VEER, Gerrit de (ca 1570-ca 1598). Tre Navigationi fatte dagli Olandesi, e Zelandesi... Venice, 1599. FIRST EDITION IN ITALIAN.
Small 4to (202 x 143 mm). Engraved full-page compass rose, 31 half-page engraved plates (including 5 maps). (Small paper flaw causing loss to 2 letters on title-page, title-page and some margins at end soiled, a few margins at end with tiny flaws and repairs, lacking final blank.) Modern morocco gilt. FIRST EDITION IN ITALIAN translated by Giunio Parisio. Two issues of his tranlation were published in 1599: the present issue, pulished by Girolamo Porro, and another by Ciotti. Barentz's first and second voyages of 1594 and 1595, respectively, were led by Linschoten with de Veer as Mate. "Barent's third and last was his greatest, ranking among the hardiest achievements of all Polar Exploration. Sailing in 1596, he set his course neither by the Northeast nor the Northwest Passage, but boldly across the Pole he discovered Spitzbergen, but as he could not penetrate the pack-ice beyond, he abandoned his original ideaAfter passing the farthest point of his 1594 voyage, Barents rounded the northern tip of the island, where his ship was crushed in the ice and he and his men were forced to spend the winter in great misery. The following spring the survivors set out on open boats and after incredible difficulties reached Russian territory. Barents perished during the passagebut his indomitable spirit had enabled a party of men for the first time to winter far within the Arctic Circle, suffering from all the hardships inseparable from such a first experience" (Penrose, Travel and Discovery in the Renaissance p.174). Adams V-317 (Ciotti issue); Brunet V, 1127 (Porro issue); Mortimer Italian 521.
