Van Riebeeck Society, First Series …. A Complete Set, volumes 1 - 50 .

Van Riebeeck Society, First Series …. A Complete Set, volumes 1 - 50 .… issued approximately one book a year for about 50 years, these were usually unique translations from Dutch, German, etc. into English or original manuscript material (letters, journals, documents) in English or Afrikaans.

Most of the books are biographical, travel accounts, including accounts of shipwrecks, military accounts of the Eastern Cape frontier, Cape politics & some books on Natal and the Zulus; colonial times over a period of more than 300 years. They are usually well illustrated. The authors are not all very well known, but include Thomas Baines, George Cory, J.A. de Mist, O.F. Mentzel, Andrew Smith, Andrew Geddes Bain. Very valuable material, mostly not available elsewhere and essential for a balanced collection of South African travel and history.

For a list of all 50 books, check out any Second Series book last pages, or go to HOSKEN , p. 207/208. Ask for a complete list of titles. As there were only 500 copies printed of volume one, that means that if all were kept as part of full sets, there could be no more than 500 sets available. However in reality many who bought copies only, started their series later and missed out on some of the earlier volumes. Complete sets are quite scarce and like this set were made up when and where the buyer could locate a missing volume. Volumes 1 @ 2 are particularly difficult to find and as stand-alone books fetch thousands of rands each.

For one reason or another there are variants of volume 2, the one in this set is that with the extra illustrations, but in the matching Van Riebeeck Society binding. Cape Town, The Van Riebeeck Society, 1918 - 1969. 50 volumes, all in the original cloth. All books are first editions, excepting a few two volume reprints of early Africana travel accounts by Lichtenstein, Thompson & Isaacs. Volume one ex-library, with only a couple of numbers on verso of title-page really identifying it as a library copy, volumes 3, 5 & 7 have some ugly stains along top or bottom of the front cover.

Apart from these, there is some slight marking or rubbing of a few spines, browning of end-papers, occasional foxing, occasional ownership markings, signatures & a couple of attractive book-plates The previous owner also entered a neat small pen number on the end-paper of each book. A nice looking set, all books good & firm with no rebinding necessary.

Enquire for delivery costs on this large & fairly heavy set.