Title

Historia Iosephi Patriarchae

Full title

Sūrat Yūsuf wa tahajjī al-ʿArab: Historia Iosephi Patriarchæ, ex Alcorano, Arabicè. Cum triplici versione Latina, & scholijs THOMAE ERPENII, cujus & ALPHABETVM ARABICVM praemittitur

Short Title

Historia Iosephi Patriarchae

Title in English

Sūrat Yūsuf and Arabic Spelling: The History of Joseph the Patriarch from the Qurʾān, in Arabic: With Threehold Latin Translation and Scholia of Thomas Erpenius, whose [Remark on] Arabic Alphabet is foreworded.

Printer

Ex Typographia ERPENIANA Linguarum Orientalium

Released place

Leiden

Released date

1617

Author

Thomas Erpenius; Robert of Ketton; Herman of Carinthia; Guillaume Postel

Language

474

Qur'an

Translation

Qur'an structure

Suras

1 and 12

Pages

xxiv; 119

Further notes

Paratext. Before main text of the Qurʾān: "LINGVÆ ARABICÆ IN ACAD. LEIDENSI STVDIOSIS DISCIPVLIS SVIS THOMAS ERPENIVS S.D." (sigs. A2r-A4r), Errata (sig. A4r), "THOMAE ERPENII ALPHABETVM ARABICVM" (sigs. A4v-C4v). After main text of the Qurʾān: "ARABISMI STVDIOSIS S.D. THOMAS ERPENIVS" (sig. H4v), "HISTORIÆ JOSEPHI EX ALCORANO, Versio Latina antiqua", (sigs. I1r-K3v), "THOMÆ ERPENII ANNOTATIONES IN HISTORIAM JOSEPHI, quibus obscuriora quæque loca illustrantur & difficiliorum vocum ratio Grammatica exponitur" (sigs. K4r-S2v). [Without title: Arabic text of Sura 1 and Latin translatoins by Robert of Ketton and Guilliaume Postell (sigs. S3r-v), and Erpenius's commentary on Sura 1 (sigs. S3v-S4r).

Sources

Erpenius did not specify the manuscript(s) he used for this edition. Although it remains open, Erpenius might have used several manuscripts of the Qurʾān; one of which is now preserved at the Bodleian Library, Oxford as Marsh 358. This manuscript Qurʾān was donated by Isaac Casaubon to Erpenius. In the 1600s Casaubon studied the Qurʾān with another Dutch orientalist scholar Adriaen Willemsz. At Erpenius's request, Casaubon gave Erpenius the manuscript (cf., Alastair Hamilton, "Isaac Casaubon the Arabist", Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, 72 (2009), 143-168, 158, n. 119). According to the entry in Alexander Nicoll, Bibliothecae Bodleianae Codicum Manuscriptorum Orientalium Catalogus, 65b-66a, on 66a, "Erpenius enim integrum contextum ad codices quatuor magna diligentia contulit, et Lectionis discrepantiam in oris tenui calamo notavit; horum codicum signa sunt er (Exemplar Regis), es (Ex. Scalig.), em (Ex. Maur.), ex (Ex. Cas.)." But that Marsh 358 belonged to Erpenius does not preclude that he used other manuscripts of the Qurʾān when he was editing Historia Iosephi Patriarchae. Erpenius also appends Latin translation of Sura 12 and 1 by his predecessors. One of the Latin versions of Sura 12 is made by Robert of Ketton and Herman of Carinthia, which had been edited by Theodor Bibliander (1509-1564). One of the Latin translation of Sura 1 was taken from Guillaume Postel's version.

Arabic Type

Typographia ERPENIANA Linguarum Orientalium

Link to library catalogue

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Bibliographical references:

Christian Fridrich de Schnurrer, Bibliotheca Arabica (Halae ad Salam: Typis et sumtu I. C. Hendeii, 1811), no. 368, pp. 404-5; Wilhelmina M. C. Juynboll, Zeventiende-eeuwsche Beoefenaars van het Arabisch in Nederland (Utrecht: Kemink en Zoon, 1931), pp. 82-3; Rijk Smitskamp, Philologia Orientalis: A Description of Books Illustrating the Study and Printing of Oriental Languages in 16th- and 17th-Century Europe (Leiden: Brill, 1992) [Titelauflage: with additions of an E. J. Brill catalogue originally published in three parts, 1976, 1983, and 1991], no. 89, p. 97; Alastair Hamilton, "Isaac Casaubon the Arabist", Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, 72 (2009), pp. 143-168; Arnoud Vrolijk, "The Prince of Arabists and His Many Errors. Thomas Erpenius’s Image of Joseph Scaliger and the Edition of the Proverbia Arabica (1614)", in Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, 73 (2010), pp. 297-325; Alastair Hamilton, "The Long Apprenticeship: Casaubon and Arabic", in Anthony Grafton and Johanna Weinberg, “I have always loved the Holy Tongue.” Isaac Casaubon, the Jews, and a Forgotten Chapter in Renaissance Scholarship (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2011), pp. 293-306; Arnoud Vrolijk and Richard van Leeuwen, Alastair Hamilton, tr., Arabic Studies in the Netherlands: A Short History in Portraits, 1580–1950 (Leiden: Brill, 2013); Alastair Hamilton, "The Qur'an as Chrestomathy in Early Modern Europe", in Jan Loop, Alastair Hamilton, and Charles Burnett, eds., The Teaching and Learning of Arabic in Early Modern Europe (Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2017), pp. 213-229, especially on pp. 215-19.

Individuals

Thomas Erpenius (Editor, Translator, and Commentator); Robert of Ketton (Translator); Herman of Carinthia (Translator); Theodor Bibliander? (Editor); Guillaume Postel (Translator)

Descriptive card

This edition presents Arabic text and Latin translations of Sūras 1 and 12. After the preface and an introduction to Arabic alphabets and grammer, Erpenius offers Arabic text and two Latin translations of Sūrat Yūsuf; the first, interlinear Latin translation is literal word for word rendering of Arabic words; the second Latin translation in the margin is rather neat rendering. Then, the "Versio Latina antiqua", i.e., the Latin translation of Robert of Ketton and Herman of Carinthia follows. These Latin versions are followed by Erpenius's own grammatical and philological annotations. At the end of this edition, Erpenius puts Arabic text and Latin translations of Sūra 1. The Latin translations include an interlinear, word for word rendering of Arabic words, "Versio antiqua" by Robert of Ketton and Herman of Carinthia, the translation of Guillaume Postel (1510-1581), and the "Versio alia melior, nostraeque vicinior". With grammatical notes on Sūra 1, Erpenius closes this edition.

Entry author

Kentaro Inagaki