Folio. Dutch text printed in double columns, Part 1: [6] 262 pp., [5] / Part II: [1] 581 pp., [7], (pp. 313 - 321 incorrectly paginated, same with pages 337 to 344 - after the first 344 page), first title page printed in red and black, the edition is illustrated with an allegorical frontispiece (dated 1678), +39 engraved plates and maps, including 31 double-page or folding (1 map loose) includes the fine large Panoramic View of Jerusalem in good condition; also, Dapper's issue of Jansson's 6 Sheet Map of the Holy Land, plus over 30 text engravings representing views of Damascus, Tripoli, Aleppo, Jaffa, Ramah, Solomon's Temple, Jerusalem etc., 2 ink Library stamps to frontis., occasional tone spotting and browning, full blind arabesque stamped vellum (lightly stained) corners a little bumped and curled, a very good copy with fine plates and maps, Jacob van Meurs, Amsterdam, first edition, 1677.

Synopsis

First edition which appeared in Dutch. “Dapper has edited the work from accounts of various travellers… His works are of especial importance because of the fine plates, which include maps, plans, beautiful views and costumes… Between 1670 and 1688 he produced his descriptions of Asia, Africa, China, Syria and Palestine, and the Greek Archipelago. Some of the sources he used are very rare now.”
Olfert Dapper (1635-1689) was a Dutch physician, writer and expert on Africa. He was born in Amsterdam around 1635. In May 1658, he enrolled at Utrecht University and two years later was signing himself “doctor medicinæ,” although there is no evidence that he ever received any medical training. In 1663, he published a historical description of Amsterdam. In 1665 he published a Dutch translation of the works of Herodotus. With the increased interest in exploration and foreign cultures, a flourishing trade in travel books developed in Holland in the mid 17th century. Following this trend, Dapper was just over thirty when he embarked on the geographic and ethnographic research that was to occupy him for the rest of his life. He threw himself into this vast undertaking, tackling first Africa (1668), then China (1670), Persia (1672) and the Middle East (1680). His books became well known in his own time, with translations rapidly appearing in English, French and German. In 1986 a museum devoted to him, Musée Dapper, was opened in Paris. Dapper never visited the exotic destinations he wrote about. Largely due to his utilisation of the accounts of Jesuit missionaries and explorers, he steered clear from making value judgements about the societies he described. He avoided ethnocentric connotations and became the first person to adopt an interdisciplinary approach, weaving together the separate threads of geography, economics, politics, medicine, social life and customs. Unlike some of his contemporaries, Dapper produced a genuine work for posterity, not just a compendium of exotic curiosities.
Bibliographic references: Avery Architectural Library, p. 240; Atabey, 324; Blackmer, 449 for German edition of 1681; Tiele 301; Europe and the Arab World 27.le 88; Rohricht 1171.