require('includes/navbar.php') ?>

AFRICA
FIRST to
Timbuktu & Back
(“A
Temboctou”). Caillié, René Auguste. Journal
d'un voyage a Temboctou et a Jenné, dans l'Afrique Centrale, précédé
d'observations faites chez les Maures Braknas, les Nalous et d'autres peuples;
pendant les années 1824, 1825, 1826, 1827, 1828. Paris: L'Imprimerie Royale,
1830. 8vo (21.1 cm, 8.25"). 3 vols. I: Frontis., [4], xii, 472, [4] pp. II: [4],
426 pp. III: [4], 404, [2] pp. (lacking 5 plates and map).
$1500.00
Click the interior image for an enlargement.
First edition. Caillié, a French explorer and adventurer inspired by a boyhood love of Robinson Crusoe, spent eight months in Senegal posing as a convert to Islam and learning Arabic; he was also the first modern European traveller to make a successful voyage to Timbuktu and back — Maj. Gordon Lang preceded him to the city, but was murdered during his travel home. Caillié was
awarded the Société de Géographie de Paris prize of 10,000 francs for his completed trip, despite his description of his travels through Senegal, Mali, and the Sahara's having been met with some skepticism in his native France; the travelogue was better received in England, and very popular in translation there.
Vol. I opens with a steel-engraved portrait of the author.
Howgego, II, C2. Period-style quarter tan cloth and light blue paper–covered sides, spines with printed paper labels. Five plates and one map lacking (frontispiece present); two leaves each with tear along inner margin, not touching text; foxed throughout but without embrittlement.
(24387)
Back to Africa?
American Society for Colonizing the Free People of Colour of the United States. [drop-title] Memorial of the President and Board of Managers of the American Society for Colonizing the Free People of Colour of the United States. January 14, 1817. Read and ordered to lie on the table. [Washington: William A. Davis, 1817]. 8vo. 5 pp.
$175.00
An early document of the American Colonization Society, founded
in December 1816. The memorial urges the transport of free blacks to Africa:
“Those great ends, it is conceived, may be accomplished by making adequate
provision for planting, in some salubrious and and [sic] fertile region, a colony,
to be composed of such ... persons as may choose to emigrate; and for extending
to it the authority and protection of the United States, until it have attained
sufficient strength and consistency to be left in a state of independence.”
Signed in type on p. 5: “Bush. Washington, president.” Government
document: House document (United States. Congress. House); 14th Congress, 2nd
session, no. 37. Printed at head of title in square brackets: 37.
Click
the image to the left
for an enlargement.
Shaw & Shoemaker 42652. Removed from a nonce volume;
inner edge slightly irregular. Leaves once separated, now re-attached at inner
edge with transparent tape. Clean, with only a little darkening along inner
margins. (18246)

First Printing of
Any Portion of the Bible in This Language
Bible. O.T. Genesis. Fang. 1894. La Genèse, premier livre de Moïse. Londres: Societé Biblique Britannique et Étrangè, 1894. 12mo (16 cm; 6.25"). Frontis. color map, 186 pp.
$750.00
Fang is a Bantu language (Niger-Congo genetic) that is spoken in many dialects in northern Gabon, southern Cameroon, and Equatorial Guinea.
This is the first printing of any portion of the Bible in Fang (here Gabon-Fang). The translator was A.W. Marling of the American Presbyterian Mission.
Rare: We trace only two copies in U.S. libraries.
North & Nida, Book of a Thousand Tongues (1972), 387. Publisher's black flexible leather (very black, not the charcoal that our photo seems to show!) stamped in blind and gold: chipped at edges and spine repaired. Now in a cloth clamshell case with a leather spine label. (25426)

One from the
Church of Scotland Mission
Bible. N.T. Lala. 1947. Ichalayano Ichabwangu icha ku Sikulu wesu no Mupanusi wesu Yesu Kristu. Edinburgh & Glasgow: National Bible Society of Scotland, 1947. 12mo (19 cm; 7.5"). [2] ff., 519, [1] pp.
$350.00
Biza-Lala (a.k.a. Lala-Bisa, Ichibiza-ichilala, chiBiza-chiLala, ichiWiiza-Lala) is a “union usage [that] attempts to provide Scriptures in a literary idiom that will serve speakers of both the Wiza and Lala languages. It differs from other union versions . . . in that it follows an actual spoken language found in the Chitambl region” (North & Nida). Lala and Biza are Bantu languages (Niger-Congo genetic) of Zambia, spoken in the east, along Luangwa River (Biza), and the southwest (Lala), Northern, Central, and Eastern provinces. They are also spoken in the Congo.
Click the images for enlargements.
This is the first printing of the New Testament and Psalms in this language. The translation is the work of Cecilia M. Irvine and J.S. Howie of the Church of Scotland Mission.
We locate only three U.S. libraries reporting ownership.
North & Nida, Book of a Thousand Tongues (1972), 1352. Publisher's red cloth, slight discoloration at top of spine and abrasion/discoloration to back cover. Upper outer edges of pp. 17–92 bumped and crumpled, front free endpaper with spots of soil. NOT a dreadful copy but not a fresh one! (25341)
For a NEW, unillustrated, PDF-format list of 100 Bibles, Testaments,
& Bible Parts in Non-European Languages,
click here.
For Books for the BUSTED
BIBLIOPHILE, click here.
First
German-Language Edition
Social
& Economic Causes
of SLAVERY
Buxton, Thomas Fowell. Der afrikanische Sklavenhandel und
seine Abhülse ... mit einer Vorrede: Die Nigerexpedition und ihre Bestimmung. Leipzig: F.A.
Brockhaus, 1841. 8vo (21.6 cm, 8.5"). lxx, 453, [3] pp.; 1 fold. map.
$750.00
First German-language edition: A translation of Buxton's African Slave Trade and Its
Remedy, published in English in two parts in 1839 and 1840. Sir Thomas Fowell Buxton, 1st Baronet,
was an influential humanitarian and evangelical who campaigned against capital punishment,
promoted prison reform, and (most famously) supported the abolition of slavery; Allibone called him
“one of the noblest examples of philanthropic zeal of modern times.” In the present work, he first
analyzes the slave trade in depth, then proposes means of addressing both the economic factors and
the African “Superstitions and Cruelties” enabling the continuation of slavery. The British
government sent a mission to Niger as a result of the author's advocacy of diplomatic efforts, but
recalled it after numerous members of the party died of fever, much to Buxton's dismay; that
expedition is described here in a preface by Carl Ritter.
The volume is illustrated with an oversized, folding engraved map captioned in English.
Uncommon:
OCLC and NUC Pre-1956 find only nine U.S. holdings (one deaccessioned).
Goldsmiths'-Kress 32415.2; Sabin 9688. On Buxton, see: Oxford Dictionary of
National Biography online and Allibone, 317. Boards covered with German-style
black-flecked brown paper, spine with printed paper label. Pages slightly age-toned, with a very few
scattered instances of light spotting; map with faint offsetting and short tear along lower inner margin,
not touching image. An attractive copy. (25325)

Christianity Abroad, at Home, & among the (Jewish?) Native Americans
Crawford, Charles. An essay on the propagation of the Gospel; in which there are numerous facts and arguments adduced to prove that many of the Indians in America are descended from the Ten Tribes ... the second edition. Philadelphia: James Humphreys, 1801. 12mo (18.3 cm, 7.2"). [1] f., 154 pp., [1] f. [with] Woodward, William Wallace. Increase of piety, or revival of religion in the United States of America; containing several interesting letters not before published. Together with three remarkable dreams, in succession, as related by a female in the Northern Liberties of Philadelphia to several Christian friends, and handed to the press by a respectable minister of the gospel. Philadelphia: W.W. Woodward, 1802. 12mo. [1] f., 114 pp.
$750.00
Click the interior images for enlargements.
This volume opens with the second edition, following the first of 1799, of Crawford's rendition of the popular argument that the Native Americans sprang from the lost tribes of Israel. The author considered the North American tribes' alleged Jewish ancestry a special incentive for converting them to Christianity; and, though other opportunities for missionaries (such as in Sierra Leone and the East Indies) are discussed as well, the sections here on the plight of the Indians — on educational and work
projects conceived for them by Philadelphia Quakers, and the speech and letter of Seneca and Mohiconick (signed by “Sachems,” “Counsellors,” and “Owls” — are probably of greatest interest.
The second item here is the first edition of Woodward's collection of revival-themed letters to and from various clergymen, closing with an account of Mrs. Rebecca Ashburn's mysterious dreams. In these dreams a minister unknown to Mrs. Ashburn attempted to save her soul; she later identified her would-be converter as one Dr. William Rogers.
This work is very uncommon in print form. OCLC and NUC Pre-1956 find only five U.S. institutional holdings of this Philadelphia printing, although it is widely held in microform.
Essay: Sabin 17433; Shaw & Shoemaker 370; Rosenbach, American Jewish Bibliography, 123; Singerman, Judaica Americana, 0136. Increase: Shaw & Shoemaker 2587; Sabin 105172. Period-style half mottled calf and marbled paper–covered sides, spine preserving original gilt-stamped leather title-label. Title-page and first text page institutionally pressure-stamped. Pages lightly age-toned, somewhat more so in second work; one leaf with tear from outer margin extending into text. (25209)
Missions
around
the
World, Illustrated
Edwards, Bela Bates. The missionary gazetteer; comprising
a geographical and statistical account of the various stations of the American and foreign Protestant
missionary societies of all denominations, with their progress in evangelization and civilization.
Boston: William Hyde & Co., 1832. 12mo (19.4 cm, 7.6"). Frontis., [4], [ix]–431, [1] pp. (pp. 137/38
bound in out of order); 24 plts.
$225.00
Click the interior image for an enlargement.
First U.S. edition, “prepared upon the basis of a volume
published in London, in 1828, by Mr. Charles Williams” (p. ix). The 1828
Missionary Gazetteer incorporated material from an American work compiled
by the Rev. Walter Chapin, almost all of which has been excised and replaced
with new descriptions for the present work according to Edwards. The reports
are organized alphabetically by city, and describe the establishment of schools,
successes and challenges of conversion, and native habits before and after the
arrival of missionaries among the
Africans,
Chinese, Indians, Native Americans, etc.
The volume is illustrated with a total of
25
wood-engraved plates and a wood-engraved title-page vignette
depicting architectural views, native dress, dwellings, and religious sites.
American Imprints 12263; Sabin 21891. Late 19th-century
half roan with marbled paper–covered sides, spine with gilt-stamped
title; edges and extremities showing moderate shelf wear (refurbished) . Front
pastedown with old seminary bookplate, frontispiece and title-page with faded
rubber-stamps of the same, one preliminary leaf with inked numeral in lower
margin. Most plates with offsetting, pages with scattered light spotting;
otherwise clean and unmarked.
In
fact, a nice copy of an interesting missionary and in part ethnographical
work. (25507)
[Justel, Henri, ed.]. Recueil de divers voyages faits en Afrique et en l’Amerique, qui n’ont point esté encore publiez.... Paris: Louis Billaine, 1674. 4to (23.7 cm, 9.4"). á4ã4A–Z4Aa–Hh4 Ii2Kk4Ll21§–4§45§2 **A–**C4 a2b–g4 *A–*K4L2; [8] ff., 262, 35, [1 (blank)] 23, [1 (blank)], 49, [1 (blank)] pp., [1] f., 81, [1 (blank)] pp., 3 fold. plans, 4 maps (3 fold.), 9 plts.
$6500.00
First edition of this collection of significant and interesting voyages, edited by a scholar and book collector who served in the employ of Louis XIV before being appointed Keeper of the King’s Library at St. James by Charles II. The compilation includes French-language travelogues of Barbados, the Nile River, Ethiopia, “l’Empire du Prète-Jean,” Guiana, Jamaica, and the English colonies, with illustrations including banana and palmetto trees, Caribbean pottery, and maps of New England, Jamaica (including Florida and the Antilles), and Barbados.
Some of both the voyages and the maps make their first published appearances here—among them the New England map depicting the Maryland and Virginia coastlines, engraved by R. Michault after one contained in Richard Blome’s Description of the Island of Jamaica, part of which work appears here translated into French.
Altogether, a volume notable both for its strong African and North American content and for the aesthetic appeal of its plates and pleasingly ornamented typography.

Single-click images where the hand appears on
mouse-over, for enlargements.
Sabin
36944; Alden & Landis 674/159;
Beinecke Lesser Antilles Collection 68; Baer, 17th-Century Maryland,
78. Recent 17th-century style mottled calf with covers framed in a gilt roll
and double-panelled in gilt fillets with gilt-stamped corner fleurons,; spine
with gilt-stamped leather title and author labels and gilt-stamped decorative
devices. Several pages (not including title) and the versos of a few plates
stamped by a now-defunct institution. Paper slightly embrittled. Light waterstaining
to a number of leaves and plates, mostly in margins; the first map with two
repairs. One leaf (blank?) prior to Colonies Angloises excised; lacking the folding map of the Nile. A good
copy, in a handsome binding of recent vintage and contemporaneous style.
(Portuguese Colonialism). Companhia Geral de Pernambuco e Paraíba. Instituiçaõ da Companhia Geral de Pernambuco, e Paraíba. Lisboa: Miguel Rodrigues, 1759. Folio. 30 pp., [1] f.
$2000.00
Following Pombal's success in establishing the trading monopoly known as the Companhia do Grão Pará e Maranhão in 1755, which was to have exclusive rights to the vast northern area of Brazil, the great Portuguese reformer established a similar monopoly for the southern region: the Companhia Geral de Pernambuco e Paraíba. The new company's trade monopoly was to be supreme in the two captaincies noted in its name, with Brazil–Africa/Africa–Brazil commerce—i.e., the slave trade—being specifically included in its perquisites.
The image below left is a composite the bottom of one page, the top of the next showing the slavery clause.


This, the first edition of this publication, contains the statutes of the company in 63 numbered clauses, plus a copy of the royal decree approving them and officially establishing the company. It was to be reprinted in 1776.
Single-click images where the hand appears on
mouse-over, for enlargements.
Several sources, including Rodrigues, call this a "rare" publication.
Borba de Moraes (2nd ed.), Bibliographia brasiliana, I, 419; Maggs Bros., Bibliotheca brasiliensis, 231 (misstating the contents and failing to find it in Rodrigues); Rodrigues 698 "rare." On the Pombaline reforms, see: James Lockhart and Stuart Schwartz, Early Latin America: A history of colonial Spanish America and Brazil. Recent quarter red morocco with raised bands: Gilt beading on, and gilt ruling above and below, each band; gilt center-devices. Marbled paper sides and matching marbled endpapers. Contemporary numbering of the leaves in ink; some contemporary marginalia in ink.
Nice.

WORLD MYTHOLOGY — 8 Vols. & Thousands of Entries
Pozzoli, Giovanni; Felice Romani; Antonio Peracchi, et al. Dizionario storico-mitologico di tutti i popoli del mondo. Livorno: Stamperia Vignozzi, 1824–28. 8 vols. 8vo (21 cm, 8.25"). I: 580 pp. II: 581–1163, [1] pp. (pp. 1057–64 repeated in place of pp. 1065–72). III: [1165]–1708 pp. (pagination 1551–52 repeated, 1687–88 skipped). IV: [1709]–2342 pp. V: 2351–3086 pp. (pagination skips 2519–26). VI: 3087–3855 pp. (pagination skips 3407–08). VII: 576 pp. VIII: 577–1074 pp.
$2500.00
Click the middle and right hand-images for enlargements.
Second edition of this classic dictionary of comparative mythology,
a hefty collection of the deities, heroes, tales, festivals, antiquities, and
other folklore of numerous cultures and countries including Mexico, Peru, America,
Africa,
India, Japan, China, etc, along with Jewish, Greek, and Roman antiquities. The
foundation of the work was François Noel's Dictionnaire de la Fable;
copious additions and corrections were made by Pozzoli, Romani (the famed poet,
scholar, and librettist for La Scala), and Peracchi (another librettist). The
resulting encyclopedic endeavor was originally published from 1809–27
under the title Dizionario d'ogni mitologia e antichità incominciato,
according to Graesse and Brunet, who both give Pozzoli's first name as Girolamo.
This set includes two volumes of supplemental text, adding a number of entries.
The first edition was followed by two volumes of supplemental plates, not
present here and not called for: Graesse describes this edition as “sans
grav.”
The pagination is erratic in a number of places; there is a numbering gap
from 2342 to 2351 between vols. IV and V, but the text and signatures are
uninterrupted.
Uncommon:
OCLC locates only two U.S. institutional holdings of this second edition.
Provenance:
Most volumes with small inked ownership inscription in an outer margin:
“G.R.W.” the mark of William Rollinson Whittingham (1805–79),
fourth Episcopal Bishop of Maryland and an enthusiastic book collector.
Brunet, IV, 851; Graesse, V, 429. Not in Sabin. Contemporary
half binding, recently rebacked with tan paper, spines with printed paper
labels; boards rubbed and faded with small chips, one vol. with front cover
waterstained. Foxing almost throughout, generally no worse than moderate;
light waterstaining in upper margins of vol. I; one leaf in vol. VII with
lower outer portion torn away, with loss of words from about 18 lines on each
side. Vol. II with printer's error replacing pp. 1065–72 with duplicates
of pp. 1057–64; pagination erratic in other places. Most vols. with
ownership mark as above; vol. VI with one pencilled and one inked marginal
annotation. (25862)
Salt, Henry. A voyage to Abyssinia, and travels into the interior of that country, executed under the orders of the British government, in the years
1809 and 1810; in which are included, an account of the Portuguese settlements on the east coast of Africa .... Philadelphia: M. Carey; Boston: Wells & Lilly (pr. by Lydia R. Bailey), 1816. 8vo (23.5 cm, 9.25"). 24, 454 pp.; fold. map.,
illus.
$1250.00
First U.S. edition and printed by Lydia Bailey, following the London first of 1814. Salt, a British traveller and Egyptologist, first visited Ethiopia in 1805, and returned in 1809 on a diplomatic mission intended to promote ties between the British government and the Emperor of Abyssinia. The Voyage gives Salt’s observations of Ethiopian customs, manners, dress, cuisine, and music, along with the factual details of his diplomatic achievements — or lack thereof, in terms of concrete agreements — followed by an appendix comparing vocabulary words from various languages spoken along “the Coast of Africa, from Mosambique to the borders of Egypt, with a few others spoken in the Interior of that Continent” (p. 395).
This is an untrimmed copy in original boards, with
24 pages of advertising for Carey publications bound in at the front of the volume. The preliminary map, engraved by John Bower, has hand-colored border lines; this American edition does not call for the plates found in the English first, but does include in-text depictions of several “Ethiopic inscriptions.”
Shaw & Shoemaker 33864; NSTC 2S3118. Publisher’s quarter tan paper over light blue paper–covered sides; front cover detached and back joint cracked, binding spotted, paper cracked and split along spine, spine label now absent and replaced with hand-inked title, spine with later paper shelving label. Front pastedown with institutional bookplate, front free endpaper with inked ownership inscription dated 1829. Half-title with portion of outer margin torn away (not touching text) and laid in. Map lightly foxed, with two short tears along folds. Pages age-toned, with occasional spots of foxing.
Scotland.
Parliament. Committee concerning the African & Indian Company.
Broadside. Begins: “Minuts [sic]
of the proceedings in Parliament Wednesday 26. February 1707....”Edinburgh:
Heirs of Andrew Anderson, 1707. Folio (31 cm, 12.1"). [1] p.
$500.00
Number 78 (of 89) of the 1706–07 minutes, this is a brief
account of a committee report “anent the Accompts”of a Scottish company
trading to Africa and the Indies, authorized for printing by Andrew Anderson
by decree of Sir James Murray, Lord Clerk Register. Many of the Parliamentary
documents printed by Anderson and heirs display the same misspelling of minutes
as seen in the header of this example.
ESTC T78547 (for holdings of complete sets). Tipped onto
a leaf of 19th-century paper; now in a Mylar folder. Lower margin and
bottom of outer margin slightly tattered to a curve; otherwise relatively
minor creasing, soiling.
A
Swede
in South Africa
Scottish
Edition
Sparrman, Anders. A voyage to the Cape of Good Hope, towards the Antarctic polar circle, and round the world: But chiefly into the country of the Hottentots and Caffres, from the year 1772, to 1776...translated from the Swedish original. Perth: Pr. by R. Morison, Jr. for R. Morison & Son, G. Mudie, & J. Lackington, 1789. 12mo (19 cm, 7.5"). I: Map, frontis., xx, 264 pp.; 2 plts. II: vi, 260 (i.e., 258) pp., [1] f.; 7 plts.
$1300.00
Click the images for enlargements.
Rare first Scottish edition of this travelogue, written by a Swedish
naturalist and pupil of Linnaeus. Sparrman traveled to the Cape ostensibly to
tutor children, with his real goal being “to investigate the Works of Nature
in this remote corner of the globe,” as the preface puts it. In this journal
of his travels he provides a wealth of sociological and naturalistic observations,
and takes special pains to debunk previously supplied tales that he considers
incorrect.
An
appendix of examples of Hottentot and Caffre language is also supplied.
The
engraved plates include illustrations of a rhinoceros, a hippopotamus, dwarf
mice, and Hottentot weaponry, as well as an oversized folding landscape and
a map of the territory covered by the author.
ESTC T131019. Recently rebound in quarter calf over marbled paper
sides, spines with gilt-stamped title labels. Title-page and two others of
vol. I stamped by a now-defunct institution; one page with outer margin reinforced.
Small hole to map. Title-page of vol. II with topmost left portion of title
repaired and replaced in facsimile; title-page and five others stamped. Pagination
skips in vol. II from 136 to 139. A few minor spots of foxing to plates; one
plate with short edge tear carefully repaired.
(Again??)
Back to Africa?
United States. Congress. [drop-title] Report on colonizing the free people of colour of the United States. February 11, 1817. Read, and committed to a committee of the whole House on Monday next. [Washington: William A. Davis, 1817]. 8vo. 5 pp.
$200.00
Click the image for an enlargement.
An early document of the American Colonization Society, founded in December 1816. Concerns the feasibility of negotiating with Great Britain to establish a colony of free blacks in Sierra Leone. Government document: House document (United States. Congress. House); 14th Congress, 2nd session, no. 78. Printed at head of title: [78].
Shaw & Shoemaker 42738; Library Company, Afro-Americana, 10602. Removed from a nonce volume. Lightly pencilled librarian's notation on p. [1]. Leaves separated. (18440)
Search
& Seizure
Van Buren, Martin (President, 18371841). [drop-title] Search or seizure of American vessels on coast of Africa, &c. Message from the President of the United States, transmitting a report from the Secretary of State, in relation to seizures or search of American vessels, &c. March 3, 1841. Read, and laid upon the table. [Washington, 1841]. 8vo. 766 pp.
$400.00


The ships were being stopped as part of England's attempts to end the slave trade. Correspondence between the Secretary of State and the Legation of the United States in London, the British Legation at Washington, and the United States Consulate at Havana. Correspondence dates from 12 February 1836 to 1 March 1841. Government document: 26th Congress, 2d Session. Doc. No. 115. Ho. of Reps. Executive.
Click
the image
for an enlargement.
Disbound; three holes in inner margin, not touching text. Ink notation and numeral on first page. Some dog-earing and tattering in corners and outer margins. Pencillings in several margins. Occasional mild spotting. Now housed in a simple archival phase box. (13455)
And
to Close, Two Inexpensive Little
Volumes . . .
(Africa–East). Ames, Evelyn.
A glimpse of Eden. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, (1967).
$18.00
Illustrated. Second printing. Picture at left.
(Africa). Kane, Robert.
Africa A to Z. Garden City, New York: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1961.
$10.00
First edition. Endpaper maps. Black and white photos. Front cover
soiled.
For
more "Travel Lite" (not necessarily African) —
click here.
PLACE
AN ORDER | E-MAIL
US | GO (BACK) TO TOPIC/INTEREST
TABLE | PRB&M HOME
All material © 2010
The Philadelphia Rare Books & Manuscripts
Company