Histoire naturelle, civile, et ecclésiastique de l'empire du Japon: composée en allemand [...] et traduite en françois sur la version anglaise de Jean-Gaspar Scheuchzer [...]. Ouvrage enrichi des plans & des cartes nécessaires.

3 vols. 12mo: [4 incl. front.]-lxx-[2]-312, [6]-416, [4]-379-[17] pp.; 13 folding pls (a few spots and a few pages browned in vol. 1, light dampstain on the table, marg. notes on pp. 71-72, tear in map IV, edges cut off on pp. 219-222 in vol. 2).

Cont. calf, gilt border of a triple fillet on covers, turn-ins gilt, spine lavishly gilt with red label for the title, red edges (small traces of use on covers, joints a bit rubbed). Nice copy.

Abbreviated French translation of Kaempfer's most accurate account of 17th-century Japan (1st ed. 1727; 1st Fr. ed. 1729) with 10 maps (on 13 pls), including a map of the Empire of Japan based upon Japanese maps and the author's observations during his travels to the imperial court, 4 town plans of Juthia (capital of Siam, current Ayutthaya in Thailand), Nagasaki, Miyako and Jedo (now Tokyo), 1 map of the Menam river (Thailand), 4 road maps of the author's journeys from Nagasaki to Osaka and Tokyo. Rare copy of this second 12mo edition by Gosse & Neaulme (1st ed. 1731) which Herman Uytwerf republished in Amsterdam in the same year. The author, the German naturalist Engelbert Kaempfer (1651-1716), was physician to the VOC trading post in Nagasaki from 1690 to 1692. Kaempfer's tact, diplomacy and medical skill overcame the cultural reserve of the Japanese who granted him a residence permit at a time when foreigners were generally banned from the Archipelago. Ref. Tiele 585. - Cordier 417. - Landwehr, VOC, 533 (ed. H. Uytwerf).