The Holy Land In The Original Cloth
I suppose it was an understandable statement because really there is no substitute for being able to visit a rare book shop or fair, and being able to see and handle the beautiful, sensual objects that books can be, in order to understand the age-condition conundrum.
The books I’ve chosen for my weekly selection need no apology where condition is concerned. The Holy Land, the cradle of three great religions, steeped in antiquity of an age that is difficult to fathom for those of us from more recent civilizations, has always attracted travellers and writers.
Cloth became the dominant binding for books sometime in the early nineteenth century, and it was not long before very attractive examples in a wide variety of styles were being produced.
George Robinson’s Travels in Palestine and Syria, an elegant work from 1837, in pale blue fine ribbed cloth, with restrained blind-stamped decoration, is quite hard to find in any condition. Little is known of the author save that he was obviously a man of some means, able to travel for years on end without having to work. The present book gives an account of a visit to a friend in the Ionian Islands in 1829 and was tempted by the proximity of the Levant into making his present journey. He travelled via Egypt having spent a winter in Smyrna. From there he travelled to Jaffa visiting the whole of Syria and Palestine arriving at Constantinople at the end of 1831. It is a very perceptive account with interesting chapters on his time in Palestine.
Nowadays when thinking of the Church of England (C of E), we don’t normally think of fervour. In the not so distant past, however, the C of E was far more self-confident, and nothing quite displayed this like a tour of the Holy Land. For this reason, I’m always a bit wary of reverends in Holy Places. James Laird Patterson’s Journal of a Tour (1852), could easily have fallen into that category. I think, though, that he has managed to steer a middle course between enthusing about his beliefs and what he observed around him. The book itself is more elaborately bound than Robinson’s and shows the rapid sophistication of cloth bindings.
A little more to my personal taste is the account of the Frenchman, Louis de Saulcy. His Narrative of a Journey round the Dead Sea, 1854, was occasioned by his looking for something interesting ‘in a place fraught with danger’. De Saulcy made several important discoveries including the site of the city of Jericho. This second edition shows the continuing elaboration of cloth with pictorial blind-stamped camels to the covers.
Discover more: The Holy Land, Syria and Arabia
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[Text in Persian and French]. Sefer Nameh.
NASIR-i KHUSRAW.Original price £3,500.00 - Original price £3,500.00Original price £0.00£3,500.00£3,500.00 - £3,500.00Current price £3,500.00Mecca and Bahrain. The scarce original printing of Schefer's translation of the Safarnama, an eleventh century account of a pilgrimage to Mecca fro...
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Records of the Persian Gulf pearl fisheries 1857-1962
[ARABIAN GULF]; Anita Burdett, editor.Original price £1,500.00 - Original price £1,500.00Original price £0.00£1,500.00£1,500.00 - £1,500.00Current price £1,500.00A very important work on the pearl fisheries of the Arabian Gulf, bringing together in a single research collection all relevant documents from Br...
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Records of the Emirates 1966-1971
[ARABIAN GULF]; Anita Burdett, editor.Original price £2,750.00 - Original price £2,750.00Original price £0.00£2,750.00£2,750.00 - £2,750.00Current price £2,750.00A Very important collection of documents covering the period in Arabian Gulf history which saw the British withdrawal from the region.6 vols, 8vo,...
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Records of the Emirates 1961-1965
[ARABIAN GULF].Original price £2,750.00 - Original price £2,750.00Original price £0.00£2,750.00£2,750.00 - £2,750.00Current price £2,750.00A comprehensive collection of documents covering an important period in the history of the Arabian Gulf. Includes much on oil and water disputes, ...
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Historic maps of Bahrain 1817-1970.
[BAHRAIN].Original price £1,500.00 - Original price £1,500.00Original price £0.00£1,500.00£1,500.00 - £1,500.00Current price £1,500.00A comprehensive collection containing 69 maps and charts of Bahrain originally produced between 1817 and 1970. The volumes are divided into naval ...
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A history of Persian navigation.
HASAN, Hadi.Original price £1,250.00 - Original price £1,250.00Original price £0.00£1,250.00£1,250.00 - £1,250.00Current price £1,250.00Hasan's History of Persian Navigation is based on Chinese, Persian and Arabic sources, and provides the first scholarly account of the history of ...
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Egypt, the Sinaitic Desert and the Holy Land.
AGATE, Margaret M.Original price £1,500.00 - Original price £1,500.00Original price £0.00£1,500.00£1,500.00 - £1,500.00Current price £1,500.00Scots in the Sinai. Margaret Agate kept a diary of her journey in Egypt between Autumn 1901 and Spring 1902. She made an excursion on the Nile and ...
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Desert, Marsh and Mountain
THESIGER, Wilfrid.Original price £1,750.00 - Original price £1,750.00Original price £0.00£1,750.00£1,750.00 - £1,750.00Current price £1,750.00Signed limited edition. Thesiger's splendid look back at his earlier explorations in Abyssinia, the Arabian gulf, Iraq, and Yemen, in a well illust...
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The Autobiography: Traveller's Prelude; Beyond Euphrates; The Coast of Incense; Dust in the Lion's Paw.
STARK, FreyaOriginal price £1,000.00 - Original price £1,000.00Original price £0.00£1,000.00£1,000.00 - £1,000.00Current price £1,000.00Complete set of Stark's autobiography. Freya Stark is one of the most well known female travellers associated with the Middle East. She was one of ...
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