Adolph von Wrede’s Reise in Ḥadhramaut: Beled Beny ‘Yssà und Beled el Ḥadschar Herausgegeben mit einer Einleitung, Anmerkungen und Erklärung der Inschrift von ‘Obne

DESCRIPTION

8 vo. viii, [1 plate], 375 pp. 1 folding map at rear, contemporary half-calf, book plate verso front cover, previous owner's name printed & inscribed on half-title & title page, copy from the library of Professor Karl-Heinz Bernhardt, ex-library stamp on title page, light foxing on title page, otherwise copy clean and in good condition, Braunschweig, Vieweg, 1870. Note: Account of the journey along the coast of Hadhramaut in 1843, first published in 1870 by Heinrich von Maltzan.Gustav Adolph von Wrede (1807-1863) was a noted German researcher on Arabia. He was the first European to travel to Yemen and explore Hadhramaut. Von Wrede left home at the age of 16 to travel the seas and found himself in 1826 in Smyrna (now Izmir in Turkey). Wrede was an instructor in the Ottoman army, and he also participated during the Russo-Turkish war. He returned to Westphalia, north western Germany, but missed the Orient. Wrede could not find a German publisher for his travel memoirs, so he tried to have it published in English. However, the translator suddenly committed suicide and as the maps and other drawings by Wrede were in his estate and could not be found, the English edition was not completed. Embittered and deprived of all means of subsistence, Wrede emigrated. Between 1826 and 1850 he travelled and started working in Turkish and Egyptian service in the Orient and wrote his travel notes in 1843. Maltzan (1826 - 1860), in his twenty-fifth year his health broke down, and he became a traveller. "The spell of the East grew upon him, and he had the desire to visit the centres of Mohammedan faith”. Maltzan travelled also through Yemen and his account of that journey is rich in topographical and cartographical material. Bibliographic references: Embacher 299; Dinse 443; Marco 2331; Henze III. 360.