(1991). Soldiers in trade: the case of Ottoman Cairo. British Society for Middle Eastern Studies. Bulletin: Vol. 18, No. 1, pp. 16-37.
French interest in the Arab countries of the Mediterranean is long-standing, the result of the geographical proximity of France to these countries and the commercial ties that developed between France and the échelles of the Levant. Travel accounts of the eighteenth century afforded the French a systematic, practically scientific familiarity with these countries, one that culminated in the Description de l'Egypte. French colonization of the Arab countries of North Africa and the Middle East only increased this interest. From 1830 to 1950, scholarly research was dominated by Orientalism, though colonial prejudices served only to tinge these thorough studies, whose results are often still valid. Research during the years 1950–70 underwent a transition marked by the process of decolonization. Since the 1970s, French research has experienced a rapid expansion, particularly in the field of urban studies, which is one of its traditional strong points.
Daniel Crecelius and ‘Abd Al-Wahhab Bakr (tr.): Al-Damurdashi's Chronicle of Egypt 1688–1755, al-Durra al-Musana fi Akhbar al-Kinana. (Arab History and Civilization. Studies and Texts, Vol. 2.) xii, 424 pp., foldout map. Leiden: EJ. Brill, 1991. Guilders 220, $125. - Volume 57 Issue 2
(1994). Islamic city, Arab city: orientalist myths and recent views. British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies: Vol. 21, No. 1, pp. 3-18.
L’histoire d’Alep a l’epoque ottomane est a la fois bien connue et entouree d’une certaine obscurite. La reference indispensable pour qui etudie la grande ville de Syrie du Nord est naturellement l’ouvrage magistral que lui a consacre J. Sauvaget (1941), il y a tout juste un demi-siecle. Mais il est a peine necessaire de rappeler la contradiction etonnante qui existe entre l’etude perspicace de Sauvaget sur l’Alep ottomane, dont il montre bien l’eclat materiel et architectural, et les conclus...
La structure urbaine est conforme a la structure des grandes villes arabes de l'epoque avec une zone centrale fortement occupee par les activites economiques (commerce et artisanat) et une zone peripherique constituee de quatre grands quartiers. Le faible niveau des activites economiques specialisees dans une ville moyenne comme Constantine apparait comme tres frappant lorsqu'on la compare aux grandes villes du temps. Ce niveau peut etre apprecie par le nombre de marches et de corporations de metiers
The centre of Algiers which has been destroyed in the two years following the French occupation can be restored, thanks to the documents preserved in the Archives of the French "Génie", in Vincennes. This reconstruction, which sustains the work of Eudel, allows us to complete our knowledge of the general structure of the town before the colonial conquest, in 1830.
