Bibliothèque Royale/Impériale.
Binding somewhat worn at the hinges; a very good copy. Daunou, "Notice historique sur la vie et les ouvrages de M. le baron Silvestre de Sacy", in: Mémoires de l'Institut de France XII (1839), pp. 510-511; not in Lambrecht.