Histoire naturelle, civile et ecclesiastique de L'Empire du Japon: Composeé en Allemand …

The Hague: Chez P. Gosse, & J. Neaulme,, 1729. The chief source of Western knowledge of Japan First edition in French, the second overall following the English edition of 1727, of this encyclopaedic description of Japan's flora and fauna, religion and customs, and government and industries. Kaempfer's account framed European understanding of Japan for over a century, and it was considered so definitive that later experts such as Isaac Titsingh saw no need to compose their own. Born in Westphalia, Kaempfer (1651-1716) graduated in 1676 with a doctorate in languages, history, and medicine from Cracow. In 1681 he moved to Upsala and two years later was chosen to accompany Ludwig Fabritius's embassy from Charles XII to Russia and Persia. At Esfahan, he decided not to return with the rest of the party, but instead obtained employment with the Dutch East India Company and headed south for Bandar Abbas, where for two years he was the surgeon at the Dutch factory. In 1688 he set sail for the east and, on 24 September 1690, "he arrived at the Dutch factory of Deshima in Nagasaki, Japan, the only Japanese port at that time open to foreign trade" (Howgego). In 1691 Kaempfer embarked with the head of the factory on his first journey to the imperial court at Edo, receiving an audience with Tokugawa Tsunayoshi. He made a second similar trip in 1692 before leaving Japan and returning to Batavia, eventually sailing for Europe some time in 1693. Kaempfer composed his account in manuscript form during his travels, yet it was only published after his death. The manuscript was acquired by Sir Hans Sloane in the 1720s as part of the purchase of Kaempfer's scholarly and literary remains, before being "presented to the public in 1727 in a fairly free translation by the young Swiss naturalist Johann Caspar Scheuchzer. The French translation of Scheuchzer's English text appeared two years later and was more widely read on the continent, including in Germany, where French was more readily understood than English at the time. Those who only read German had to make do with the back translation from the French (1749), until in 1777-79 Kaempfer's Westphalian compatriot Christian Wilhelm Dohm... finally published the original in two volumes" (Osterhammel, p. 19). "The eighteenth century's famous and influential travelers and travel writers, from Engelbert Kaempfer and John Chardin to Carsten Niebuhr, Constantin de Volney, and Alexander von Humboldt, were no victims of 'Orientalist' delusion and peddlars of fantasies and lies about the Other... From Western European humanism, they inherited a role model of the 'philosophical traveler' - an ambulatory scholar who, not yet bound by the constraints of strictly defined academic disciplines such as geography or ethnology, contributed to universal knowledge in accordance with the most advanced methodological standards of the day" (ibid., p. 212). Provenance: from the Château Dampierre library of the ducs de Luynes, with a late 19th-century Dampierre bookplate on the front free endpaper verso of volume I. Both title pages also bear the black ink stamp of the Hôtel de Luynes, Paris ("D.L.P."), the family's expansive residence in the capital. The sixth duke steered the Dampierre library through the troubles of the French Revolution, ensuring that it survived intact until its dispersal in 2013. Two volumes, folio (353 x 230 mm). Late 19th-century quarter calf, red and green labels lettered in gilt, compartments and raised bands tooled in gilt, marbled sides and endpapers, edges sprinkled red. With engraved allegorical title to vol. I, 45 engraved plates, maps, and plans (43 folding), including large folding map of Japan, engraved arms on dedication leaf, cul-de-lampes; title pages printed in red and black with vignette engravings. Contemporary inked collation on verso of first publisher's blank in vol. I. Spines a little sunned, a few minor repairs, some browning throughout text as usual, plates presenting well with only one rather heavily browned, occasional tidemarks, a few old tape repairs to closed tears, text unaffected. A very good copy. Brunet II, p. 763: Cordier 416; Cox I:333; Garrison-Morton 6374.11; Howgego I K1; Landwehr, VOC 532; Wellcome III 376. See Nissen BBI 1019 note. Jürgen Osterhammel, Unfabling the East: the Enlightenment's Encounter with Asia, 2018.