MOSER, Heinrich.

Inquire · Offered by Peter Harrington

Durch Central-Asien. First edition in German, containing additional plates by General Komarov not found in the French edition of 1885. In 1883 Moser joined General Tchernaieff on his way to Tashkent, then continued to Samarkand, Bukhara, Ashkabat, Tehran, and finally Istanbul. His work contains descriptions of the Kazakh and Kyrgyz people and the various habitations of the steppe.Moser (1844-1923) was born in Russia but taken to Germany at four years old. His father was a famous watchmaker who expected Moser to also enter the trade, but instead he returned to Russia in 1868 to travel around Siberia and Russian Turkestan. In this work he introduces the various ethnic groups he interacted with. "Whether Moser describes the dwellings of the Kyrgyz, an oriental bazaar, or the clothing of a Sartin, his accounts are always an expression of keen observation and great empathy for the foreign mentality" (Pfaff, p. 216, in German). He also comments on the Russian attempt to define a solid border in Central Asia and the dangers of eradicating the local Islamic traditions.

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