A relation of Some Years Travaile, Begunne Anno 1626. Into Afrique and the Greater Asia, Especially the Territories of the Persian Monarchie: And Some Parts of the Orientall Indies, and Iles Adjacent by Herbert, Thomas - 1634

London: William Stanby and Jacob Bloome, 1634. 1st Edition. Hardcover. Very Good. 4to. [x] 225 p.p. [14 p.p. table]. Half bound red calf over marbled boards. Title on red leather spine label. Marbled boards well worn and chipped, edges rubbed. Hinges secure. Engraved and printed title pages and colophon leaf. "A" at head of printed title cropped, signature clipped from top of A3, some headlines and catchwords shaved, a few short tears, inner margins of a few leaves strengthened. Pencil ownership inscription to verso of FFEP, and a few pencil and ink notations throughout. Illustrated throughout with engravings (natives, fish, birds, funeral customs, etc.) and two maps. Wide ranging observations of African and Asian countries visited, Babylon, Baghdad, the Alcoran, Religion of the Persians, the Persian language with vocabulary lists. A final section concerns "A Discourse and proofe that Madoc, ap Owen Gwynedd first found out that Continent now call'd America." Sir Thomas Herbert, 1st Baronet (1606-1682), was an English traveler, historian and a gentleman of the bedchamber of King Charles I while Charles was in the custody of Parliament (from 1647 until the king's execution in January 1649. After attending Tonbridge School, he is said to have studied at Trinity College, Cambridge, and Jesus College, Oxford (1621), but afterwards removed to Cambridge. This is his primary work, reissued with additions, &c., in 1638 as Some Yeares Travels into Africa and Asia the Great (al. into divers parts of Asia and Afrigue), a third edition followed in 1664, and a fourth in 1677. This is one of the best records of 17th-century travel. Among its illustrations are remarkable sketches of the dodo, cuneiform inscriptions and Persepolis.