Item #29479 Pilgrimage to Palestine, with notes and observations on the present condition of the Holy Land, the manners, customs and institutions of the people, the ruins of ancient cities, and the prospects of missionary enterprises. J. V. C. SMITH.
Pilgrimage to Palestine, with notes and observations on the present condition of the Holy Land, the manners, customs and institutions of the people, the ruins of ancient cities, and the prospects of missionary enterprises.

Pilgrimage to Palestine, with notes and observations on the present condition of the Holy Land, the manners, customs and institutions of the people, the ruins of ancient cities, and the prospects of missionary enterprises.

Boston: David Clapp / Gould & Lincoln, 1853. First Edition. Hardcover. Octavo. [vi] + 340pp. Original blue cloth, blind-stamped decorations on spine & boards, gilt-lettered on spine. B/w frontis. & steel engravings in text throughout. Index. The author, New Hampshire-born Jerome van Crowninshield Smith (1800 - 1879), was a Brown University trained physician who served as the first professor of anatomy and physiology at Berkshire Medical School before settling in Boston where he was port physician from 1826 - 1850. He was an active Freemason from the age of twenty-two, and it seems likely that his interest in the supposed roots of Masonry in the Middle East were at least one of the motivating factors for the extensive travels he undertook there in the early 1850s. These travels resulted in three books: "Pilgrimage to Egypt" (1852); "Pilgrimage to Palestine" (1853); and "Turkey and the Turks" (1854). On his return to Boston he served as Mayor from 1854-1855, and later occupied the chair of anatomy and physiology, and later that of anatomy alone, in New York medical college. He was also an active writer on medicine and natural history, and was made a Deputy Grand Master of his Masonic lodge. His study of Palestine obviously covers Palestine as it was at the time, including what is now Israel, and parts of Syria, Lebanon, etc. Cloth lightly rubbed, spine somewhat discolored, and a bit frayed at head & foot. Owner names & stamp on front free endpaper, adhesive (glue) remains to front pastedown - likely from bookplate no longer present, endpapers darkened, slight foxing to frontis. & title-page, otherwise a solid, internally-clean VG or better copy of a genuinely rare book. Item #29479

Price: $425.00

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