The School of Languages (Madrasat al-Alsun)
Muhammad ‘Ali was seized of an awareness of the urgent need for a translation program among the various languages in use in Egypt so that the sciences and knowledge needed for the establishment of a modern state and a nation blessed with affluence could be introduced. Egypt, however, lacked sufficient translators to be able to cater to this urgent need, and Muhammad ‘Ali therefore set up Madrasat al-Tarjama (The School of Translation), or Madrasat al-Mutarjimin (The Translators’ School), in 1251/1835. This school, later to become famous as Madrasat al-Alsun (The School of Languages), was run by a prominent scholar of the time named Rifa‘a al-Tahtawi, an al-Azhar graduate who had studied for five years in Paris. At the School of Languages, students were taught mathematics, geography, history, and similar subjects, in addition to Arabic, Turkish, and French. Given that most of the students were Egyptian, it would be difficult to claim that the school registered great success in the teaching of Turkish; nor did Rifa‘a al-Tahtawi know any languages other than Arabic and French, and this too may have had an impact. Nevertheless, the five-year program in Turkish language at the school definitely provided an opportunity for a group of young Egyptians who had taken this course and been trained in general knowledge to emerge who were capable of undertaking translations between Arabic and Turkish. The following are the names of a number of graduates of the School of Languages who made an effective contribution to the educational and cultural life of Egypt prior to the death of Muhammad ‘Ali:21
• Khalifa b. Mahmud al-Misri: joined the school in 1836-37 and taught at various Egyptian schools, then worked as a tutor to Prince Mustafa. He was a member of the Maarif Meclisi (Education Council) in Istanbul while resident there. He published Kaldid el-cumdn Ji fevdid el-tercuman (The Ropes of Pearls on the Virtues of the Dragoman) (1266/1850), whose first part contains an Arabic-Turkish-French dictionary while the second consists of the rules of French grammar explained in Turkish and Arabic on facing pages.
• Murad Muhtar Morali: joined the school in 1837 and was later employed as director of the Khedival Library.
He knew Turkish, Greek, Arabic, and French and had a work printed in Egypt under the title el-Nuhbet el-zekiyefi el-lugat el-Turkiye (The Fragrant Bouquet on the Turkish Language) (1873, 1877, 1882-83, and 1891-92), as well as a translation into Arabic entitled Qissat Abi ‘Ali ibn Sina wa-shaqiqihi Abi al-Harith wa-ma hasal lahuma min nawadir al - ‘aja ’ib wa-shawarid
Al-ghara ’ib (The Story of Abu „ , l, >
° Mehmed Kadri Bey (later Pasha), author
Ali ibn Sina and His Br°ther Abu of the dictionary el-Durr el-muntahab
Al-Harith and of the Rare Marvels min lugat el-Fransis ve el-Osmaniytn
And Queer Wonders that Befell v" el-Arab (Pear's Selecttd fr°m the
Languages of the French, the Ottomans,
Them) (1880, 1888, 1895, 1896). and the Arabs)
• Laz Mehmed Efendi: joined the school in 1837. We know little of his life. He translated a number of books into Arabic, and also produced a translation into Turkish of a book translated into Arabic from the French by Mara§li Mehmed Effendi and entitled, in Turkish, Irmaklar ile derelerin istik§dfma dairdir (On the Exploration of Rivers and Streams) (1859-60).
• Mustafa el-Giridi: joined the school in 1837. He knew Turkish, Greek, Arabic, and French.
• Mehmed Kadri Pasha (1821-88): joined the school after 1838. He was the son of an Anatolian father and an Egyptian mother. The khedive chose him as a tutor for the heir to the throne. He held a number of posts, becoming minister of justice in Sharif Pasha’s Constitutional Party cabinet in 1881 under Khedive Tawfiq and later minister of education in Sharif Pasha’s fourth cabinet. He wrote a number of books, mostly on law, and compiled a dictionary that he entitled el-Durr el-muntahab min lugat el-Fransis ve el-Osmaniyin ve el-Arab (Pearls Selected from the Languages of the French, the Ottomans, and the Arabs) (1875).22
• ‘Ali al-Jizawi: appears from his name to have been raised in the area of al-Jiza, to the south of Cairo. Nothing is known of his life except that he was employed as a teacher in the Egyptian schools and may have studied at the School of Languages. He translated from Arabic into Turkish a book entitled Tercumet ifdzat el-ezhdn fi riyazet el-sibyan (The Translation of The Exhaustive Mental Exercise on Mathematics for Boys) (1259/1843), a book on mathematics originally written in French and translated by Rifa‘a al-Tahtawi into Arabic.
It would seem that of the six individuals discussed above, only the last, ‘Ali al-Jizawi, did not have Turkish as his mother tongue, or as the language of his base culture. He seems to have learned Turkish at the school and made, as previously noted, some translations between Turkish and Arabic, the difference between him and the others being that he lacked the ability to translate directly from a third, European, language into Turkish.
The Translation Chamber (Ghurfat al-Tarjama/Tercume Odasi)
When the number of translators from French into Arabic who had graduated from the School of Languages had grown, a need emerged for an apparatus capable of supervising and monitoring the soundness of their translations. It was not sufficient to know grammar and syntax to be able to translate from French, especially where science books were concerned. Thus, in 1258/1841, the Ghurfat al-Tarjama (Translation Chamber) was established within the School of Languages, and was charged with the supervision and monitoring of translations in progress.23 The Chamber consisted of four bureaus. The first translated works on mathematics, the second on medicine and physics, the third on social and human sciences, and the fourth was confined to translation into Turkish. This arrangement makes it clear that there were not enough translators into Turkish to allow specialization by subject matter.
A person of experience in the field was appointed to head each bureau. He was assisted by another, in addition to a specified number of students from the school. Minas Effendi, translator for the Schools Office, was appointed head of the Turkish Bureau, with four students from the school under his supervision and four scribes to make fair copies. During the short-lived governorship of Ibrahim Pasha, the Translation Chamber was reorganized into two bureaus, Turkish and Arabic. At the same time, Major General Kani Bey, head of the Turkish Bureau, was appointed head of the whole chamber and asked Ibrahim Pasha to transfer capable translators and assistants from other government departments in Egypt to it.24
There can be no doubt that the energy these two institutions imparted to the translation program contributed to the noticeable increase in the number of books translated from Arabic to Turkish. This new development made checking and supervision of the translations undertaken by the recent graduates of the School of Languages obligatory. The committee of experts referred to above was formed by Muhammad ‘Ali Pasha two years after the creation of the Translation Chamber and included Sulayman Pasha, Mahmud Bey, Kani Bey, and Hakkakyan Bey; it checked the translations into Arabic and Turkish of sixty-seven books and approved the printing of fourteen of them.25
World History
