[Rarebooks] fa: TRAVELS OF ANACHARSIS IN GREECE - 31 Engraved MAPS, PLANS, VIEWS &c. 1791

[Ardwight Chamberlain]

Listed now, auction ending Sunday, November 5. Images and more details can be found at the URL below or by searching for the seller name arch_in_la. 

http://tinyurl.com/ychnzkto

Thanks,
Ardwight Chamberlain
Ann Arbor, MI, USA

[Jean Denis Barbie du Bocage:] Maps, Plans, Views and Coins, Illustrative of the Travels of Anacharsis the Younger in Greece, during the Middle of the Fourth Century before the Christian Ǣra. London: Printed for G. G. and J. Robinson, Paternoster-Row, MDCCXCI [1791]. First edition; 4to (29 cm), untrimmed, in modern linen-covered boards with printed spine label; 51, [1] pp., plus 31 folding and double-page engraved plates, some hand-colored in outline (complete). eSTC N70932.

A companion to J. J. Barthelemy's epic fictional travel narrative, Voyage of Anacharsis the Younger, with thirty-one handsome engraved plates by T. Cooke after Barbie du Bocage, a French cartographer and geographer who also wrote the introductory essay, "Critical observations on the maps of ancient Greece." The plates consist of 26 maps and plans (1 folding, 11 hand-colored in outline), 4 views, and a depiction of ancient coins.

A rather uncommon work: eSTC locates only 2 individual copies in the UK, 3 in the U.S. All the leaves have been mounted on stubs at the gutter; large folding map of Greece strengthened along the folds; plate no. 28 ("Plato on the Promontory of Sunium discoursing to his Disciples") somewhat foxed and laid down on modern paper; otherwise, except for occasional modest offsetting and a few scattered spots to the margins, very clean and fresh. Title-page with the early (1799) signature of "P. Miller of Dalswinton," presumably Patrick Miller of Dalswinton (1731-1815), the early patron and friend of Robert Burns whose lease to the poet of ellisland Farm proved a disastrous transaction for both. An amateur engineer and inventor, Miller is remembered as a leading pioneer of steam navigation.