[ARAB MACCHIAVELLI / THE MIDDLE EASTERN “PRINCE"] Tercüme-yi Silvân al-Muta’ fî Udwân al-Atbâ [i.e., Consolation for the Ruler during the Hostility of his Subjects]. Translated by Mehmed Said b. Kara Halil.

AL-SIQILLI, HUJJAT IBN ZAFAR, (1104-1170), Seyh Mehmed Sadik Buhari Matbaasi, Istanbul, AH 1285 = [1869]. Contemporary quarter calf with gilt decorations on spine, green boards. Slightly worn to extremities. Otherwise, a very good copy. Rare first printed Ottoman edition of the magnum opus by Ibn Zafar, considered as ‘Eastern Macchiavelli’ lived four centuries before Macchiavelli. The treatise is a form of wisdom literature with a long Arabian and Persian tradition, called "mirrors for princes", which purported to be handbooks for princes and caliphs offering counsel on the proper use of power, good governance, and the conduct of commerce and trade. Ibn Zafar dedicated the first edition of Sulwan to an unknown king facing revolt - possibly the ruler of Damascus expelled by Nur ad-Din - and the second edition to his patron Abu'l-Qasim ibn Hammud ibn al-Hajar. (Wikipedia). This edition is the first printed Turkish edition, published in a printing house established in the name of Sadik Me