Translations of One Thousand and One Nights
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Translations of One Thousand and One Nights have been made into most of the world's major languages.[1] They include the French translation by Antoine Galland (titled Les mille et une nuits, finished in 1717). Galland's translation was essentially based on a medieval Arabic manuscript of Syrian origin, supplemented by oral tales recorded by him in Paris from Hanna Diyab, a Maronite Arab from Aleppo.[2]
The first English translation appeared in 1706 and was made from Galland's version; being anonymous, it is known as the Grub Street edition. There are two extant copies, one kept in the Bodleian Library and one in Princeton University Library.[3] After this, several English reissues appeared simultaneously in 1708. As early as the end of the 18th century the English translation based on Galland was brought to Halifax, Nova Scotia, Montreal, Philadelphia, New York and Sydney.[3] Generally, translations starting from Galland were censored due to lewd content.[4]
Meanwhile, the original scattered Arabic texts were collected and printed in four corpuses:
- the so-called Calcutta I or Shirwanee Edition (1814–18, 2 volumes)
- the Bulaq or Cairo Edition (1835, 2 volumes)
- the Breslau Edition (1825–38, 8 volumes)
- the Calcutta II or W.H. Macnaghten Edition (1839–42, 4 volumes)
Galland-based English translations were superseded by that made by Edward William Lane in 1839–41. In the 1880s an unexpurgated and complete English translation, The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, was made by Richard Francis Burton.