Antoine Galland

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For the publisher and printer, see Antoine Galland (1763–1851).
Antoine Galland
Born(1646-04-04)4 April 1646
Rollot, Picardy, Kingdom of France
Died17 February 1715(1715-02-17) (aged 68)
Caen, Normandy, Kingdom of France
Occupations
  • Orientalist
  • archaeologist
Years active1670–1715
Known forFirst European translator of One Thousand and One Nights
Notable workLes mille et une nuits

Antoine Galland (French:

archaeologist, most famous as the first European translator of One Thousand and One Nights, which he called Les mille et une nuits. His version of the tales appeared in twelve volumes between 1704 and 1717 and exerted a significant influence on subsequent European literature and attitudes to the Islamic world. Jorge Luis Borges has suggested that Romanticism
began when his translation was first read.

Life and work

Galland was born at Rollot in Picardy (now in the department of Somme). After completing school at Noyon, he studied Greek and Latin in Paris, where he also acquired some Arabic. In 1670 he was attached to the French embassy at Istanbul because of his excellent knowledge of Greek and, in 1673, he travelled in Syria and the Levant, where he copied a great number of inscriptions, sketched and—in some cases—removed historical monuments.

After a brief visit to France, where his collection of ancient coins attracted some attention, Galland returned to the Levant in 1677. In 1679 he undertook a third voyage, being commissioned by the

Barthélemy d'Herbelot de Molainville
.

When d'Herbelot died in 1695, Galland continued his Bibliothèque orientale ("Oriental Library"), a huge compendium of information about Islamic culture, and principally a translation of the great Arabic encyclopedia Kaşf az-Zunūn by the celebrated Ottoman scholar

William Beckford (in his oriental tale Vathek).[citation needed
]

After the deaths of Thévenot and d'Herbelot, Galland lived for some time at Caen under the roof of Nicolas Foucault, the intendant of Caen, himself no mean archaeologist. There he began, in 1704, the publication of Les mille et Une Nuits, which excited immense interest during the time of its appearance and is still the standard French translation. In 1709 he was appointed to the chair of Arabic in the Collège de France. He continued to discharge the duties of this post until his death in 1715.

Besides a number of archaeological works, especially in the department of

Qur'an and a Histoire générale des empereurs Turcs. His journal was published by Charles Schefer in 1881.[3]

Translation of The Thousand and One Nights

Main article: Les mille et une nuits
The first European edition of Arabian Nights, Les Mille et une Nuits, by Antoine Galland, 1730 AD, Paris

Galland had come across a manuscript of

The Tale of Sindbad the Sailor in Constantinople during the 1690s and, in 1701, he published his translation of it into French.[4] Its success encouraged him to embark on a translation of a fourteenth- or fifteenth-century Syrian manuscript (now known as the Galland Manuscript
) of The Thousand and One Nights. The first two volumes of this work, under the title Mille et Une Nuits, appeared in 1704. The twelfth and final volume was published posthumously in 1717.

He translated the first part of his work solely from the Syrian manuscript. In 1709 he was introduced to a

Hanna Diab
, who recounted fourteen more stories to Galland from memory. He chose to include seven of these tales in his version of the Nights.

Mystery surrounds the origins of some of the most famous tales. For instance, there are no Arabic manuscripts of

Ali Baba, the so-called "orphan tales", which pre-date Galland's translation.[5] Galland had in turn heard these tales from the Syrian storyteller Hanna Diyab.[6][7][8]

Galland also adapted his translation to the taste of the time. The immediate success the tales enjoyed was partly due to the vogue for

Sir Richard Burton to refer to "Galland's delightful abbreviation and adaptation" which "in no wise represent(s) the eastern original."[10]

His translation was greeted with immense enthusiasm and had soon been translated into many other European languages:

Burton or Mardrus and everything to do with Antoine Galland's bijoux and sorceries.[12]

Works

  • Les paroles remarquables, les bons mots et les maximes des Orientaux, S. Benard, 1694
  • Contes et fables indiennes, de Bidpaï et de Lokman; traduites d'Ali-Tchelebi ben Saleh, auteur turc.
  • Histoire de l'esclavage d'un marchand de la ville de Cassis, à Tunis, La Bibliothèque, « L'écrivain voyageur ».
  • De l’origine et du progrès du café, La Bibliothèque, coll. « L'écrivain voyageur ».
  • Le Voyage à Smyrne, Chandeigne, coll. « Magellane », 2000.
  • Histoire de Noureddin et de la belle persane, André Versaille Éditeur, 2009
  • Histoire d'Aladin ou la lampe merveilleuse
  • Les Milles et une Nuits

See also

References

  1. ^ Les paroles remarquables, les bons mots et les maximes des orientaux . Traduction de leurs ouvrages en arabe, en persan et en turc, avec des remarques. 1694.
  2. ^ Galland, Antoine (1646-1715) Auteur du texte (1836). De l'Origine et du progrès du café, opuscule du XVIIe siècle par Galland,... Nouvelle édition augmentée d'instructions sur les propriétés de cette fève et le meilleur procédé pour en obtenir la boisson dans toute sa perfection [par Cadet de Vaux].{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  3. ^ Details of life from chronology in Garnier Flammarion.
  4. ^ Robert L. Mack, ed. (2009). "Introduction". Arabian Nights' Entertainments. Oxford: Oxford UP. pp. ix–xxiii.
  5. ^ Haddawy, The Arabian Nights, Introduction pp.xvi
  6. ISBN 9781631495175
    . Retrieved 23 May 2019.
  7. ^ Paulo Lemos Horta, Marvellous Thieves: Secret Authors of the Arabian Nights (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2017), pp. 24-95.
  8. ^ Waxman, Olivia B. (May 23, 2019). "Was Aladdin Based on a Real Person? Here's Why Scholars Are Starting to Think So". Time. Retrieved 3 February 2021.
  9. doi:10.1163/157006405774909899
    .
  10. ^ Burton, A Thousand Nights and a Night, v1, Translator's Foreword pp. x
  11. ^ This section: Irwin, Chapter 1; some details from Garnier-Flammarion introduction
  12. ^ Borges, pp. 92-93

Sources

External links
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