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KOLB, Peter.
Caput Bonae Spei Hodiernum Das ist:
Vollständige Beschreibung des Africanischen Vorgebürges der Guten Hofnung, Worinnen in dreyen Theilen abgehandelt wird, wie es heut zu Tage nach seiner Situation und Eigenschaft aussiehet; ingleichen mas ein Natur-Forscher in Den Dreyen Reichen Der Natur daselbst findet und antrisst: wie nicht menigerund was die eigenen Einwohner die Hottentotten, vor seltsame Sitten und Gebräche haben: und endlich alles/ mad die Europaeischen daselbst gestifteten Colonien anbetrift.
First edition of this important early account of South Africa at the beginning of the eighteenth century, which was rapidly translated into Dutch, English and French, becoming the "standard reference work for scientific travellers" to the region (Speake, Literature of Travel and Exploration). Kolb was commissioned by his patron, the keen amateur astronomer Bernhard Friedrich Baron von Krosigk of Brandenburg, to go to the Cape to carry out a programme of celestial observations. He sailed from the Texel in 1704 on a Dutch East India Company ship, having made arrangements with them for a "reduced rate" (Mendelssohn). He arrived in July 1704 and stayed there until April 1713, when he returned to Amsterdam. According to Theal, Kolb was indolent, conceited, and unscrupulous, however, despite a few inaccuracies of a type which might be expected in a publication of this date, it does seem that his account was invaluable to those who followed him in the exploration of the region. His study of the Hottentot people (now correctly called the Khoikhoi or "real people", Hottentot merely being an imitation of how the Khoisan languages sounded to European visitors) was "the exactest the World had yet seen," and "the natural history section was of considerable value at the time of publication, Sclater, in 'The Fauna of South Africa' observing that it contains the earliest list of South African animals." Illustrated with a wonderful portrait frontispiece of Kolb engraved by Wolfgang Philipp Kilian after Krüger; a folding map of the region, with insets of a view of Table Bay, a plan of the bay itself, and a plan of the Dutch star fort, and a splendidly detailed suite of plates covering local peoples, places, customs, flora and fauna, including a battle royal between an elephant and a heavily-armoured rhino and the unusual specifics of local agricultural and hunting practice. A very nice copy of a far from common work.
Folio (326 × 207 mm). Contemporary vellum, titles to spine gilt, edges stained green. Portrait frontispiece, folding map and 23 engraved plates. Ownership inscriptions to front free endpaper: Gottfried Friedrich Freiherr von Richthofen, purchase information dated 1772; gift inscription of Archidiaconus Schoenwalder dated 1888; A.W. Hoermle, name and date 1922. Vellum a little rubbed, turn-ins lifting a touch, short split at tail of upper joint, light browning, short tear, repaired verso to folding map, but overall a very good copy.
