BOSMAN (Willem). - Lot 8

BOSMAN (Willem). A Voyage to Guinea, Containing a New and Very Accurate Description of That Coast Where Gold, Elephant Tusks, and Slaves Are Found and Traded. Utrecht: Antoine Schouten, 1705. — In-12, 158 x 90: portrait, frontispiece, (8 ff.), 520 pp., 18 plates. Havana calfskin, decorated raised spine, gilt inner edge, red edges (contemporary binding). Rare first French edition of this account. Its author, Willem Bosman (1672–17..), a geographer and merchant, records in it the results of 14 years spent on the west coast of Africa. He provides a detailed description of the regions and kingdoms, their governments, customs, religion, and the administration of their inhabitants, as well as the local flora and fauna. His account is particularly notable for his observations on the slave trade. It is also in this work that the terms “Assiantés” or “Aschantis” appear for the first time, referring to a West African people living in Ghana. The edition is illustrated with a portrait of the author, a frontispiece, and 29 figures spread across 18 fold-out plates. Copy from the library of Raymond Jean François Marie Lacave Laplagne Barris (1786–1857) at the Château de Laplagne, President of the Court of Cassation, Peer of France, Grand Officer of the Legion of Honor, Senator, and President of the General Council of the Gers. He served as executor of Louis XVIII’s will. His bookplates have been scraped off. Spine skillfully rebinded; leather wear on the back cover. Tears in the portrait have been restored, with some damage to the engraving; restoration on the reverse of the frontispiece, as well as on the title page, following the removal of a former bookplate. Tears in the engravings, but no missing material. A few faint water stains. Provenance: Raymond Jean François Marie Lacave Laplagne Barris, with bookplates.