CAILLE (René): Journal d'un Voyage à Temboctou et à Jenné, d - Lot 297

Lot 297
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CAILLE (René): Journal d'un Voyage à Temboctou et à Jenné, d - Lot 297
CAILLE (René): Journal d'un Voyage à Temboctou et à 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 : par René Caillié. With an itinerary map, and geographical remarks, by Mr. Jomard, Member of the Institute. Paris, Imprimerie Royale, 1830. 3 vol. in-8 full contemporary marbled calf and 1 atlas in-4 marbled half calf with contemporary corners, spine ribbed and decorated in the grotesque style (a little rubbed, two spines cracked, corners worn for the atlas), small gilt roulette on the plates of the text volumes, marbled edges. (4)-XII-475 pp. ; 12 pp. of catalog, (4)-426 pp. ; 404-(2) pp, and for the Atlas 1 large folded map by Jomard and 5 plates numbered 2 to 6 on 3 leaves. Rare first edition. Portrait of René Caillé in frontispiece engraved by Couché fils. In 1824 René Caillié (1799-1838) arrived in Senegal "with the crazy dream for the others to penetrate Timbuktu and to win the prize offered by the Geographical Society to the first European who will return from the mysterious city. He prepared himself by going to live with the Moors for a year to learn Arabic and to be initiated into Islam; he could then pass himself off as an Egyptian kidnapped by Bonaparte's French and who wanted to join his own people. In 1828, he entered Timbuktu: There was a deadly silence. Not even the slightest bird could be heard there. The return through the Sahara is a terrible ordeal, his health is broken. But before his premature death, it will be one more trip, the last one, not a read or lived trip, but the writing of his own Trip to Tembouctou and Jenné. This voyage is the product of childhood readings, when Caillié dreamed of knowing the adventures of a Robinson Crusoe and of making some important discovery in this Africa whose maps showed then only unknown deserted or marked countries. In his turn, his own journey will ignite imaginations, will determine vocations. Passion for travel pushed to the extreme, the idea of reaching a forbidden city, of succeeding where others have failed, where others have given up" (In French in the text). Followed by (volume III): Remarks and geographical researches on the voyage of M. e du voyage? followed by the vocabularies collected by M. Caillié, of his itinerary day by day, of the explanation of the plates of the voyage, and of notes on several points of natural history and geography; ended by the documens and various pieces. Some light foxing but a very nice copy in a luxurious full binding of the time, identical for the text and the atlas (which is in half-binding), a very rare condition for this work.
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