Basire James, First Edition (6 results)

Hardcover. Condition: Fine. Dust Jacket Condition: Fine. 1st Edition. 1st ed., 1st printing ; xi, 561 pages : illustrations ; 25 cm ; ISBN 9780691200903, 9780691233963, 0691200904, 0691233969 ; OCLC 1110656207 ; dark grey cloth in dustjacket; dustjacket attached to endpapers ; Contents: A Quaker's Odyssey. Dinner at Longman's -- In the classroom of nature -- An errand in the city -- The vocal circle -- Lecturer and physician -- The Herculaneum papyri -- Antiquity Embraced. Words from Egypt's past? -- The sounds of an ancient language -- Paris atmospheres -- Rooted in place -- Hier pour demain -- L'Affaire Polycarpe -- An Egyptian geography of Egypt -- Indications -- Scripts and Bones. Summer at Worthing -- Letters from Paris -- The papyri of the Description de l'E?gypte -- Seeking uxellodunum -- The master of conditions -- Abandoning the alphabet at Grenoble --Demonstrations -- Iconoclasm at the Acade?mie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres -- Reading the Past. The obelisk from Philae -- A singular and puzzling artifact -- A momentous change -- Words and sounds -- Parisian reactions -- Words across the Channel -- Antique Letters. Grey's box -- An opportune encounter -- The "true key" to Egyptian hieroglyphs -- The semantic trap avoided -- The reception of the Pre?cis -- "Hold your laughter, friends!" ; "In 1799, a French officer was clearing debris from a military installation when he discovered a stele bearing three scripts: ancient Greek, hieroglyphic, and a third that could not be definitively identified. This artifact, which came to be known as the Rosetta Stone, has traditionally played the starring role in the history of decipherment, which has until now been understood as an instance of code-breaking, a kind of Bletchley Park avant la lettre. In The Riddle of the Rosetta, Buchwald and Josefowicz delve into a wide array of British and French sources as well as archival material to produce a comprehensive new history of the decipherment. More than a puzzle-solving exercise based on a single artifact, the decipherment engaged with the era's social, cultural and intellectual contexts. It grew in the midst of heated disputes about language, historical evidence, the status of the Bible, the nature of polytheism, and the importance of classical learning. Jean-Franc?ois Champollion in France and his British rival, the medical doctor and polymath Thomas Young, approached the decipherment from different standpoints derived from their contrasting temperaments, educational experiences, and attitudes to antiquity. Imbued with reverence for Greek culture and raised a Quaker, Young disdained Egyptian culture and saw Egyptian writing principally as a way to uncover new knowledge about Greco-Roman antiquity. To him, the decipherment was akin to a challenge posed by a problem in mathematics or science. Champollion's altogether different motivations and attitude unfolded amidst the political chaos of Restoration France, in fierce response to the intrigues of opposing scholars aligned with throne and altar. Unlike Young, Champollion admired ancient Egypt, and this sympathy, coupled with his willingness to upend conventional wisdom about the enigmatic Egyptian signs, freed him to travel a path down which Young refused to go. A remarkable intellectual adventure reaching from the filthy back streets of Georgian London to the hushed lecture rooms of the Institut de France, from the forgotten byways of provincial France to the splendor of the Valley of the Kings, this book reveals the decipherment in its full historical complexity" ; FINE/FINE. Book.

Hardcover. Condition: Very Good. BASIRE James 1769-1835 (illustrator). First Edition. 2 vols - The Charts & Plans with The Report, complete, 16 large plates, VG, 1st ed. Charts & Plans, 54*68 cms (small double elephant), in modern half calf with contemporary marbled boards, some blind tooling, paper title, board edges a little bumped. Spine, gilt tooling & titles. Internally, title page with title & plate list within double ruled borders, 16 large, double page, folding plates of engraved maps, plans, elevations and sections, including a general map of the routes between Carlisle and Belfast, detailed plans of proposed harbours, new roads and bridges, including 7 of which are partly hand coloured, leaves water marked 1801, some very minor toning & spotting, some creasing, small paper repairs to head of tp, some of the plates are 140*63 cms! The Report, 34.6*22cms (Tall Folio), in modern blue paper wraps, white paper label to upper cover, [2], 3-75 pp, [2], [1], paper watermarked 1804, t.e.g., first 4 leaves have contemp. ink numbering to top corner, contains the report pp 3-5 & The Appendix pp 7-75. Printed by L. Hansard & Son for the House of Commons. (Parliamentary Papers, 1780-1849, Vol 52, Part 7, 26 - Repot, 1809). Telford, civil engineer, whose main achievements in road making were the London to Holyhead and Bangor to Chester roads as engineer to the Holyhead road commissioners from 1815, and the Glasgow to Carlisle, Lanarkshire, and highlands of Scotland roads as engineer to the highland roads commissioners from 1803. See ODNB. M'KERLIE who in 1806 as a Rear-Admiral M'Kerlie, was instructed by the Admiralty to assist Mr. T. Telford, a Civil Engineer, in making a survey of the line of communication between the north of England and the north of Ireland, and also in surveying the harbours on each side of the Channel.

No Binding. Condition: Very Good. 1st Edition. Size: Frame 35 x 44 cm, print image 18 x 22.5 cm Condition: Print in very good condition, mount new and good used frame This print is a first edition issue from the account of Captain Cook's Voyage to the Pacific Ocean, published in 1784. This was Cook's third voyage, starting in 1776, and the one in which he met his death in 1779. John Webber was the artist who accompanied Cook and his crew, and his drawings were subsequently engraved for the publication. Webber, only 27 years old at the time, went on to become a well known painter and fellow of the Royal Academy, but today is known mainly for his association with Cook and especially his painting of Cook's death and its many engraved versions. One principal purpose of Cook's voyage was to find the elusive North-West passage, which Cook failed to do, but this is why he found himself in 1778 in Prince William Sound, one of the first explorers to visit it. It fact it was only named Prince William Sound in that year. Webber's drawings were the first to bring to Westerners' eyes the feature of the people of that area. This print was engraved by James Basire, a very famous engraver of the period who had worked for Hogarth among others. The hand colour is later - the print was originally published without colour. The paper is laid paper of the period, and we are happy to guarantee that it is a first edition print. There are other issues of this print which are later and generally inferior.

1/2 leather. Condition: Very Good. First Edition. Engraved frontis; 4to 11" - 13" tall; 533 pages; 1775 Printed By A. Ward; and Sold By J. Dodsley & J. Todd, York & London. 1st edition. Soundly bound quarto in period quarter calf with leather spine label and marbled paper covered boards. [iv], (1]) - 416; (1-3]) - 111, [2] pp. One blank at front followed by half title; page [112] a contents leaf and [113} errata, followed y 2 blanks. Mild cracking to leather top third of the front joint, but still sound and pliable. Light scuffing and rubbing to leather at spine and tips with expected light shelf rubbing to board surfaces. Cut paper bookplate of Louisa Catherine Sligo mounted to front pastedown. . The 1st edition in well preserved condition. VG . Oversize book likely to require additional charges for expedited or international shipping.

Hardcover. Condition: Fair. 1st Edition. 2 volumes quarto 15x11 inches- original boards, crudely rebacked. Two titles, two lists of plates and 151 FINE ENGRAVED PLATES- the majority by Bartolozzi after Guercino- includes 30 double page folding plates. Some, mostly marginal, spotting- but affecting the decorative nature of only 6 plates and 6 plates with an old outer marginal crescent waterstain not affecting the image. A reasonably good copy of the first edition of this work- a rare printing that in later editions had only 91 plates.

Folio 19 x 13 1/2 inches, original publisher's wrappers with ornate vignette title to the upper wrapper. Worn. Title page, 4 pages and 4 double page lithograph plates. Complete. Some old waterstains to the margins. see photos. Second edition. Extremely scarce work in either edition. First published in 1843. The plates depict elevations and sections of Hurricane, a 2-2-2 standard gauge locomotive, and are technically accurate as well as very decorative. COPAC lists only one copy of this second edition (British Library) and two of the first edition (Oxford and Cambridge).