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Sale 2543 - Lot 319
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Sale 2543 - Lot 319
Estimate: $ 600 - $ 800
Niebuhr, Carsten (1733-1815) Description de L'Arabie. Larg quarto, two volumes in one, half-titles present in both volumes, illustrated with twenty-five plates and maps, many folding, and one folding typographical table (plates 13 and 14 trimmed with some marginal loss); later full marbled sheepskin with blue paste-paper endpapers, gilt decorated spine (binding quite worn and chipped), contents good, ex libris S. P. Scott with bookplate inside front board and signature on ffep, likely American attorney and author Samuel Parsons Scott (1846-1929) whose book collection contained 8,000 volumes at his death, 9 3/4 x 7 1/4 in. Paris: Chez Brunet, 1779.
Revised and enlarged edition, including Niebuhr's detailed ethnographic, geographic, and linguistic observations. The sole survivor of his ill-fated expedition, the author traveled in the Middle East between 1761 and 1767. His maps, town plans, and transcriptions of cuneiforms are practicularly important. As his fellow Europeans succumbed to local diseases, Neibuhr adopted local dress and diet, and survived.