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On the Provenance of the Islamic Collections |
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The Library's Islamic collections are modest compared to the universities where the
Oriental languages have been studied and the collections have been enriched through the
travels of learned men. The collections have been created in connection with Sweden's
diplomatic relations with the Islamic world or otherwise through the activities of the State
and the Royal Court, whose interests have been different from those of the learned world.
The modest size of the collection, some hundred manuscripts and some thirty incunabula, does not allow
for any generalizations, but among the less well represented categories are the religious and
philosphical treatises, while works of poetry and profane prose are more numerous.
By 1650, the Royal Library possessed two Qur'ans and some other Arabic and Turkish book, probably war-booty from Prague 1648. Most of them seem to have left Sweden with Queen Christina in 1654. One of the Qur'ans is now in the Vatican Library. Three books (specimen), war-booty from the Austrian conquest of Turkish Budapest 1686, were donated to the library shortly before the Royal Palace Fire 1697 (which they survived) by followers of the Swedish general Nils Bielke, who had taken part in the Austro-Turkish wars. At the same time, Swedish field marshal Otto Wilhelm Königsmarck served with the Venetians against the Turks in Greece. This war meant the blasting of the Parthenon, but also that one Turkish prayer-book came into Swedish hands. After the five-year sojourn of King Charles XII in Turkey 1711-14 the influx of Islamic books grew considerably. Manuscripts were acquired through the Orientalist Henrik Brenner (specimen), who had traveled in Persia on diplomatic missions in the 1690's, and later became Librarian to the King, through the Secretary Hans Perman (specimen), posted in Constantinople during the King's stay in Turkey, and through his colleague Gustaf Celsing, (specimen), who later became a translator and responsible for Turkish relations at the Royal Chancery in Stockholm.  His two sons Gustaf and
Ulric Celsing served as ambassadors in Constantinople
1745-80, but their large collections came to the Uppsala university library. Only
a few Persian manuscripts and Turkish
incunabula came to the Royal Library.
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 The first Swedish diplomats in Turkey after Charles XII were, however, two young students
of economy, Edvard Carleson and Carl Fredrik von Höpken, who are also famous in book
history as the transmitters to Sweden of the first set of 'Turkish incunabula' in 1736.
Some of Perman's manuscript and a few others, mainly poetry and fables, ended in the Drottningholm palace library, where king Gustav III had them rebound in red morocco and marked as 'suitable for the education of a young Prince', typical for the 'Pre-Romantic Orientalism' of the 18th century. 
But the largest single collection of Oriental manuscripts came to the Library in 1832
through the naturalist Johan Hedenborg (1787-1865) who had arrived to Constantinople in 1825
as a doctor to the Swedish ambassador Löwenhielm and travelled widely in the Orient.
The Government bought his collections, including 28 Oriental manuscripts
(specimen) and a number of prints,
e.g. the 'Cedid Atlas Tercümesi' 1803 and the large map of Greece 1797 by liberation
hero Rhigas Ferraios. Hedenborg himself published an illustrated description
of the "Customs and Costumes of the Turkish Nation" (1839, in Swedish). He was a
veritable Collector; his
preference for poetry and belles lettres, exquisite calligraphy and finely
decorated bindings is representative for the early 'Romantic Orientalism'.
The ambassador Löwenhielm himself made a large number of watercolours with motives from Turkey, now preserved in the Uppsala University Library. Shortly before, Carl Peter von Heidenstam, another officer and diplomat at Constantinople, had produced an illustrated travelogue and some watercolours, now in the possession of the Royal Library. The remaining 19th century brought a few more collections: The Drottningholm manuscripts mentioned above; the Engeström manuscripts, of disparate origins, some war-booty, some from the Maghrib, one from the Druze of Syria; the Rålamb manuscripts, including the Costume Book displayed in this exhibition and several documents from the age of Charles XII. The Qur'an donated to Claes Rålamb in 1657 was however acquired separately. |