Books and Manuscripts

Atlas for Captain Cook's Third Voyage
(London, 1784 or 1785). Folio atlas only, comprising two engraved maps (one folding) and 61 engraved plates, with original tissue guards. Contemporary three-quarter brown calf over marbled paper-covered boards, rebacked with original spine laid down, stamped in gilt, extremities and boards rubbed and worn, original calf dry and chipping; foxing and scattered soiling in plate margins; scattered shallow tidemark along bottom edge; repaired closed tear in top edge of plates 54 and 56; contemporary armorial book-plate on front paste-down. Hill, p. 61; Howes C-729a; Sabin 16250

Scarce and complete atlas volume for Captain James Cook's third and final voyage. Organized to seek the Northwest Passage, Cook and his men charted the Christmas and Hawaiian Islands (named the Sandwich Islands by Cook), as well as the American west coast from Northern California to the Bering Strait. Cook was killed in Hawaii following a skirmish with the island's native population, and the voyage was continued by Charles Clerke, and then, after Clerke's death, by John Gore.