"Arabs and Arabists contains nineteen selected articles by Alastair Hamilton on the Western acquisition of knowledge of the Arab and Ottoman world in the early modern period. The first essays are on Arabs who visited Europe and gave instruction to Western Arabists, and on Europeans who either visited the Arab (or the Ottoman) world in search of manuscripts and information or who, like Franciscus Raphelengius, Isaac Casaubon and Adriaen Reland, studied it at a distance and remained in the West. These are followed by a section on the actual study of the Arabic language in Europe, and above all the creation of the first Arabic-Latin dictionaries, and another on the European study of Islam and Western translations of the Qur'an"--
1. A polyglot traveller in the republic of letters / Jan Loop -- 2. Between literature and history / Ziad Elmarsafy -- 3. Islam as a 'rational' religion: early modern European views / Noel Malcolm -- 4. Thomas Erpenius, Oriental scholarship and the art of persuasion / Arnoud Vrolijk and Joanna Weinberg -- 5. From Astronomica to Exotica: Jacob Golius's edition of al-Farghānī's On the science of the stars in comparison with the earlier versions / Charles Burnett -- 6. An unrecognized 'critique' of John Selden's Historie of tithes: John Gregory's 1634 edition of View of the civile and ecclesiasticall law by Thomas Ridley / Mordechai Feingold -- 7. Ravius in the East / Gerald J. Toomer -- 8. Die silberne Rippe der orientalischen Schrift. Johann Ernst Gerhards Stammbuch und seine Reise durch die Niederlande im Jahr 1650 / Martin Mulsow -- 9. The errant eye: Johann Michael Wansleben and the monasteries of Suhāg / Nicholas Warner -- 10. Histoire connectée du monachisme oriental. De l'érudition catholique en Europe aux réformes monastiques au Mont Liban (XVIIe-XVIIIe siècles) / Aurélien Girard -- 11. Historia Literaria Alcorani: two Lutheran scholars chronicling Oriental scholarship at the turn of the Eighteenth century / Asaph Ben-Tov -- 12. Fasting: the limits of Catholic confessionalization in Eastern Christianity in the Eighteenth century / Bernard Heyberger -- 13. Away with all the Greeks: ancients, moderns and Arabs in Étienne Fourmont's 'Oratio de lingua Arabica' (1715) / Alexander Bevilacqua -- 14. Richard Pococke and the natural curiosities of the East / Jan Marten Ivo Klaver -- 15. Patrick Russell and the Arabian nights manuscripts / Maurits H. van den Boogert -- 16. Volney's Meditations on ruins and empires / Robert Irwin -- 17. Malivoire et Rousseau informateurs de la cour de Vienne: Les bouleversements de la Perse des années 1795-1798 vus de Bagdad / Francis Richard -- 18. Ahmad Faris al-Shidyaq in England: 1848-1856 / Tarif Khalidi -- 19. Snouck Hurgronje's Consular ambitions / Jan Just Witkam.
"Arabic is the only living language to have been taught in Dutch higher education for more than four centuries. Practical usefulness, however, has been a prerequisite from the start. Knowledge of Arabic was to promote Dutch interests in the Muslim world, or to help refute Islam. As a cognate of Classical Hebrew, the study of Arabic served as an ancillary science to Biblical studies. Nevertheless, many Arabists such as Thomas Erpenius and Jacobus Golius rose to international distinction. With more than 110 colour illustrations from the Leiden Oriental collections, Arabic Studies in the Netherlands. A Short History in Portraits, 1580-1950 by Arnoud Vrolijk and Richard van Leeuwen will help the reader to gain insight into a fascinating aspect of Dutch intellectual history."--
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'The Arcadian Library is unique in Europe. The 10,000 or so volumes which it owns provide a complete picture of the encounter between two cultures and show how the civilization of the Arab and Islamic worlds was appreciated in the Christian West from the earliest times to the present day. The purpose of this heavily-illustrated survey is to provide an idea of the variety of works, documents, and images which the library holds in different domains. Travel writings prevail, a reflection of the impressions made on Europeans by the vast region centred on Arabia and the Levant and stretching from the Maghreb to South and Central Asia, and of the discoveries they made and the effect of their findings on Western knowledge and sensibility. The section on travellers also includes some of the rarer items in the library - unique manuscripts and maps, colour-plate books, and unpublished letters from figures such as Richard Burton, T.E. Lawrence, and Gertrude Bell. In addition to travel there is a large collection of Turcica, with its rare pamphlets and illustrations; a section on Arab science and medicine which contains priceless incunables of translations of Arabic texts; an important selection of Quran translations and material on Eastern Christianity; documents both published and unpublished on the Arabs in Spain and the influence of the tradition they established on early modern Spain and the rest of Europe; numerous products of oriental scholarship and, finally, works of oriental literature which include, besides translations from Turkish and Persian, unpublished manuscripts, and splendidly illustrated copies of The Arabian Nights. Over 200 illustrations of some of the finest items in the library, including four 8-page fold-outs, complement the text. The bibliography, running to almost 2000 entries, gives an overview of some of the most important items in the library.'
