Johann Michael Wansleben’s Travels in Turkey, 1673–1676 is a hitherto unpublished version of a remarkable description of Istanbul, Izmir, and Bursa by the German scholar traveller Wansleben. Wansleben was in the Ottoman Empire to buy manuscripts, statuary, and curios for the French king, but it is his off-hand observations about Ottoman society that often make Wansleben’s account such a valuable historical source. His experiences add to our knowledge of such diverse topics as prostitution in the Ottoman Empire, taxation, and the French consular system. His visit to Bursa is also noteworthy because few Western travellers included the first Ottoman capital in their tours of the East or described it at such length.

In Supplier Dieu dans l'Egypte toulounide, Mathieu Tillier and Naim Vanthieghem provide the edition, translation and study of a booklet preserved on papyrus and dated 267/880-881. It offers a selection of some forty hadiths heard by Khalid ibn Yazid, a minor local scholar, concerning the invocations that every pious Muslim has to use when addressing God. Composed during the reign of the famous governor Ahmad ibn Tulun, the first autonomous ruler of Islamic Egypt, this manuscript bears exceptional testimony to the way traditional sciences were taught at the time. Not only does it open an unprecedented window on the milieu of ordinary transmitters, whose names soon fell into oblivion, but it also sheds new light on the Tulunids' religious policy and on the islamisation of Egypt. Dans la seconde moitie du IIIe/IXe siecle, un savant repondant au nom de Halid b. Yazid enseigna une quarantaine de hadiths sur le theme des invocations que tout pieux musulman se devait d'adresser a Dieu. Un opuscule issu de son enseignement, portant la date de 267/880-881, a survecu sur papyrus. Mathieu Tillier et Naim Vanthieghem en proposent ici l'edition, la traduction et l'etude. Compose sous le regne du fameux gouverneur Ahmad b. Tulun, premier souverain autonome de l'Egypte islamique, ce manuscrit offre un temoignage exceptionnel sur la maniere dont les sciences traditionnelles etaient alors enseignees. Il ouvre non seulement une fenetre inedite sur le milieu des transmetteurs ordinaires, dont les noms tomberent rapidement dans l'oubli, mais vient aussi eclairer d'un nouveau jour la politique religieuse des Toulounides et la dynamique d'islamisation de l'Egypte.

This volume brings together contributions by scholars focussing on peritextual elements as found in Middle Eastern manuscripts: dots and various other symbols that mark vowels, intonation, readings aids, and other textual markers; marginal notes and sigla that provide additional explanatory content akin to but substantially different from our modern notes and endnotes; images and illustrations that present additional material not found in the main text. These elements add additional layers to the main body of the text and are crucial for our understanding of the text's transmission history as well as scribal habits.

Sa'deddin Efendi was a renowned Ottoman chief jurisconsult, influential statesman, eminent scholar, and prolific translator of Arabic and Persian works into Turkish. Prognostic Dreams, Otherworldly Saints, and Caliphal Ghosts comprises a critical edition, English translation, and a facsimile of his hagiographic work on controversial Ottoman sultan Selim I ("the Grim"). Sa'deddin's Selimname consists of a preface and twelve anecdotes in which Selim I is portrayed as a divinely ordained sultan who delves into the realm of meditation, communicates with otherworldly saints and the "rightly guided" caliphs, and foretells the future.