4to. xcviii, 498 pp., frontispiece portrait, 3 maps of which 2 are folding, contemporary half-calf with marbled boards, title gilt on raised decorated spine, appendix, previous owner’s book plate verso front cover, edges slightly rubbed, spotting at the last few pages, John Murray, London, second edition, 1822.

Synopsis

The travels described here took place in 1813 and 1814, to which are prefixed a Life and Memoir of the Author. Burckhardt (1784-1817), a Swiss traveller and adventurer who adopted native dress and went by the name of “Sheikh Ibrahim”, left Aleppo in 1812 and made his way to Cairo from where he undertook two journeys: one along the Upper Nile and the other through the Nubian desert. Leake edited these travels from Burckhardt’s journals; he also wrote the biographical memoir which is a preface to the travels. This was the first of Burckhardt’s works to be published and was followed by Travels In Syria, 1822. All of these journeys were made on behalf of the Africa Association whose president, Sir Joseph Banks, had recruited Burckhardt for the long and difficult project of exploring Africa. The journeys described in these works were preparatory to the major effort of exploring the interior of Africa. In 1817 Burckhardt began the exploration of the countries of the Niger, but he had an attack of dysentery and died in October of the same year.
Bibliographic references: Blackmer 238; Chahine 713; Hilmy I 105; Weber 107; Tobler p. 141.