Photographer: Neurdein, Étienne & Louis-Antonin.
Title: Kairouan - La mosquée des Sabres.
Date: 1906-1915.
Country: Tunisia.
Medium: silver print mounted on black paper.
Size: 12 x 18,5 cm.
Condition: very good.
Reference: ELNI1007/1.
Provenance: British collection.
Extra: titled ((Kairouan - La Mosquée des Sabres), numbered (385) and signed (ND Phot.) in the negative. Mosques of the Sabres (also known as the Zaouia Sidi Amor Abbada) - built in 1860 as the tomb of a local blacksmith, also revered as a holy man.
Étienne Neurdein (1832–1918) and Louis-Antonin Neurdein (1846–1914),  Sons of the photographer Jean César Neurdein (pseudonym Charlet). The Parisian publishing house by was founded in Paris ca. 1864 by Étienne, who was soon joined by his brother, and published postcards marked with an ND logo. Étienne managed the studio and photographed portraits, while Louis-Antonin travelled widely photographing monuments, buildings and landscapes.However, Étienne already had begun publishing postcards in 1875 under the firm name Neurdein et Cie. In 1887 the company was known as Neurdein Frères and as ND. Phot. beginning in 1906. In 1915, the name became Neurdein, and then again, from 1916 to 1918, Neurdein & Cie. The Neurdein company was the largest French publisher of postcards of the time. By the turn of the century, they were being funded by the French government to produce images and postcards of Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia in order to promote colonial tourism and stimulate private investment. The number of Maghreb images they produced were second only to their representations of France. They would send photographers to the colonies to take the pictures, process and edit them in Paris, and then market them to businesses in the North of Africa. The cards were divided into two categories: "views" of major cities and "types and costumes" of the local people.  In 1913, the existing Neurdein postcard plates were acquired by Lévy et fils et Cie, and in 1920, Emile Crété acquired the two companies, and they were joined to form Lévy et Neurdein réunis, located at 44, rue Letellier, Paris, although some cards would continue to be issued either under the Neurdein logo (ND) or the Lévy logo (LL). In 1932, the joint company was acquired by the Compagnie des Arts Photoméchaniques (CAP), although the publishing house remained at 44, rue Letellier. The fund was bought by the Roger-Viollet agency in 1970.