[Arabic title.] Maured Allatafet, seu Rerum Aegyptiacarum annales, ab anno Christi 971, usque ad annum 1453.: E codice MS. Bibliothecae Academiae Cantribrigiensis textum Arabicum primus editit, Latinè vertit, notsique illustravit J. D. Carlyle.

Cambridge: printed by J. Archdeacon for the University, and sold at the shops of B. White and Sons, London, J. & J. Merrill, Cambridge; J. Fletcher, and J. Cooke, Oxford,, 1792. First edition of this noted history of Egypt from the Fatimid conquest to the mid-15th century. Ibn Taghribirdi (c.1410-1470) was the son of a Mamluk amir and himself a close companion of a son of Sultan Jaqmaq (r. 1438-53); his work is generally critical of the Shi'ite Fatimids and apologetic with regard to the Sunni Mamluks, though together with his predecessors al-Qalqashandi and al-Maqrizi he is considered one of the most important chroniclers of the Mamluk era. Ibn Taghribirdi is best remembered for a multi-volume chronicle entitled al-Nujum al-Zahirah, printed between 1851 and 1862, but the present text, Mawrid al-Latafah ("Source of Sweetness") was his first to be published. The Arabic text is accompanied by a Latin translation and extensive notes by the Cambridge Arabist Joseph Dacre Carlyle (1758-1804), who, during his residence at Cambridge,"profited from the instructions of a native of Baghdad, who passed in Britain under the name David Zamio. As a result, Carlyle became so proficient in oriental languages that he was appointed professor of Arabic on the resignation of Dr Craven in 1795" (ODNB). Quarto (222 x 176 mm). Rebound to style in half calf preserving the original early 19th century dark red morocco label, marbled sides, speckled edges, endleaves renewed. A very good, wide-margined, complete with the errata leaf. Gay 2073; Ibrahim-Hilmy II p. 25; Schnurrer 184.