BRAHE, Count Per the younger, at his private press

Collection of nine accounts of travels to the far East, the East and the West Indies.

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Johan Kankel for Count Per Brahe the younger, 1674- Visingsborg Castle (Visingsö, Sweden), 1675. Five works (containing nine narratives) bound together, small quarto; the first title-page neatly laid down and ownership marks clipped from margins; in fine condition in contemporary dark calf with lighter calf inlays, spine panelled in gilt between raised bands, covers ornately panelled and bordered in gilt and blind with elaborate dentelle borders and fleurons; the initials A.H. in gilt on covers, and with a contemporary ownership inscription (see below). A beautiful privately-created compendium of seventeenth-century Swedish accounts of travels to the Far East and to the East and West Indies. This handsome volume gathers together nine travel accounts in five works separately printed at the private press of Count Brahe. It was probably bound for and certainly owned by the mayor of Jonkoping, and was later in the library at Ericsberg Castle.

The German craftsman Johan Kankell operated the private press of Count Per Brahe the younger at Visingsborg Castle in the south of Sweden. Brahe, Swedish soldier and nobleman, was an important political figure who acted as governor general of Finland between 1637 and 1654, and was an influential reformer. Later he was chancellor of Sweden and became one of the regents following the death of Charles X in 1660. He was related to the astronomer Tycho Brahe, who also had a famous private press in Sweden, at Uraniborg on the island of Hven.

The binding is also the work of local craftsmen. The volume was acquired in the 1670s by Alexander Haijock, mayor of Jonkoping, the nearest city to Visingsö and the administrative capital of the area. In the 19th century it was acquired for the library at Ericsberg Castle on the west coast of Sweden, a collection only very recently dispersed.

The contents of the volume are listed below and identified by reference to Sven Almqvist's bibliography of the press, Johann Kankel: Per Brahe's boktryckare på Visingsö (Uppsala 1965).

1. VARIOUS AUTHORS. Een kort beskrffning uppa trenne reesor och peregrinationer, sampt konungarijket Japan... Pp. (iv), 304. Second edition, first published in 1667. Almqvist 19; Bibl. Alt-Japan-katalog 173/74; Cordier, BJ 380 & BS 1943-44.

Comprises:

a. KIOPING, Nils Matson. I. Beskrifwes een reesa som genom Asia Africa och manga andra hedniska konungarijken... (Kioping's narrative of Cape of Good Hope, Mauritius, Arabia, the Holy Land, Armenia, Persia, Ceylon etc).

b. WILLMAN, Olof Eriksson. Beskriwes een reesa till Ostlndien China och Japan (A voyage to East India, China and Japan).

c. WILLMAN, Olof Eriksson. ... om forbenembde stoora och machta konungarijketz Japan tillstand... forrattat och beskrefwen... (Willman's account of Japan which he visited in 1651. His account of Tokaido, the "East Sea Route", is one of the earliest known in European literature).

d. CARON, Francois. Included in the previous work is a translation of Caron's account of Japan.

e. ANONYMOUS. Uthfores een reesa ifran Muszcow till China, genom Mongul och Cataja... (A journey from Moscow to China).

2. SCHOUTEN, Joost. Sanfdrdig beskrijjfning om konungarijket Siam, thess regering, macht, religion, seder, handel och wandel. Pp. (ii), 60, one blank leaf.

First Swedish edition of Beschrijving van Siam (1636), translated from a German edition (Nurenberg 1663). Almqvist, 27; Cordier, BI 719-20.

3. MARTINI, Martini. Historia om thet tartariske krijget uthi konungarijket Sina, sampt theras seder. Pp. (iv), 162, one blank leaf.

First Swedish edition of De bello tartarico historia (1654). Translated from the Latin (Amsterdam 1655), by Ambrosio Niedelberg. Almqvist, 21; Cordier, BS 626.

4. HEMMERSAM, Michael. West-Indiansk rese-beskriffning, fran ahr 1639 till 1645. Ifran Amsterdam till St: Joris de Mina, itt Castell i Africa. Pp. (viii), 94, one blank leaf.

First Swedish edition. Almqvist, 20; Borba de Moraes, p.397; Sabin, 31290.

5. KORT BERATTELSE om Wast Indien eller America, som elliest kallas Nya Werlden. Pp. (ii), 42.

Almqvist, 28; Sabin, 38244.

• AUD 36,000.00 > Andere Währungen
• Bestellnummer: 807_802

• Antiquariat: Hordern House (AUSTRALIA)