LABAT, Jean-Baptiste.
Nieuwe reizen naar de Franse eilanden van America.
Amsterdam, Balthasar Lakeman, 1725. 4 volumes bound as 2. 4to. With 2 engraved frontispieces, 11 folding engraved maps and plans, and 83 full-page plates. Contemporary polished half calf. [2], 18, 350; [1 blank], [1], 404; [2], 235, 254; [1 blank], [4], 200, 167, [32] pp.
€ 7,500
First Dutch edition of Labat's detailed journal recording his travels in the Caribbean. The work is replete with historical observations and contains important sociological, geographical, zoological, anthropological and gastronomic remarks, including an elaborate treatise on the cultivation of cocoa and the fabrication of chocolate. The maps depict North and part of South America with the Caribbean, the islands of Martinique, Barbados, Santa Domingo, etc.
The author, a Dominican Priest, travelled to Martinique in 1694. He sojourned two years in the island and then sailed for Guadeloupe, where he was appointed procurator-general of the Dominican convents. He travelled extensively in the French, Dutch, and English Antilles, using his knowledge of engineering and agriculture to build water mills and dams, to dig canals, etc.
Fine set. Alden & Landis 725/121; Hünersdorff, Coffee, pp. 836-837; Nissen, ZBI 2330a; Sabin 38415 (10 maps and 76 plates only).
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