Nicolay, Le navigationi et viaggi nella Turchia, Antwerp, 1576, contemporary limp vellum

Nicolas de Nicolay

Le navigationi et viaggi nella Turchia [translated by François Flory]. Antwerp: Willem Silvius, 1576

4to (208 x 142mm.), title within decorative border and with printer's device, with blank leaves **4 and ii4, numerous woodcut costume illustrations within decorative borders, contemporary limp vellum, binding slightly defective, lacking two pairs of ties

FIRST ITALIAN TRANSLATION. The artist, geographer and spy Nicolas de Nicolay (1517-1583) went to the court in Constantinople as part of an embassy from Henri II to the Sultan; Henri's predecessor had counted Suleiman as an ally and Henri wished to revive that accord. Nicolay's work, a combination of a travelogue with a survey of the Ottoman Empire, was first published in French in 1567 and quickly translated into other European languages. His depiction of the Ottomans is less pejorative than other similar accounts although still interwoven at times with salacious details of sex, drugs and cruelty.

The woodcut illustrations are smaller versions of the original engravings from the 1567-1568 Lyon edition, by Antonij van Leest and others.

LITERATURE:

Edit16 31562; cf. Mortimer, Harvard Italian 319 (1580 Venice edition)