Talk:Tarikh al-Sudan

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Spelling
Googling "Tarikh al-Sudan" etc (with quotes) gives the following hits: The Wiki disambiguation page for Tarikh omits "Tarikh es-Sudan" but has 4 others with al. Does Wikipedia have guidelines? Aa77zz (talk) 15:33, 21 November 2008 (UTC)
 * Tarikh es-Sudan - 905 hits (used here)
 * Tarikh al-Sudan - 746 hits (used by Hunwick)
 * Tarikh es-Soudan - 1510 hits (used by Houdas)
 * Tarikh al-Soudan - 3 hits

I've repeated my searches with the language specified and find: Thus Tarikh es-Soudan is the most popular form on the French sites while Tarikh al-Sudan is just ahead on the English site. This is the form used by Hunwick. I propose to move the article - if I can do so without breaking all the links and the redirect. Aa77zz (talk) 11:34, 27 November 2008 (UTC)
 * Tarikh es-Sudan - French 312 hits, English 509 hits
 * Tarikh al-Sudan - French 23 hits, English 587 hits
 * Tarikh es-Soudan - French 718 hits, English 576 hits
 * Tarikh al-Soudan - French 2 hits, English 0 hits

Moved Aa77zz (talk) 12:47, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

René Caillié and the Tarikh
The French version of Encarta states that René Caillié (author of "Timbuctoo: The Mysterious" - 1896) brought back a copy of the Tarikh from Djenné to Paris so that it could be translated by specialists: http://fr.encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_741547696/Tarikh_es-Sudan.html

I would put this in the article if I could find a decent reference. René Caillié mentions the Tarikh es-Sudan. For instance on page 90: "After the human documents I consulted the written, and among all the historical manuscripts collected in my travels the only one to refer to the origin of the Songhois is the Tarik."

Did Octave Houdas translate this version? Perhaps Houdas tells us in his introduction. My local library wouldn’t have his book – I would need to go to the British Library. Aa77zz (talk) 12:35, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

How old are the existing manuscripts?
Stimulated by the excellent FA on the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, I wondered about the age of the existing copies of the Tarikh and whether we knew which had been copied from which. Hunwick mentions seven manuscripts (MS A-G). From Hunwick’s footnotes it would appear that they are all quite similar.
 * MS A – Used by Houdas - no info in Hunwick
 * MS B – Used by Houdas – BNP MS 5256 (Houdas Manuscript B - copied in Djenne by Felix Dubois See Houdas and Dubois)
 * MS C – BNP MSS Arabes, 6096 (would appear to be MS C of Houdas - date is 1206/1792 - see Gallica link and Houdas
 * MS D – Bibliotheque de l'Institut de France, Paris, MS 2414 (Fonds De Gironcourt 200). (Hunwick page xvii: Mid-eighteenth century)
 * MS E - Bibliotheque Nationale, Alger, Fonds Ben Hamouda, MS 4.
 * MS F – Centre de Documentation et de Recherches Historiques Ahmad Baba, Timbuktu, MS 660. (Hunwick page xviii: undated by probably nineteenth century)
 * MS G - Centre de Documentation et de Recherches Historiques Ahmad Baba, Timbuktu, MS 681. (Hunwick page xviii: undated by probably nineteenth century)

I looked at library catalogues. MS B and C are in the BNF (downloaded catalogue as a pdf)
 * MS B – second half of the 19th century
 * MS C – 19th century
 * MS D – Using MS number given by Hunwick and found: http://www.calames.abes.fr/pub/institut.html#details?id=IF2C11219 MS 2414: Pièce 200: Histoire des Songhois et des rois du Soudan (No author, title or date given – difficult to find without knowing MS number).

Thus MS D is the oldest and is mid-eighteeth century. Aa77zz (talk) 14:53, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

Links to Gallica from French Wikipedia: Aa77zz (talk) 21:55, 16 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Manuscrits à la bibliothèque nationale de France :
 * Taʾriḫ al-Sūdān, traité d'histoire des Songhay et de Tombouctou (années 1790) (manuscrit arabe N° 6096)
 * Taʾriḫ al-Sūdān, traité d'histoire des Songhay et de Tombouctou (manuscrit arabe N° 5256)
 * Taʾriḫ al-Sūdān, traité d'histoire des Songhay et de Tombouctou (manuscrit arabe N° 5147)

Note that Houdas manuscript A is BNF 5147. Houdas manuscript C was sent to him - no BNF number specified.

Aa77zz (talk) 17:20, 25 May 2013 (UTC)