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Author: Nieuhoff, John and John Ogilby
Title: An Embassy from the East-India Company of the United Provinces to the Grand Tartar Cham Emperour of China...
Place Published: London
Publisher:John Macock
Date Published: 1669
Description:

[4], 1-146, [2], 149-327, [1], 106 [2], 18 pp. With 18 copper-engraved plates including frontispiece & added pictorial title-page; folding map of China; double-page plan of Kanton; 97 engravings in the text. (Folio) 41x25 cm (16x10") period calf boards rebacked with dark brown modern calf spine, new endpapers, marbed edges.

Nieuhoff traveled to China in 1655 as a steward for Peter De Goyer and Jacob De Keyzer as representatives of the Dutch East India Company, with plans to break the Portuguese monopoly over trade with China. Nieuhoff's narrative, along with the accounts of traveling Jesuits were the first reliable narratives of China available to a European audience. The work includes many incidental remarks on the manners and customs of the Chinese, together with a second part comprising a general description of the Chinese Empire. The fine plates and illustrations show town views in China, Tibet and Tartary, together with subjects such as costume and natural history. Following the index is included the 18 pp. " ?A Narrative of the Success of an Embassage Sent by John Maatzuyker de Badem, General of Batavia; unto the Emperour of China & Tartary, the 20. of July 1655." A scarce and important work. With the amorial bookplate of Edward Lord Suffield. HBS 67036

Wear and soiling to original boards with rubbing to extremities, some leather worn away at edges and corners; some offsetting and rippling to original endpapers, toning, scattered light foxing mostly to margins, occasional small chip or tear to page edges, a very solid copy; very good.