Description

Folio: [8] with title page and text in Arabic and French, XXXIII black and white plates, reverse collation, original card binding with printed title, green cloth spine (old owner’s signature in blue ink in the lower part of the title page, binding with minimal wear and staining, otherwise in a good, clean condition).

A large richly illustrated plate book with commentaries in Arabic in French represents the results of the 1920s excavations in the ancient city Al Fustat, the capital of Egypt before Cairo. The book was published by the Museum of Islamic Art in Cairo, which today hosts many artefacts from this archeological site.  Al Fustat had been the capital of Egypt for circa 500 years until it was burned down in the 12th century by its own vizier, Shawar, to keep the city’s treasures from falling in the hands of the Crusaders.  

The text on the excavations by an archeologist and professor Albert Gabriel (1883-1972) was published in Paris, seven years prior, in 1921, under the title Les fouilles d’Al Foustat et les origines de la maison arabe en Égypte.

References: OCLC 13892556 & 28312546.