“A RARE AND UNIQUE ARCHIVE OF PHOTOGRAPHS OF THE HIJAZ, AND OF MAKKAH IN PARTICULAR”: AN EXCEPTIONAL RARITY. FIRST EDITION THE ATLAS VOLUME OF SNOUCK HURGRONJE’S BILDER-ATLAS ZU MEKKA, 1888, ONE OF ONLY 100 COPIES, WITH 65 MOUNTED COLLOTYPES, AND TEN TINTED AND CHROMOLITHOGRAPHIC PLATES: A KEY WORK IN THE EARLY HISTORY OF PHOTOGRAPHY OF MECCA

HURGRONJE, Christian Snouck. Bilder-Atlas zu Mekka. Haag: Martinus Nijhoff, 1888. Folio portfolio (11 by 15 inches), original tan printed boards sympathetically respined in half-brown cloth, original 40 plates (one folding), original plate list, loose as issued, later cloth ties. Housed in a custom clamshell box.

First edition of Dutch scholar Snouck Hurgronje’s magnificent folio Atlas, one of only 100 copies issued, a momentous photographic record of 19th-century Mecca containing 65 mounted collotypes, six tinted lithographs (including one folding) and four chromolithographic plates featuring breathtaking images of Mecca and Kaaba, along with many splendid portraits—“a classic of exploration and anthropology”— with images by Snouck Hurgronje, “the first European photographer of Mecca,” Doctor Abd al-Ghaffar, “the first [native] Meccan photographer,” and two credited by Hurgronje as being by Muhammed Sadiq Bey, another pioneer of Arabian photography.

Dutch scholar Snouck Hurgronje’s Bilder-Atlas zu Mekka is one of the most important books on Mecca. This exceedingly rare folio portfolio is especially significant in assembling among the earliest published photographs of the Holy City, along with the first portraits of Meccans of different social classes (from sheiks, sharifs, members of the middle class to slaves), and the first portraits of hajjis from different parts of the world, from Yemen to Java. Snouck Hurgronje traveled to Jeddah and Mecca from 1884-5 in order “to study Islam in all its aspect in its very center, in an environment where it was least influenced by non-Islamic elements and where it was not under foreign rule.” It was a time in which European colonial powers viewed Mecca as “a safe haven for fundamentalist activities…. The city was seen as a place from where pan-Islamic ideas could unhindered radiate all over the Muslim world.” The Dutch government, in particular, was seeking in-depth information about the region for political and commercial reasons. In addition to his scholarly background, Snouck Hurgronje “spoke the Arabic vernacular fluently. The fact the he had brought with him photographic equipment made him interesting as a potential maker of portraits. Hurgronje evidently exploited the social advantages coming along with that, and his photography proved to be a catalyst for establishing relationships and breaking down social barriers… Hurgronje’s use of photography made him the first westerner in Mecca to do so” (Just Witkam, Introduction, Mecca, xiii-xx). “Hurgronje has given us a rare and unique archive of photographs of the Hijaz, and of Makkah in particular’ (Badr el-Hage, Saudi Arabia Caught in Time, 46).

Relying on bulky large-format cameras and fragile glass negatives, Snouk Hurgronje and Doctor Abd al-Ghaffar, the first Meccan photographer, produced most of powerful images present this Atlas, which also includes two by Muhammed Sadiq Bey, another pioneer of Arabian photography (Badr el-Hage, 3). Writing of Ghaffar’s work in particular, Arsalan Mohammad writes: “These sepia pictures are truly breathtaking… the very first photographs taken in Mecca by an Arab photographer… We see portraits of prominent dignitaries and their families, posing stiffly for the camera in their finest clothes. A Saudi bride sits uncomfortably in what appears to be chain-mail armour—it is, in fact, a wedding outfit, studded with coins.” In a letter dated July 5, 1887 Ghaffar described the difficult conditions facing the photographers: “‘we were not able—and we do not know why—to make photographs in the darkroom during the extremely hot and sultry weather, as the watering of the glass negative did not work properly. The gelatin dissolved and became diffused… Using a portable darkroom in a tent, which accompanied the photographic team, meant that the images were immediately created. However, the process was fraught with difficulties and technological issues. The cameras themselves were heavy, delicate objects, which used plate glass slides, coated with a light-sensitive preparation of gelatin Due to the harsh bright light of the desert skies and the long exposure times, the photographic pioneers would often end up with blank-faced subjects and bleached-out clothing—especially useless when the whole point of the project was to document the intricate finery and foreign strangeness of the subjects. Hand-retouching the negative plates became common, giving a strange, impressionist effect to many of the prints, which in turn lent an added air of mystery and exoticism to the final works” (“Road to Religion,” The National). First edition: one of only 100 copies produced. Featuring images of Kaaba, Mecca, portraits of “Othman Pascha mit dem egyptsichen Mahmal” and “Othman Pascha erbaute Hauptwache,” views of pilgrims, and much more. Complete with: folding panoramic sepia lithographic plate (No. 1), 18 leaves with full-page mounted prints (Nos. 3-4, 7-11, 26-36); eleven leaves with four mounted prints per leaf (Nos. 12-16, 19-23, 25), one leaf with three mounted prints (No. 24), five leaves with full-page tinted lithographic plates (Nos. 2, 5-6, 17-18) and four leaves with brilliantly colored chromolithographics (Nos. 37-40), original plate list: loose as issued. Text in German.

Plates fresh with only occasional light marginal foxing, faint soiling not affecting images.