Jeddah : Old and New : With the Compliments of Mohamed Said Farsi, Mayor of Jeddah
57: Stacey International, 1982. 3rd revised edition. Hardcover. In a slipcase. Text in English. 143 pp. Full color and b/w photos. Signed and inscribed in Arabic by Mohamed Said Farsi, The Mayor of Jeddah.
Jeddah in the last quarter of the twentieth (Gregorian) century – or the first quarter of the fifteenth Hijra century – is a phenomenon. It is an ancient Arabian city, and the core of it is, to this day, traditionally Arab : a highly compact complex of fine nineteenth century merchants houses, mosques, schools and humbler dwellings, deep shaded alleys and a labyrinth of markets and walkways, with the history of its indigenous inhabitants written on every fanlight and corbel, lattice and balcony, dome and minaret.
Jeddah has traditionally been the commercial centre of Saudi Arabia. At the same time, ever since the foundation of Islam fourteen Hijra centuries ago, it has been the arrival and assembly point every year for Muslims from all over the world closing in upon Holy Mecca on the greatest journey of their lives, the hajj pilgrimage.
These attributes remain with Jeddah. Yet today it is also a modern city growing at an unprecedented rate, whose 1980 population of about one million, having doubled in the previous six years, is expected to have more than doubled again in the following twenty years. It has grown, remarkably, with a grace and controlled purpose that does much credit to those who preside over its extraordinary expansionist energy.
It is a city, therefore, with a strikingly modern face, sophisticated in its infrastructure and services, with an ancient heart which – as its guardians recognise – it cannot "live" without. This work is a record of Jeddah, "Bride of the Red Sea" – Arab, Islamic, and cosmopolitan, Old and New : a unique seat of civilisation at a unique moment in its history. Fine / Near Fine. Item #6309
ISBN: 0905743229
Price: $700.00