Folio. 10 pp., [1], Arabic text with parallel Latin translation, modern cardboard binding, browned pages, otherwise in very good condition, first work printed in the Breslau printing office of Georg Baumann’s widow Magdalena, Breslae, Germany [1608].

Synopsis

EXTREMELY RARE SOLE EDITION. First work printed in the Breslau printing office of Georg Baumann’s widow Magdalena with Arabic types, containing the Lord’s Prayer, Psalm 50 and the first Sura of the Qur’an in Arabic text with parallel Latin translation. This work is also considered to be the first Arabic-language publication in Germany.
The pioneering Arabist and physician Peter Kirsten started a private press in Breslau (Wroclaw) in 1607 (cf. Reske 130). His Arabic typeface, which shows the influence of the Medicean types, was cut by Peter von Selau. “Kirsten studied Arabic mainly because he hoped it would prove useful for reading Avicenna and other physicians in their original language, rather than in the faulty translations available, for he had been taught at medical school that a good practitioner would need to be a good Avicennist, and could more readily do without Latin than without Arabic” (cf. Fück). Kirsten himself financed the entire press run.
The “Qanun” of Ibn Sina and Kirsten’s “Tria specimina characterum arabicorum” (Bible excerpts and the first sura of the Qur’an in Arabic and Latin parallel text) are followed by a three-part Arabic grammar rarely encountered complete and several Biblical studies with an Arabist slant. These were the first books printed in Germany from an Arabic typeface. Roper notes that Kirsten “created a superior type-face, with some calligraphic qualities, which he not only used for his own letter specimens and Arabic grammar […] but later took to Sweden, where he inaugurated Arabic typography under royal patronage.” Individual titles by Kirsten are quite uncommon in institutional holdings and the few that have appeared at auction have often been rebound. A sound, contemporary copy of his major works such as this is a genuine rarity.
Bibliographical references: Einzige Ausgabe. STC K 463. Schnurrer 45.