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LANGSDORFF, Georg Heinrich von (1744-1852). Voyages and Travels in various Parts of the World, during the years 1803, 1804, 1805, 1806, and 1807. London: B. Clarke for Henry Colburn, 1813.
2 volumes, 4o (280 x 220 mm). Frontispiece portrait, folding map and 20 engraved plates. (Some light offsetting, and staining.) Contemporary cloth, paper spine label, uncut, partially unopened (rebacked preserving original spine, light chipping to spine labels). Provenance: James Wickersham, bibliographer, compiler of A Bibliography of Alaskan Literature, 1927 (bookplate); Thomas W. Streeter (bookplate; his sale part VI, Parke Bernet, 22 April 1969, lot 3506; purchased from Edward Eberstadt & Sons, 1941).
FIRST EDITION IN ENGLISH. An important account of the Russian Embassy to Japan, the Alaska fur trade and the Russian settlement in California, by one of the scientists on Krusenstern's world voyage for the Czar of Russia. Expedition ships Nadeshda and Neva investigated the Marquesas, described and illustrated in detail here and with Langsdorff's appended vocabulary of the islands. With Count Rezanov, a founder of the Russian American Company and Russian Ambassador to Japan, he sailed to Japan to open trade talks (which failed), but their stay is finely detailed and illustrated to include a voyage to Hokkaido and an appended vocabulary of the Ainu language. Langsdorff left the expedition in Kamchatka with Rezanov in 1805 and sailed for Alaska and Sitka, the site of the first Russian fort, and continued to California, the first Russian settlements at Fort Ross and San Francisco. The second volume further describes the Pribilof Islands, Unalaska, Sitka, Kodiak, the native inhabitants and the Russian American Company: "Voyage to the Aleutian Islands, and the North-West Coast of America, and return by land over the North-East Parts of Asia, through Siberia, to Petersburgh," which Sabin credits as having the fullest account of Sitka and San Francisco to date. Returning to Kamchatka, Langsdorff made his way back to St Petersburg via Yakutsk from Okhotsk, also described in detail. Arctic Bibliography 9665. Hill 969; Kroepelien 708; Sabin 38896; Streeter sale VI: 3506 (this copy); Wickersham 6245. See Lada-Mocarski 69 (German edition). (2)
2 volumes, 4
FIRST EDITION IN ENGLISH. An important account of the Russian Embassy to Japan, the Alaska fur trade and the Russian settlement in California, by one of the scientists on Krusenstern's world voyage for the Czar of Russia. Expedition ships Nadeshda and Neva investigated the Marquesas, described and illustrated in detail here and with Langsdorff's appended vocabulary of the islands. With Count Rezanov, a founder of the Russian American Company and Russian Ambassador to Japan, he sailed to Japan to open trade talks (which failed), but their stay is finely detailed and illustrated to include a voyage to Hokkaido and an appended vocabulary of the Ainu language. Langsdorff left the expedition in Kamchatka with Rezanov in 1805 and sailed for Alaska and Sitka, the site of the first Russian fort, and continued to California, the first Russian settlements at Fort Ross and San Francisco. The second volume further describes the Pribilof Islands, Unalaska, Sitka, Kodiak, the native inhabitants and the Russian American Company: "Voyage to the Aleutian Islands, and the North-West Coast of America, and return by land over the North-East Parts of Asia, through Siberia, to Petersburgh," which Sabin credits as having the fullest account of Sitka and San Francisco to date. Returning to Kamchatka, Langsdorff made his way back to St Petersburg via Yakutsk from Okhotsk, also described in detail. Arctic Bibliography 9665. Hill 969; Kroepelien 708; Sabin 38896; Streeter sale VI: 3506 (this copy); Wickersham 6245. See Lada-Mocarski 69 (German edition). (2)