Beschreibung:

LANGSDORFF, Georg Heinrich von (1774-1852). Voyages and Travels in Various Parts of the World, during the Years 1803, 1804, 1805, 1806, and 1807. London: Henry Colburn, 1813. The first edition in English, with important accounts of Russian California, the Northwest fur trade and Japan. Langsdorff was one of the scientists on Krusenstern's world voyage for the Czar of Russia. Expedition ships Nadeshda and Neva investigated the Marquesas, described and illustrated in detail here and with Langsdorff's appended vocabulary of the islands. With Count Rezanov, a founder of the Russian American Company and Russian Ambassador to Japan, he sailed to Japan to open trade talks (which failed), but their stay is finely detailed and illustrated to include a voyage to Hokkaido and an appended vocabulary of the Ainu language. Langsdorff left the expedition in Kamchatka with Rezanov in 1805 and sailed for Alaska and Sitka, then continued to California where he visited the first Russian settlements at Fort Ross and San Francisco. The second volume further describes the Pribilof Islands, Unalaska, Sitka, Kodiak, the native inhabitants and the Russian American Company. Arctic Bib. 9665. Hill 969; Howes L-81; Kroepelien 708; see Lada-Mocarski 69; Sabin 38896; Streeter sale 3506; Wickersham 6245. Two volumes, quarto (266 x 208mm). Frontispiece portrait, folding map and 20 engraved plates (some very mild toning/offsetting). 19th century morocco gilt (rebacked to style, endpapers renewed). Provenance : Reg and Philip Remington, Books.