In July 1799, a French officer serving in Napoleon's Egyptian expedition unearthed a granite block bearing text in three different scripts €” Greek, demotic Egyptian, and hieroglyphics. Following the discovery, a remarkable competition ensued for possession of the stone as well as for decoding its inscription. Using all the elements of a detective thriller, the authors, a well-known novelist and a leading Egyptologist, tell the story of international intrigue surrounding the intellectual quest to crack the stone's code €” the key to reading ancient Egyptian texts for the first time in 14 centuries. Also included are reproductions of the stone and its inscriptions as well as portraits of the key figures involved in its translation.

The Rosetta Stone: The Story of the Decoding of Hieroglyphics

History

Solé, Robert

Valbelle, Dominique

Americas

Basic Books

Headstrong painter Dora Sawaya meets and soon marries Milo Touta, a confident fledgling photographer from a distinguished Syrian-Greek family, and when he encourages her to take up photography as well, her work quickly surpasses his, causing friction and jealousy between the couple

The Photographer's Wife

Literature & Fiction

Brownjohn, John

Genre Fiction

Harvill Pr

It is mid-summer in 1891 and Emile Touta is gathering his extended family for the annual photograph on the beach at Alexandria, when he falls in love with Dora. Soon they marry. Helping in her new husband s portrait studio, Dora finds herself drawn to photography and her work soon eclipses Emile s efforts. The studio s reputation soars and Cairo s high society is swiftly clamouring to be photographed there. However Dora s behaviour and ambition shock many. Meanwhile nationalism is taking root in British-occupied Egypt. Dora, in a radical gesture of her own, leaves for Khartoum, to cover the British conquest of Sudan. Alone there, she begins finally to reconcile her identities as a talented artist and a woman of her society. Robert Sole s evocation of late 19th century Egyptian society, peopled by a confidently and exuberantly drawn cast of characters, is a powerful historical fiction which makes no concession to sentimental nostalgia.

Harvill Press

Tells the story of the Batrakanis, members of a Syrian family who immigrated to Egypt, where they prosper as fez makers, until the overthrow of King Farouk gives the Egyptians control of their own country for the first time since the pharaohs and ending the popularity of the fez.

Birds of Passage

Literary

The Batrakanis, Syrians living in cosmopolitan Egypt in the early twentieth century, achieve wealth by manufacturing tarboosh until Egyptians once again rule and the family is forced to exile.

Contemporary

When Dora and Emil Touta are married in Egypt in 1861, she begs him to teach her the secrets of his photographic studio. Soon Dora's skill with a camera has far eclipsed Emil's and the studio is the talk of Cairo. But the Cairene elite, however sophisticated, is not ready for a woman as emancipated as Dora, and her marriage shows signs of strain. She must choose between the role of a wife and that of an artist in a society whose own identity is divided as nationalism takes root under British occupation.

Energetic and cosmopolitan, the Batrakani family fate is entwined with that of their adopted land, Egypt, as it is caught in the upheavals of the 20th century. Georges Bey Batrakani is the patriarch of this family of Greek Catholic, French-speaking Syrians, living in a Muslim Cairo run by the British. He is driven by the need to achieve the wealth necessary for the luxury he craves. His chosen method is to manufacture the tarboosh, or fez, worn by every member of the Egyptian establishment. As long as the tarboosh holds sway, the family flourishes. But in 1952, everything must change. Egyptians take the reins of power for the first time since the pharaohs, and the tarboosh becomes an anathema. The Batrakanis, birds of passage, their love affair with Egypt at an end, must move on to a new exile elsewhere.

HARVILL/SECKER

On the very night the young Maxime Touta first arrived in Alexandria, the khedive died. It was January 1863 and the dawn of a new era. Egypt was in thrall to the French, whose Suez Canal would transform Egypt's fortunes, and the pawn of the British, and yet she was Ottoman at heart. For the thirteen-year-old it proved an awakening of every sort, for there he met Albin Balinvin, the Cairo correspondent of the Semaphore d'Alexandrie, a man who was not afraid to speak or write the truth. In years to come he would be Maxime's teacher and mentor. And Nada Sahel came into his life - a young orphan girl under his father's protection and, like the Toutas, a Syrian exile. She would be his life's passion. A successful journalist Maxime looks back over a dramatic and romantic period in history - Egypt's and his own. He casts a wry, affectionate eye over the foibles of both the Touta clan and the nation's rulers, the exuberant nature of family life alongside the political machinations of the day. The Alexandria Semaphore is an enthralling family saga, an authentic reconstruction of Egyptian history and the most tender of love stories.

The Alexandria Semaphore

Alexandria Semaphore

The Harvill Press

The Rosetta Stone was first discovered by Napoleon's army. It took the combined efforts of the best minds of the 19th century to decode its hieroglyphics so that the content could be read for the first time in 14 centuries.

The Rosetta Stone: The Story of Decoding the Hieroglyphics

Religion & Spirituality

Profile Books

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Solé, Robert. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Solé, Robert

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Solé, Robert. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

The Rosetta Stone: The Story of the Decoding of Hieroglyphics

The Photographer's Wife

The Photographer's Wife

Birds of Passage

Birds of Passage

The Photographer's Wife

Birds of Passage

The Alexandria Semaphore

Alexandria Semaphore

The Rosetta Stone: The Story of Decoding the Hieroglyphics