4to. Volume I: xiii, [1], 329 pp., without half-title, 2 engraved plates including a frontispiece portrait of Futih Ulee Shah (Fat'h-Ali Shah Qajar, King of Persia) and and engraved portrait plate of Shaknubat, mistress of Kureem Khan, both after Persian originals, printed by T. Cadell & W. Davies, London, first English edition, 1807 / Volume II: A History of the Mahrattas; to which is Prefixed, an Historical Sketch of the Decan: containing a short account of the rise and fall of the Mooslim sovereignties prior to the era of Mahratta independence: xii, 279 pp., 2 engraved plates heavily foxed, appendices, errata, including list of subscribers, printed for John Richardson, London, first edition, 1810, contemporary calf, lightly marked, professionally rebacked with new spine, some spotting and browning, Provenance: A. Guillim, early ownership inscription on title pages, 1807-1810.

Synopsis

The author was working in the Bengal Civil Establishment. This work is the first English edition after a previous edition that was originally published in Bombay in 1804 with numerous errors. The author describes his voyage from India to Bushire through the Gulf, including a chapter on Arab horses, an early account of Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab and Wahhabi Islam, and passages on hawk-hunting and pearl fishing in the Arabian Gulf “from the 56th to the 48th degree east longitude”, i. e. essentially the Gulf coast from Ras alKhaimah to Qatar and Bahrain and on to Kuwait. An early attempt at an encompassing description of Persia, by the civil servant Edward W. H. Scott-Waring in Bengal (1783-1821). The travel account presents a quantity of social, political and historical information on Iran and Arabia during the period of transition from the fall of the Zund Dynasty to the rise of the Qajars in the last quarter of the 18th century.
Bibliographic references: Diba Collection p. 139; Wilson p. 240; Henze IV, 461. Cf; Weber I, 3 for Bombay 1804 edition; Brunet V, 1416; Graesse VI/2, 420 (1804 edition).