Volney

1821 · ref. 160633 — Paris: Bossange Frères 1821. With autograph material by the author First complete collected works. Bound into this set are five letters by Volney including one dated only a week before his death addressed to his friend Colonel Pierre Jacotin the head geographer responsible for all mapping operations during Bonaparte's Egyptian campaign. The letters underscore Volney's keen engagement with the contemporary discourse surrounding the geography of the Arabian Peninsula Egypt and the Levant. Jacotin met Volney in Corsica in the 1790s while working as a cadastral mapper. His conversations with Volney - who had travelled extensively to Egypt and Syria - eventually inspired him to pursue a career in Egypt where he was later assigned as military cartographer to the Napoleonic expedition. Jacotin's account of the cartographic survey work conducted in the area later formed the basis of the monumental Description de l'Égypte. Bound in at the beginning of the first volume are three letters sent by Volney to Jacotin from Paris respectively dated 20 March 11 April and 17 April 1820 Volney died on 25 April. A fourth letter at the end of vol. IV is dated 24 October. In the first letter Volney apologises for not having been able to receive Jacotin who had come to visit him the day before due to a bad fever. In the others Volney asks Jacotin for help and advice with preparing the plates specifically the maps for an English edition of his Ruines which "a bookseller" had asked him permission to publish; he also points out misspellings appearing in earlier states of the plates for example correcting toponyms in the Arabian Peninsula. No details are given concerning the edition in question. The first translation of the Ruins appeared in 1792 and was followed by numerous others. Further manuscript pages in Volney's hand are tipped into the first volume with a note gifting them to Jacotin. These contain an extract from an anonymous article published on 1 July 1819 in The Monthly Magazine London with the title "Account of Newly-Discovered Antiquities in Arabia Petraea Derived from the Personal Inspection of a Recent British Traveler". The traveller was William John Bankes 1786-1855 and the article is concerned with the projected publication of his voyage. Bankes travelled from Jerusalem to Wadi Musa passing through Kerak Castle Mount Hor and Petra; he describes the ancient Roman ruins that he saw during the trip and recounts sojourning with the Bedouin transcribing a Bedouin love song. Volney translates part of the article into French and adds his own comments and questions. A philosopher and orientalist Volney 1757-1820 wrote extensively on history religion politics and linguistics. His major works include Voyage en Syrie et en Egypte published in 1787 which had a profound impact on the Western view of the region and inspired Napoleon to undertake his invasion of Egypt in 1798 and Les Ruines 1791 a philosophical treatise on the history of social political and religious institutions and the rise and fall of empires. According to the distinguished American historian Ussama Makdisi holder of the Arab-American Educational Foundation Chair of Arab Studies at Rice University Volney's Voyage en Égypte et en Syrie "was simply the first of the great works of modern travel writing and description. Volney was a man of the Enlightenment. His work was suffused with its vocabulary and his humanism motivated him to travel to Asia to better understand the nature of 'despotism' under which his native France laboured" Makdisi p. 17. 8 vols octavo 204 x 123 mm. With 40 engraved plates many folding including portrait of author tables and maps. Contemporary quarter calf smooth spines divided by gilt fillets gilt and black ornaments in compartments black calf labels marbled boards endpapers and sides black silk bookmarkers. Embossed library stamp lettered "Ct Perret Havre" on front free endpaper of vol. I perhaps Auguste Perret 1874-1954 French architect active in Le Havre. Extremities rubbed couple of small chips short superficial splits at foot of front joints of vols. V and VIII remaining firm patches of stripping to leather of vols II and III occasional light foxing to contents faint damp stain to lower margin of final leaves and folding plates of first 5 vols otherwise generally bright and clean. A very good set. Ussama Makdisi The Culture of Sectarianism: Community History and Violence in Nineteenth-Century Ottoman Lebanon 2000. hardcover