The True Description of Cairo: A Sixteenth-Century Venetian View, Volumes I, II, and III [COMPLETE 3-VOLUME SET]
- Hardcover
- Oxford: The Arcadian Library and the Oxford University Press, 2006
Oxford: The Arcadian Library and the Oxford University Press, 2006. First Edition. Hardcover. Very good +/very good. First Edition. Hardcover. 13 7/8" X 9 3/4". Volumes I and II are bound in red cloth over boards, stamped in gilt, with black and white pictorial dust jackets. Mild shelfwear to dust jackets and bindings, firm and sound. Volume III is a large folded map within a matching slipcase. Folding map in excellent condition; slipcase is edgeworn and bumped, with some very tiny tears at extremities. All pages are clean, bright, and unmarked. A very presentable first edition set, complete in three volumes, of this stunning textual and pictorial exploration of 16th century Venice from The Arcadian Library.
ABOUT THIS SET:
In 1549 a Venetian printmaker, Matteo Pagano, published a large engraving of an aerial view of the city of Cairo; it was accompanied by a Latin text ("Descriptio Alchiriae") written by the orientalist scholar, Guillaume Postel. The depiction of the city is sufficiently accurate to permit a detailed interpretation of the city to be made, and it remained the standard western representation of this fabled eastern city for the next 250 years.
Nicholas Warner provides a context for Pagano's view of Cairo, a translation of Postel's text, and a commentary on the contents of the engraving itself in addition to the accompanying narrative. An index of subsequent revisions, and a superbly produced enhanced facsimile of the engraving itself is included.
Volume 1 (208 pages) includes 36 large color plates, 5 black-and-white plates, and a modern facsimile of the original Latin text "Descriptio Alchiriae"; Volume 2 (208 pages) includes 68 black-and-white images, all details of the map. Volume 3--the map--is a "modern facsimile" of the original Map, i.e. with blemishes, etc. removed, packed in a slip case. It is the same size as the original, and folds out in a similar manner to an ordnance survey map. It is printed in two colors to match the original.
ABOUT THIS SET:
In 1549 a Venetian printmaker, Matteo Pagano, published a large engraving of an aerial view of the city of Cairo; it was accompanied by a Latin text ("Descriptio Alchiriae") written by the orientalist scholar, Guillaume Postel. The depiction of the city is sufficiently accurate to permit a detailed interpretation of the city to be made, and it remained the standard western representation of this fabled eastern city for the next 250 years.
Nicholas Warner provides a context for Pagano's view of Cairo, a translation of Postel's text, and a commentary on the contents of the engraving itself in addition to the accompanying narrative. An index of subsequent revisions, and a superbly produced enhanced facsimile of the engraving itself is included.
Volume 1 (208 pages) includes 36 large color plates, 5 black-and-white plates, and a modern facsimile of the original Latin text "Descriptio Alchiriae"; Volume 2 (208 pages) includes 68 black-and-white images, all details of the map. Volume 3--the map--is a "modern facsimile" of the original Map, i.e. with blemishes, etc. removed, packed in a slip case. It is the same size as the original, and folds out in a similar manner to an ordnance survey map. It is printed in two colors to match the original.
Details
Title
The True Description of Cairo: A Sixteenth-Century Venetian View, Volumes I, II, and III [COMPLETE 3-VOLUME SET]
Author
Warner, Nicholas
Binding
Hardcover
Condition
Very Good
Publisher
The Arcadian Library and the Oxford University Press: Oxford
Date
2006
Edition
First Edition