[Rarebooks] fa: FORSTER - HISTOIRE DES DECOUVERTES et des VOYAGES FAITS dans LE NORD - 1788

[Ardwight Chamberlain]

Listed now, auction ending Sunday, March 2. More details and images can be found at the URL below or by searching under the seller name arch_in_la.

http://tinyurl.com/ol8vnv2

Thanks again,
Ardwight Chamberlain
L.A.

Johann Reinhold Forster: Histoire des découvertes et des voyages faits dans le Nord. Mis en Français par M. Broussonet. Avec trois Cartes Géographiques. Paris: chez Cuchet, 1788. First edition thus. Two volumes, 8vo (20.5 cm), in later half calf and marbled boards with morocco spine labels; xiii, [1], 399, [1] pp.; xii, 410, [2] pp; complete with the half-titles and 3 folding maps, hand-colored in outline. Howes F269; Sabin 25137.

The first French edition of this invaluable survey of expeditions in northern climes and voyages in search of the Northwest and Northeast Passages from ancient times to the 1770s. Of particular interest is Forster's account of Captain Cook's voyage of 1776, as there was no love lost between the author and the explorer. Forster had served as senior naturalist on Cook's second voyage (1772-75), but his notoriously irritable temper had resulted in his being banned from contributing to any of the official accounts of the expedition. Many other voyages are described, including those of Cabot, Frobisher, Henry Hudson, Juan de Fuca, Nicolo Zeno, the Phoenicians, Arabs, Romans, Greeks, etc. Complete with all three folding maps (hand-colored in this set): the polar region, northern Asia, and Europe at the time of Alfred the Great.

Minor wear and bumping to the extremities, cracking to the joints near the crown of vol. I, but both boards are secure; occasional modest toning and a few small scattered spots to the text, otherwise the contents are very clean and crisp, firmly bound; the fine folding maps exquisitely hand-colored (they are almost always found uncolored, as issued). A handsome set.