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[MARBAULT], Essai sur le Commerce de Russie, avec L'Histoire de ses Découvertes.
Amsterdam, 1777. (ALASKA) First edition. 12mo. Large folding map of Siberia, Alaska (as an island), and the A Leontzinkie or Aleutians at rear, "Carte des découvertes des Russes dans la mer orientale ..." Gerardin scripsit, Croisey sculpsit. Half title present. [iv] 299, (1) pp. With 57 additional leaves of annotations in contemporary hand, each entry keyed to a specific passage of text. Single leaf S3 (pp. 209-210) excised. Contemporary acid- stained calf, spine gilt. Old, early repair to joints and tips, spine and label chipped, internally fresh. Two short marginal tears to map. Contemporary bookplate of Le Colonel de St.-Joseph. Lada-Mocarski 26; Kress 1777-1817, B-59; Wickersham 1775; Howes M-270; Streeter sale 3471; not in Sabin. ¶ The last chapter deals with commerce in the Eastern sea and in America, namely Alaska. An exceedingly interesting copy with extensive commentary (in French) on conditions in and around Russia that had a bearing on trade, ranging from the impact of the Volga-Don Canal on the Black Sea trade, to the ongoing troubles in Persia, to the difficulties of the passage from Kamchatka to the Siberian mainland. Barbier assigns authorship to Marbault, noting that the text was derived from a memorandum written by Marbault for Durand, French minister in Saint Petersburg, whose secretary he was. The bookplate enables the identification of the author of the annotations as Antoine Ignace Anthoine de Saint-Joseph (1749-1826). Anthoine de Saint-Joseph was a merchant in Marseilles and Constantinople, then French trade envoy in eastern Europe (whence the first hand experience documented by these contemporary notes); he was raised to the nobility by Louis XVI in 1786. He was close to the imperial family (his wife's younger sister married Napoleon's general Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte and subsequently became Queen Desideria of Sweden), served as mayor of Marseilles from 1805 to 1813, and was made a baron of the Empire in 1808. Anthoine de Saint-Joseph drew upon his Russian and Asian travels to write the Essai historique sur le commerce et la navigation de la Mer-Noire; ou, Voyages et entreprises pour établir des rapports commerciaux et maritimes entre les ports de la Mer-Noire et ceux de la Méditerranée (Paris, 1805; Kress 4881). Trade with Russia remains fraught with risk and tumult two hundred years later. For Anthoine de Saint-Joseph, cf. Dioque, Un Haut-Alpin à Marseille. Le baron Anthoine, 1749-1826. Du grand négoce à la mairie (1991), especially pp. 123 ff
Offered for US$ 5500.00 by: James Cummins Bookseller - Book number: 231376