A Voyage to the Pacific Ocean (Atlas volume only, with full complement of 87 maps, plates and charts)

A Voyage to the Pacific Ocean. Undertaken, by the command of His Majesty, for making discoveries in the Northern Hemisphere … Performed under the direction of Captains Cook, Clerke, and Gore, in his majesty’s ships the Resolution and Discovery; in the years 1776, 1777, 1778, 1779, and 1780. London : Printed by W. and A. Strahan for G. Nicol, 1784. First edition. Atlas volume only, oblong folio, 405 x 555 mm, nineteenth century half-calf over marbled papered boards (skilfully rebacked with new corners), spine preserving original title label ‘Cook’s Voyages’, elaborately tooled in gilt, edges rubbed, corners bumped, marbled endpapers, late nineteenth century and early twentieth century ownership inscriptions, containing the full complement of 87 maps, plates and charts issued in the folio atlas of Cook’s third voyage, as well as the plates usually found within the three quarto text volumes, printed on smaller sheets for inclusion in the smaller volumes, all plates without any folds indicating they were never included in the quartos, occasional scattered foxing, plates 47 and 46 with a tear to the upper margins (not affecting the image), plates 79 – 87 with a vertical mis-crease (presumably where the atlas was closed carelessly), a very good copy.

The atlas volume (plus additional plates usually found in the quarto volumes) of the official account of Cook’s third voyage, including his death on the islands of Hawaii, the discovery ‘Cook judged his most valuable discovery’ – Hill. ‘One of the most important English books published in the last quarter of the eighteenth century.’ (Forbes).

Beddie 1543; Hill (2004) 361; Holmes 47