Travels in the Interior of Southern Africa

Finely bound in half brown leather with raised spine bands over marbled paper boards, leather corners, and marbled text block edges.

The set was profusely decorated and embellished with a large folding map, twenty hand-colored plates (five folding), and ninety-six wood-engraved vignettes (fifty in Volume I and forty-six in Volume II).

Complete copies are uncommon due to printing variations and poaching of the large color plates. This set has been carefully collated and bears all the illustrations, the large folding map, the Volume I errata, and the Volume II "Hints on Emigration to the Cape of Good Hope" (which was printed separately in 1824 and not found in all copies).

The contents are beautifully preserved, with only very light intermittent spotting.

William John Burchell (1781-1863), English explorer, naturalist, traveler, artist, and author, was the son of a wealthy nurseryman. In 1805, naturalist and explorer William J. Burchell "was appointed by the East India Company ‘schoolmaster and acting botanist’ at the island of St Helena". While there he made the acquaintance of General Janssens, the last Dutch governor of the Cape, and of Dr Martin Lichtenstein, then a young physician on the governor’s staff, and afterwards a celebrated Berlin naturalist.

Furnished with letters of introduction from them to the chief Dutch and German residents, Burchell set off to the Cape with the intention of exploring the interior of South Africa. During ensuring years of exploration, Burchell reportedly travelled nearly 7000 km throughout South Africa between 1810 and 1815, collecting specimens of animals and plants. He described his journey in this book.

The illustrations in the volumes are strikingly beautiful, and it is stated in the Preface that, ‘In order to ensure greater correctness in the vignettes, the author has made all these drawings upon the blocks themselves'.