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The Creswell Library of Islamic Art and Architecture at the American University in Cairo Part One: in the Presence of the Original Owner, 1956-73
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 06 June 2016
Abstract
In 1956 the American University in Cairo (AUC) committed itself to the formidable task of transforming a purchased personal library into a specialized university library supporting research and teaching in a new curriculum in Islamic art and architecture. The library’s original owner, K. A. C. Creswell, the eminent British historian of Islamic architecture, became at age 77 the university’s first professor in the discipline. An agreement that he would have exclusive use of the library during a three-year teaching period set the pattern for later years. Until 1973, while Creswell remained in Cairo, the uncatalogued library, though used by Islamic art faculty and their thesis-writing students, was barely accessible to other Islamic art students and faculty in related fields. Secrecy surrounding the library’s purchase hindered the university’s dealings with Creswell. When the Suez War interrupted final arrangements, Creswell’s exemption from the government-ordered expulsion of British nationals, and permission to move the books to the university, were secured by telling the government of Egypt that the library was Creswell’s gift to AUC.
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- Research Article
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- Copyright
- Copyright © The Art Libraries Society 1992
References
1.
Cairo: AUC Press, 1961; Supplement (1), 1973; Second Supplement, eds., Pearson, J. D. and Scanlon, G., 1984.Google Scholar
2.
Early Muslim Architecture, 2 vols. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1932-40), reprint (New York: Hacker), 1977; Muslim Architecture of Egypt, 2 vols, with vol.1 in 2 parts (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1952-59; reprint (New York: Hacker), 1976.Google Scholar
3.
Hamilton, R. W. ‘Keppel Archibald Cameron Creswell, 1879-1974’. Proceedings of the British Academy, 60 (1974), p.10; Geddes, C. L. ‘K. A. C. Creswell’, p.xiv, Studies in Islamic Art and Architecture in Honour of Professor K. A. C. Creswell (Cairo: AUC Press, 1965), pp.xi–xiv.Google Scholar
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See, e.g., King’s, G. D. ‘Creswell’s Appreciation of Arabian Architecture’, Muq 8, pp.94–102.Google Scholar
5.
A Short Account of Early Muslim Architecture, revised and supplemented by Allan, James W. (Aldershot: Scolar Press; Cairo: AUC Press, 1989 [orig. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1958]). Some articles of the 1920-40 period were less rigorous; see ‘Bibliography of the Writings of K. A. C. Creswell’. Studies in Islamic Art and Architecture in Honour of Professor K. A. C. Creswell, pp.xiv–xix.Google Scholar
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Hamilton, , op.cit., p.9; Gibson, Helen, ‘Knight of the Dead Stones’, Aramco World, 23, no.3 (May-June 1973), pp.2–5.Google Scholar
8.
Malcolm Reid, Donald, ‘Cairo University and the Orientalists’. Journal of Middle East Studies, 19 (1987), p.58; in Reid’s book, Cairo University and the Making of Modern Egypt (Cambridge: Cambridge U. Press, 1990; Cairo: AUC Press, 1991), the phrase became ‘his contempt for Egyptian nationalism and his uncompromising imperialism were legendary’ (p.41). A brief discussion of Cairo University’s library with references to AUC is found on pp.164–68.Google Scholar
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12. McLain’s predecessor John Badeau (later, U.S. Ambassador to Egypt) had tried to purchase the library, Murphy, p.134. McLain’s first approach probably occurred in October 1955, AUCA: McLain to Douglas. Horton, 10/20/55.Google Scholar
13. The visitor, according to a Mr. Rahn of the Swiss Embassy, was McLain; Kessler letter to au., 11/26/91.Google Scholar
14.
Karnouk, Gloria. ‘The Creswell Library: A Legacy’.Muq 8, pp.122–23 and n.12 p.125, citing Muhammad Haykal in Al-Ahram [in Arabic], 11/26/86. Heikal (the customary English transliteration), a friend of Egyptian President Nasser, says that Nasser was consulted and approved. Heikal’s account in English, Cutting the Lion’s Tail: Suez through Egyptian Eyes (London: Deutsch, 1986) errs in saying books were sent to America and that ‘a lot’ were at the American Embassy while Heikal wrote that book (pp.182–3).Google Scholar
15. AUCA: McLain to Creswell, 3/7/56, 3/15/56; cumulative bill to Creswell from Perrott, Fanner & Sims Marshall, 3/4/57 (copy courtesy of C. Kessler).Google Scholar
16. The archives show that this basic document [AUCA: McLain to Creswell, 3/7/57] was later modified in three areas: the university’s increased financial contribution to Creswell and to the bibliography project [below, n.33 and n.39]; the extension of Creswell’s teaching period until August 31, 1960; and, as of March 7, 1960, an agreement that nothing in the collection was to be removed [AUCA: McLain to Creswell, 3/7/60].Google Scholar
Dr. Kessler, who considers the library a gift, believes ‘the eventual arrangement was a life-time appointment as a Distinguished Professor … with a salary’ (her emphasis, note to au., 4/15/92). This description, though roughly resembling the result, does not specify what salary-earning service the Distinguished Professor Emeritus performed for the university.Google Scholar
17. AUCA:KACC, McLain to Creswell, 4-page letter reviewing the arrangements from March 3, 1956 on, 3/7/60.Google Scholar
18. Sequence recounted in AUCA: McLain to Hare, 11/26/56.Google Scholar
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23.
See, e.g., Wassef, Hind, ‘A Mine of Information for Islamic Scholars’, Al-Ahram Weekly, 5/9-13/91.Google Scholar
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27. AUCA: KACC, Sheniti to Creswell, 4/4/59; McLain to Creswell, 11/2/59; Sheniti to Creswell, 3/5/60.Google Scholar
28. On cataloguing Creswell books: Kessler letter to au., 11/26/91; interview, 4/16/92; temporary storage, El-Sawi interview, 11/12/91; on Creswell’s fear of their transfer, Scanlon interview, 10/17/91.Google Scholar
29. This 1981 date, though conflicting with memories linking the end of a two-year process to the 1982 opening of the Main Library, accords with records describing it as unscheduled in April 1978, planned for Fall 1979, and finished in September of 1981; Jones to Duggan, 4/17/78, CAS/CLib; Spencer to Lamont, receipt date 6/10/79, AUCA (Library); Karnouk to Freudenthal, 9/21/81, CAS/CLib; Spencer interviews, 10/20/91, 11/12/91; 5/?/92.Google Scholar
30. AUCA: KACC, Naff to Creswell, 4/4/66.Google Scholar
31.
Rogers, J. M. ‘Architectural History as Literature: Creswell’s Reading and Methods’, Muq 8, p.46.Google Scholar
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33. AUCA:KACC, ‘Promotion and Leave Record’, 10/67, retrospective to 4/56, updated through 1972-73. Inflation obviously had diminished the value of an annual payment originally higher than most AUC faculty salaries. For reference to compensation with no indication of service, AUCA: McLain to Creswell, 10/29/62; for ‘honorarium’, AUCA: Crabbs to Creswell, 5/4/67, 5/22/72. A fourth raise not on the Promotion … Record appears probable, AUCA:KACC, Creswell to KACC, 5/22/72. Creswell referred to ‘my salery [sic]’, AUCA: KACC, Creswell to Crabbs, 5/9/70.Google Scholar
34.
Grabar, Oleg. ‘K.A.C. Creswell and His Work’, Muq 8, says, ‘None of us could have worked without the learned dictionaries Creswell provided … The absence of such work for Iran … and for Anatolia and the Levant has altered … the scholarly effort in those sub-fields’ (p.3).Google Scholar
35. Procedural steps were needed, but she was told in the earliest discussions that the funds were available. Kessler interview, 4/14/92; AUCA:KACC A. Horton to John Marshall, 10/28/57.Google Scholar
36.
Christel, Kessler. The Carved Masonry Domes of Medieval Cairo (London: AARP, 1976). AUC Press publication of a new work, incorporating the dome and qibla studies within their full context, is forthcoming.Google Scholar
37.
Gibson, Helen. ‘Knight of the Dead Stones’, Aramco World, 23, no.3 (May-June, 1972), p.2. The recommendation of Ernst Kuhnel, her Berlin professor whom Creswell had known at Cairo University, had undoubtedly reassured him; C. Kessler interview, 4/14/92.Google Scholar
38.
Hamilton, p.14; cf. Creswell’s specifying her reading of all proof, ‘Preface’, Bibliography p.viii; Dr. Kessler refers to herself as a ‘buffer’, letter to au. 11/26/91.Google Scholar
39. The sum negotiated was well below the university’s cost at publication. Documents of 3/7 and 3/15/56 specify $10,000 maximum to include advertising and promotion; an undated document labeled ‘Document C LE 3500 maximum (c. $10,000); by November, 1960 AUC Press was relaying estimates from the English manufacturer of, £5643 equivalent to c. LE5643 (at 1962 exchange rates c. $16,000). AUCA:McLain to Creswell 3/7/56, 3/15/56; AUCA: KACC n.d.; AUCA: Press J. Lehman to McLain, 11/3/60.Google Scholar
40. Interview, Scanlon, 10/17/91.Google Scholar