Books and Manuscripts

Purchas, Samuel
Purchas his Pilgrimage. Or Relations of the World and the Religions Observed in All Ages and Places discouered, from the Creation unto this Present…
London: Printed by William Stansby for Henrie Fetherstone, 1614. The second Edition, much enlarged with Additions through the whole Worke. Small folio. (xxviii), 918 (erratic pagination), (40) pp.; 4k2 and 4k5 in duplicate. Illustrated with woodcut initials and head- and tail-pieces. Full contemporary brown calf, stamped in blind, orange morocco spine label, stamped in gilt, rebacked, corners restored, extremities and joints rubbed and worn, scratching to boards; all edges trimmed; title-page slightly darkened and soiled, contemporary ownership signatures to same and now crossed out; scattered soiling to text, largely within margins; large pale stain on pp. 311-314; small stain at center of p. 567; repair in bottom corner, p. 41/42; bottom corner of pp. 365/366, 451/452 repaired. ESTC S111828; Sabin 66679

A foundational text of English travel literature. A wildly popular work upon its publication in 1613, this revised second edition is expanded and features accounts of travels through Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Americas, in particular, accounts of Canada, Virginia, and Florida, as well as the explorations of Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca, Christopher Columbus, Martin Frobisher, Jacques Cartier, Henry Hudson, Sir Walter Raleigh, Hernan Cortes, and others. The work was continuously revised by Purchas and went through four editions until his death in 1626.