AVRIL, PHILIPPE:
Voyage en divers etats d'Europe et d'Asie, entrepris pour découvrir un nouveau chemin à la Chine. Contenant plusiers remarques curieuses de physique, de geographie, d'hydrographie & d'histoire. Avec une description de la grande Tartarie, & les differens peuples qui l'habitent. Paris, Claude Barbin, Jean Boudot, George & Louis Josse, 1692.
. 4to. Pp. (xx), 406, (ii), (24) table. With engraved portrait of Gen. Stanislas Jablonowski, one folding engraved map, three engraved plates and five large engraved vignettes. Contemporary calf, covers ruled in gilt, flat spine with elaborate gilt decoration and red title label, r.e. Bookplate on front paste down. First edition of Avril's narrative of his two journeys through Central Asia aiming to discover new overland routes to China. Philippe Avril, Jesuit professor of philosophy and mathematics at Paris, was summoned by Father Ferdinand Verbiest in Peking to join the mission there. For eight years, from 1682 to 1690, Avril travelled overland as far as North and Northwest China but ultimately failing to reach Peking. This narrative covers both journeys; the first by caravan through Syria, Kurdistan, Armenia, Persia and across the Caspian to Astrakan where he had to turn back, and the second about his attempt to cross Siberia from Moscow to China, with his return to the West through Constantinople, Moldavia, Poland and Lithuania. Avril's narrative is based on earlier Jeusit reports but also on new information given to him by caravan travellers and rulers he met en route, in particular the king of Syria. Cordier BS 2088. Cf Walravens (1987) 55.
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Charlotte Du Rietz Rare Books
Professional sellerBook number: 100546
€ 4000.00 [Appr.: US$ 4426.34 | £UK 3371.5 | JP¥ 646584]
Keywords: Near East, china, chine, kina, chinese, syria, persia, turkey, levant, ottoman, travel, exploration, asia, asie, asien, asiatic, central asia, kurdistan, siberia, russia, russian,