A Collection of Portraits of the Savage Tribes Inhabiting the Boundaries of the Colony of the Cape of Good Hope. Taken from the Life in 1812, by an Officer of the 21st Lt. Dragoons, engaged in an Expedition against those Tribes, under Lt.-Col. Graham.
Year: 1822
Edition: First edition
Publisher: London; Edwd Orme
Category: Africa
Later 3/4 gilt lined morocco over red cloth with the spine divided by two raised bands into three compartments with the title in gilt along the spine. Folio, approximately 380 x 270 mm with slightly varying sizes of the paper.
A lithographed title page and a total of eight plates consisting of five lithographs printed by McQueen & Co. and three aquatints, all published by Edward Orme, London, May 10th, 1822 and which all have been finely coloured by hand. The paper of three plates (marked here below "[W]") watermarked "J. Whatman Turkey Mill 1821". Quite exceptionally the original lithographed wrapper has been bound in at the end.
List of plates:
Hottentot Woman (aquatint)The plate titled "Kaffer Chief" has been paperbacked long ago to restore two tears, one in the middle from left to right, the other in the upper left corner (see picture nr. 6). Extremities of the boards and the back cover a bit rubbed, some wear and some very small tears along the edges of the paper and an occasional small spot, but overall a very attractive copy of this work.
A Boshesman (lithograph)
Female Hottentot with a child (aquatint)
Kaffer Chief (lithograph) [W]
A Boshesman with poisoned arrows (lithograph)
Hottentot girl (lithograph) [W]
A young Boshesman (aquatint)
A young Hottentot (lithograph) [W]
The work is extremely rare with only four records in ABPC and RBH combined since 1939. All copies without the original wrapper. The work is described in Mendelssohn ("..., which is now of great rarity.") and Hosken but also those copies lack the wrapper which has been bound in here.
As mentioned in the title this set was published as a collection of eight plates which came loose in a wrapper. The very few surviving sets all have been bound with just one exception, the copy from the Quentin Keynes collection that was auctioned by Christie's in April 2004, however, that set was incomplete, lacking two plates and also there the wrapper was missing.
We can find only two copies in institutional libraries worldwide; a copy in the National Library of South Africa and another copy at Trinity College, Cambridge.
A librarian of the NLSA informed us that their copy has been bound as well, complete with the lthographed title page, but also here the wrapper is missing.
In November 2021 Dr. Nicolas Bell of Trinity College, Cambridge kindly informed us that they received their copy in 2015. It was part of the bequest of the Duchess of Roxburghe, from the library of her father the Marquess of Crewe and grandfather Lord Houghton (Richard Monckton Milnes). It is bound in green watered silk on boards and has the armorial bookplate of William Symons Esq. It was probably acquired by Richard Monckton Milnes in the later 19th century. This copy too is bound without a wrapper.
This means that an example of this lithographed wrapper most likely was unknown up till now, although a copy with its wrapper apparently was auctioned in 1920. The wrapper has a dark grey colour with the title printed on the upper side. See picture #11 here below. On this wrapper someone has written the price in pencil: £ 1.1.0
Possibly this was the sales price in 1822.
This copy was kept in a locker for approximately 80 years before we acquired it in 2017.
Hosken pp. 48/49, Mendelssohn II, p. 271. Neither in Abbey nor in Prideaux.
Click on a picture to enlarge.
