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Recommending a rising star for the chair of Arabic at Algiers

[AUTOGRAPH]. MARCEL, Jean-Joseph.
[Autograph letter, signed, of recommendation for Louis Bresnier].
Paris, 9 September 1836. Folio (36 x 23 cm). Letter in brown ink on wove paper. [2] pp.
€ 1,250
Signed autograph letter of recommendation by the Parisian nobleman, professor of oriental languages at the Collège Royale de France in Paris and director of Napolean's Imprimerie Imperiale from 1803 to 1815, Jean-Joseph Marcel (1776-1854), for his student Louis Bresnier (1814-1869), supporting his appointment to the chair of Arabic at the Collège in Algiers. The letter is dated 9 September 1836, the year that Silvestre de Sacy appointed Bresnier to that chair. France had taken Algiers from the Ottoman Empire in 1830 and established the chair in Arabic there in 1832. Bresnier held the chair to his death in 1869, and it was during his tenure that the Collège gained a high reputation for its Arabic scholarship. Marcel had accompanied Napoleon's troops on their Egyptian campaign and laid the groundwork that helped Champollion decipher the Egyptian hieroglyphs of the Rosetta Stone, discovered during that campaign in 1799. He is perhaps best known for his 1805 Oratio Dominica in 150 languages, printed for Napoleon, who knighted him for his services.
Formerly folded into eighths and showing some discolouration and minor wear along the folds, but otherwise in very good condition. An original document of the beginnings of a great Arabist's career.
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Related Subjects:

Islamic culture  >  Literature & Linguistics
Middle east & islamic world  >  Africa