Lot 00129 |
AMI BOUE: LA TURQUIE D EUROPE. PARIS 1840
First edition, in 8vo, contemporary leather over boards slightly rubbed, preserving publishers original paper covers in each volume,, complete in four volumes:526p. and one large folded map,539p.,500p.,589p., text clean and bright with very few scattered spots in few pages,ex libris of Constantini Demetri Sturza (a Prince family of Greek-Romanian origin), overall in very good condition and with fine provenance.
Probably the most important scientific work on the Balkans written in the first half of 19th century. Boue explored the interior of the Balkan peninsula in the 1830s when it was still completely unknown. He was the first to distinguish about the several Slav populations and provides an exhaustive look at the Ottoman administration, the social life, the trade, the mineral wealth and the soil. He focused on the ethnography of the area and he is the very first who provide a concrete image of the huge melt of populations in the area.With more than 2.000 pages this account is a scientific encyclopedia of the Balkans of the late 1830s. Rare work