SPARRMAN, Anders.

Inquire · Offered by Peter Harrington

Resa Till Goda Hopps-Udden, Soedra Pol-kretsen Och Omkring Jordklotet, Samt till Hottentott-och Caffer-Landen, Åren 1772-76 First edition, the only copy in original wrappers traced in recent commerce, including the first discussion by Sparrman of his participation in Cook's second voyage. He provides the first substantial description of the interior of the Cape Province, as well as "valuable historical information on the natural history, ethnography and geography of the territory" (Gunn & Codd, p. 61).A student of Linnaeus, Sparrman (1748-1820) travelled widely in South Africa in the 1770s. In 1771, a few years after returning from a voyage to Canton, he accepted a position tutoring the children of the Cape's sub-governor and interpreting at False Bay. With financial support from the Swedish East India Company, he undertook expeditions into the country to collect natural history specimens. His narrative, which was quickly translated into multiple languages, "gives valuable information respecting Cape Town and the neighbouring districts in this period.... The author relates many incidents illustrating the hospitality of the Dutch farmers and their dense ignorance of matters outside their own country, and he makes allusions to the cruelty of the treatment of the slaves by the lower classes of the colonists" (Mendelssohn). He was also "a shrewd observer of the agricultural scene, commenting on the effects of burning and overgrazing, the spread of renosterbos, the decline of soil

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