David Roberts

A first edition, first issue, finely bound copy of The Holy Land.

• Sold as a set of 2 volumes.
• David Roberts (Scottish).
• London: Moon, 1842.
• Folio.
• Includes two lithographic title pages (as issued) and 120 lithograph plates by Louis Haghe after David Roberts (60 full-page), with lithographic portrait of Roberts by C. Baugniet on india paper, the half-page plates with descriptive text below image.
• Bound in contemporary morocco-backed cloth gilt, top edge gilt.

Roberts' Holy Land was one of the most elaborate ventures of nineteenth-century publishing, providing the most comprehensive series of views of the monuments, landscape and people of the region. It is one of the greatest illustrated books published in the nineteenth century. This copy is from the earliest issue, before the map and the title page for the third volume were produced in 1849.

David Roberts arrived in Cairo in September 1838. He crossed the desert by way of Suez, Mount Sinai and Petra to Gaza and Jerusalem accompanied by tribes of Bedouins, friends and guides. He later visited the Dead Sea, the Lake of Tiberias, Lebanon and the ruins of Baalbek.

Returning to England in late 1839, he sought a publisher willing to produce a lavish edition of his views. Rejected by the Finden Brothers and by John Murray, he signed a contract with Francis Moon in 1840. He and Moon shrewdly promoted their project by organizing a private viewing of Roberts' watercolors and drawings for Queen Victoria, the Archbishop of Canterbury and other influential people who immediately subscribed. They mounted public exhibitions of some travel sketches in many British cities, and the favorable press notices attracted additional subscriptions, amounting to nearly double what the project required.