Bibliothecae Bodleianae Codicum Manuscriptorum Orientalium Catalogus.
Oxford: 1787; 1821; 1835. First editions. 2 volumes. Pars Prima (1787) bound in half leather with marbled boards. The combined 1821 and 1835 parts bound together in contemporary half calf with marbled boards; gilt-lettered spine “Bibliothecae Bodleianae Codicum Manuscriptorum Orientalium Catalogus II. 1.”. Both volumes structurally sound and text blocks firm. Boards rubbed and corners worn; the second volume with cracks and losses to the spine and dried leather. In the first volume the original spine is detached but preserved and laid inside. Internally clean and generally well preserved, with occasional spotting and light foxing, more pronounced in the first half of the 1835 part. Plates with minor chipping and small edge tears, one folding plate creased.
One of the earliest printed catalogues devoted to Oriental manuscripts in a European institutional library, and the complete pioneering Bodleian catalogue comprising all three separately issued parts.
The catalogue was begun by John Uri (1724–1796), a Hungarian orientalist trained at Leiden under Jan Jacob Schultens. Uri, recommended to the Bodleian by Sir Joseph Yorke, was employed for more than twenty years to examine and describe the Library’s vast Oriental holdings, including Hebrew, Syriac, Ethiopic, Arabic, Persian, Turkish, and Coptic manuscripts. His Pars Prima (1787) records nearly 2000 codices, of which about 1400 are Arabic. It is regarded as the first scholarly treatment by a Hungarian author of Oriental manuscripts in a library context (Róna-Tas 1977, p. 47).
The prefaces to the three parts themselves trace the scholarly trajectory of the catalogue. The official 1787 preface by Bodley’s Librarian John Price explains Uri’s appointment, acknowledges the scale of his task, and admits the catalogue’s incompleteness; Uri’s own introduction was rejected at the insistence of John Randolph, Regius Professor of Divinity and later Bishop of Oxford, ostensibly out of institutional deference and cost considerations, and the manuscript—once in Samuel Parr’s library (Bibliotheca Parriana)—has since been lost. The second element of the catalogue was prepared by Alexander Nicoll (1793–1828), Regius Professor of Hebrew, and issued in 1821, adding 234 Arabic manuscripts to Uri’s listings. In his preface Nicoll recalled Uri’s achievement while stressing the considerable growth of the Bodleian’s oriental collection in subsequent decades, noting his own reliance on the advice of Silvestre de Sacy, Bernstein, and Gesenius. Nicoll’s premature death left his continuation incomplete; the task was finished in 1835 by his successor Edward Bouverie Pusey, who edited Nicoll’s unfinished manuscript, appended nine lithographic specimen plates, and supplied extensive corrections and supplements. Pusey’s 1835 preface offers both tribute and critique: he remarked on frequent errors in Uri’s part, devoting over sixty pages to revisions, and emphasized the need to re-examine the Arabic holdings owing to misattributions and forgeries. Altogether he described 296 additional Arabic codices, consolidating the catalogue as the essential reference for Bodleian’s Oriental manuscripts.
The Bodleian Library, formally established in 1602, rapidly became one of Europe’s greatest repositories of books and manuscripts. Its Oriental holdings were significantly enriched by acquisitions such as the 1693 Huntington collection of ca. 600 manuscripts from Aleppo, followed by further large purchases and donations throughout the eighteenth century. These accessions included Arabic, Persian, Turkish, Hebrew, Syriac, and Coptic codices on theology, science, medicine, and literature. The Bodleian thus offered one of the most extensive resources for Oriental studies in Europe, and the present catalogue marked the first systematic attempt to render this material accessible to scholars.
The work remains a landmark in European Oriental studies and a foundational moment in Hungarian scholarly contribution to the field.
Rare both institutionally and on the market. According to RBH, the last copy to appear at auction was sold by Sotheby’s in 1959 for £1,500.
Bibliographical note:
Uri, Johannes: Bibliothecae Bodleianae codicum manuscriptorum orientalium videlicet Hebraicorum, Chaldaicorum, Syriacorum, Aethiopicorum, Arabicorum, Persicorum, Turcicorum, Copticorumque Catalogus, jussu curatorum preli academici a Joanne Uri confectus. Pars Prima.
Oxonii [Oxford]: E Typographeo Clarendoniano, M DCC LXXXVII [1787]. [2] II, [1]–98 [1]–327 [1 (blank)] [42 (last blank)] p.
Nicoll, Alexander: Bibliothecae Bodleianae codicum manuscriptorum orientalium catalogi partis secundae volumen primum Arabicos completens confecit Alexander Nicoll A.M. e Coll. Ball. Bibl. Bodl. subpraefectus.
Oxonii [Oxford]: E Typographeo Clarendoniano, M DCCC XXI [1821]. [4] 143 [1 (blank)] p.
Nicoll, Alexander; Pusey, Edward Bouverie: Catalogi codicum manuscriptorum orientalium Bibliothecae Bodleianae pars secunda Arabicos completens. Confecit Alexander Nicoll, J.C.D. nuper linguae Hebr. professor regius, necnon Aedis Christi Canonicus. Editionem absolvit et catalogum Urianum aliquatenus emendavit E.B. Pusey, S.T.B. viri desideratissimi successor.
Oxonii [Oxford]: E Typographeo Academico, M DCCC XXXV [1835]. [2] [I]–VIII [145]–730 p., 9 engraved plates (one printed in red and black, one folded).
Literature:
Goldziher, Ignácz. Uri János. In: Értekezések a Nyelv- és Széptudományok köréből, XX/7 (Budapest, 1908).
Gróf, László. “Uri János, Nagykőrös szülötte – Oxford halhatatlan tudósa (1724–1796).” In: Erdélyi Református Egyháztörténeti Füzetek, 24: A reformáció öröksége. Egyháztörténeti tanulmányok. Ed. and rev. Kolumbán Vilmos József. Kolozsvár: Kolozsvári Protestáns Teológiai Intézet, 2018. pp. 354–369.
Róna-Tas, András. “Az Akadémiai Könyvtár Keleti Gyűjteménye.” In: Fejezetek a 150 éves akadémiai történetéből. Könyvtár; A Magyar Tudományos Akadémia Könyvtárának Közleményei (Publicationes Bibliothecae Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae), Új sorozat 2(77). Budapest, 1977, pp. 47–51.
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Price: €12,000.00