Cairo

Exceptionally rare first edition of this remarkable photographic album, printed in Cairo by Mourès & Cie, the press operated by Antoine Mourès. Produced under the direction of Auguste Mariette, it constitutes the first illustrated photographic catalogue of the Boulaq Museum, the first Egyptian museum devoted to Pharaonic antiquities and the direct predecessor of the present Egyptian Museum in Cairo.

The work comprises forty albumen prints (approximately 24.5 × 18 cm), mounted on heavy card leaves hinged on guards. Each photograph is accompanied by a printed descriptive leaf - with the exception of plates 4 and 11, which are accompanied by two - the photographs being...

First edition, illustrated with 11 double-page folio plates, including 2 plans printed on tracing paper. (Not listed in Hage Chahine.)

The text fascicle is in wrappers and the suite of plates is loose, both housed in the publisher’s original black cloth-backed portfolio with corners, flat spine without lettering, title label centered on the upper board, sand-colored boards showing some stains and scuff marks, with flaps and ties.

On the inside flap of the publisher’s portfolio, autograph inscription signed by Henri Chevrier to Pierre Glénat: "... dans l'espoir de faire un jour sa connaissance sous le soleil der Thèbes..."

Limited first edition printed in a small number of copies, extracted from the "Bulletin de l'Institut égyptien", series V, vol. X.

Illustrated booklet with 4 figures in the text and 2 plates outside the text. 

Only one copy recorded in the CCF. 

A tear to the foot of the spine, covers marginally soiled and also bearing small black stains, internally in good condition.

A publicist and collector, then secretary to the Council of Ministers, Ahmad Zaki Basha (1867-1934) was, between 1892 and 1934, one of the most dynamic figures of Egyptian cultural life: a polyglot, translator, bibliophile, philologist, and man of learning, keenly interested in modernity and...