JAN POTOCKI: JOURNEY TO TURKEY AND EGYPT. WITH NEWS OF THE AUTHOR’S LIFE AND WRITINGS BY ŻEGOTA PAULEGO [1924].

Description

Potocki Jan hr. -Podróż do Turcyi i Egiptu
Wydanie trzeci ⧏35⧐ third edition ⧏34⧐

Third edition of the travel accounts of Jan Count Potocki (1761-1815) – novelist, archaeologist, historian, ethnographer and traveler, one of the most fascinating figures of the Polish Enlightenment, author of “The Saragossa Manuscript”. The publication was published in 1924 in Cracow by the Society of Book Lovers, with a foreword by Przecław Smolik, in a limited edition of 300 numbered copies. The presented copy bears the number 78/300, and counts VIII, 102 pages.
“Journey to Turcia and Egypt” is a record of an expedition made in 1784, written in the form of letters to his mother. The author – though he runs through Turkey and Egypt at speed – gives an accurate idea of the places, monuments and people, and his impressions, reflected in the higher mind, bear the mark of uncommon learning and encompassing reason. It is one of the earliest Polish testimonies of a literary journey to the Middle East, and is part of the Enlightenment tradition of learning about the world. The first Polish edition was published in Krakow in 1849, translated by Julian Ursyn Niemcewicz.
A clean copy, with the original booklet cover preserved inside the binding. It was bound by hand in an exclusive binding of natural leather by the Polish Antiquarian Bindery.
An item for collectors of limited bibliophile editions, lovers of Potocki’s works and travel literature of the Age of Enlightenment, and bibliophiles looking for numbered copies from the outhouses of the Society of Book Lovers.

4140-20-AZQ