THE K****RS ILLUSTRATED - GEORGE FRENCH ANGAS - (numbered edition)

                                                                   THE K****RS ILLUSTRATED (GEORGE FRENCH ANGAS)

                                                  A facsimile reprint of the original 1849 edition of hand-coloured lithographs.

 A.A. Balkema, Cape Town and Rotterdam, 1974, large folio (39cms x 55cms x 3.2cms) 1974 facsimile reprint of the original 1849 edition. No 415 of 950. New introduction by Frank R. Bradlow, unnumbered prelim. pages include introduction. Pages 1-133, green leather-covered boards, gilt titles on front and spine. Book covers in unusually Fine condition. Internally also in fine condition, but some minor insect damage (historic) showing white on green front free endpaper. All 30 plates bright and clean.

ANGAS, George French. The K****s Illustrated, in a Series of Drawings taken among the Amazulu, Amaponda, and Amakosa Tribes; also, Portraits of the Hottentot, Malay, Fingo, and other races inhabiting Southern Africa: Together with Sketches of Landscape Scenery in the Zulu Country, Natal, and the Cape Colony. London: G. Barclay for J. Hogarth, [1849].

Thirty finely hand-colored lithographed plates drawn on stone by G.F. Angas, M. & N. Hanhart, B.W. Hawkins, A. Laby, J. Needham, and W. Wing, after Angas. Eleven wood-engraved illustrations in the text. With a chapter entitled General Remarks on the Races Inhabiting Southern Africa. (First Edition).

This scarce and important nineteenth century survey of South Africa, including outstanding portraits, depicting the local ethnic groups such as the Khoikhoi (then referred to as Hottentots), Cape Malays and Zulus includes plates of views of Cape Town, Durban, Wynberg, Hottentot Holland, Genadendal, Paarl and Somerset West.

"The three large works by George French Angas, The K****s Illustrated, The New Zealanders Illustrated and South Australia Illustrated, are amongst the most important of the illustrated travel books of their period... Of the three works, The K****s Illustrated is the most uncommon" (Tooley).

George French Angas (1822-1886), also known as G.F.A., was an English explorer, artist, naturalist, zoologist, painter and poet who emigrated to Australia. He studied anatomical drawing and lithography in London prior to traveling to New Zealand and Australia, and, for two years, in South Africa - resulting in the present work. His paintings are held in a number of important Australian public art collections. He was the eldest son of George Fife Angas, who was prominent in the early days of the colonization of South Australia. Angas painted some of the earliest views of South Australia. Arriving in Adelaide in January 1844, Following a trip to New Zealand he returned to South Australia in 1845 and traveled to Port Lincoln. In the following year he returned for a short while to England, accompanied by a young M ori man, Hemi Pomara, who was exhibited alongside Angas's paintings at the Egyptian Hall in London. Angas' next journey in 1846 was to South Africa, where he spent two years in Natal and the Cape, working on a series of drawings and watercolors which were published in 1849 as The K****s Illustrated.