Sir Adolphus Slade (1804 77), British naval officer and author, documents his experiences crossing Europe to Turkey in these detailed and richly worded travel journals. Having joined the Royal Navy at a young age, he was promoted to Lieutenant in 1827. Subsequently, he was posted on several missions to Turkey and Greece, in between which he would take the opportunity for personal travel and writing. This is one among several works recording his travels across Europe; he was later appointed administrative head of the Turkish Navy (his history of the Crimean War is also reissued in this series). This collection of accounts, first published in 1840, has a remarkably broad scope. Slade covers peculiarities and specificities of tradition, landscape, class, politics and architecture, often describing encounters with individuals. He draws comparisons with England, presenting the reader with a double cultural insight in a fascinating example of nineteenth-century travel writing.

The Norwegian explorer and ethnographer Carl Lumholtz (1851-1922) wrote the influential ethnographic studies Among Cannibals and Unknown Mexico (both reissued in this series) after his journeys through Australia and Mexico respectively. In 1913, Lumholtz went on his final expedition, which aimed to explore the large parts of Borneo unknown to the rest of the world. Interested by tales of head-hunting, he wanted to spend time with the indigenous people and conduct research. Originally published in 1920, this two-volume work is Lumholtz's account of his expedition. Many of the illustrations in the work are from photographs taken by the author, including pictures of members of the different tribes he stayed with. Volume 1 begins with an overview of Borneo and goes on to describe the expedition's journey into the jungle, and the various ceremonies experienced during the journey, which provide interesting insights into tribal life and belief systems.

'Oliver is an evocative storyteller, vividly bringing his tales to life' BBC History From Genghis Khan's domination on earth to Armstrong's first steps on the moon, discover the 100 moments that defined humanity and shaped our world forever. Neil Oliver takes us on a whistle-stop tour around the world and through a million years to give us this unique and invaluable grasp of how human history pieces together. From the east to the west, north to south, these 100 moments act like stepping stones allowing us to make sense of how these pivotal events have shaped the world we know today. Including many moments readers will expect - from the advent of the printing press to the birth of the internet - there are also surprises, and with them, some remarkable, unforgettable stories that give a whole new insight on our past. From the bestselling author of The Story of the British Isles in 100 Places, this is outstanding new history of how our world was made from 5000 BC to the present. ********************* Praise for Neil Oliver 'Neil Oliver writes beautifully - bringing the past to life and letting us see ourselves in a new light.' - Professor Alice Roberts 'Brilliantly demonstrates Neil's mastery of the broad sweep of British history and landscape.' - Dan Snow 'Highly-crafted...a vivid, pungent history.' - TLS 'Compelling' - Daily Mail

This two-volume work, published in 1844, is a memoir of time spent in China by Captain Arthur Cunynghame (1812 84), aide-de-camp to Major-General Lord Saltoun, Commander of the East India Company's troops in China. Cunynghame set off from Plymouth Sound on board HMS Belle-Isle in late 1841 to take up his post, and the first half of Volume 1 consists of a description of the long journey out to China (they touched at Rio de Janeiro before re-crossing the Atlantic to South Africa, and later visited Singapore and Hong Kong). Once in China, Cunynghame travelled widely in the course of his duties, and recorded his experiences in detail, from the wonders of the Yangtse River to the walls of Nankin: as he observes in his dedication, 'events and anecdotes occurring in a country that is so strange and new to all Europe may be worth recording'.

Edward Vizetelly (1847 1903) was the son of the publisher Henry Vizetelly and a perceptive war correspondent. He began his career for the Daily News and New York Times, covering the Franco-Prussian War, where he narrowly escaped being shot as a spy. This work, published in 1901, recounts the next period of his career, with vivid descriptions of people and places. In 1878, Cyprus was ceded to Britain by Turkey, and Vizetelly, then in Athens, was sent to report on the Island, where he remained for four years. In 1882, he moved to Egypt, where Arab unrest led to the massacre of Europeans in Cairo and the bombardment of Alexandria by British warships. On his return to Europe in 1889, he was commissioned by the owner of the New York Herald to find H. M. Stanley, using Zanzibar as his base. He concludes with a brief summary of subsequent events in Africa.

'My object is to give a peep into the Celestial Empire, to show its strange hills and romantic valleys, its rivers and canals ... and its strange and interesting people.' Robert Fortune (1813-80), the author of several books on China, was a keen botanist. He first went to China for the Royal Horticultural Society, but soon returned on behalf of the East India Company in order to collect tea specimens for the British government's plantations in the Himalayas. In this entertaining account, first published in 1852, Fortune includes stories of how he disguised himself in Chinese clothes to gain access to districts barred to Europeans, of watching farmers sail in what seemed to be wash-tubs, and the bizarre dyeing process that saw large quantities of Prussian Blue and gypsum poured into green tea. Full of panoramic descriptions and engaging anecdotes, this book is ideal for historians and modern-day travellers alike.

The adventurous and unconventional Lady Hester Stanhope (1776-1839) set off to travel to the East in the early nineteenth century. She had been hostess to her uncle, British Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger, and after his death she received a government pension and decided to leave England. Her personal physician Charles Meryon (1783-1877) wrote this three-volume memoir of their travels, first published in 1846. She had a reputation as an eccentric, but thought of herself as the 'Queen of the desert' and indeed achieved considerable influence in the places she travelled to. Eventually she settled in the Lebanon, where she lived out the remainder of her life. Volume 2 begins in Damascus, and includes Lady Hester's dangerous trip to Palmyra, where she had been advised it would be impossible for a woman to go. It also includes accounts of plague in Syria, and of Bedouin life.

Scottish explorer and author James Baillie Fraser (1783 1856) was already known for his narratives of travel in the East (his 1820 journal of a journey through the Himalayas being also reissued in this series) when in 1826 he published this account of his journey into the lesser known provinces of Persia. Though it includes an appendix containing information on geology and commerce, it dwells less on statistical and historical details than it does on the author's personal experiences and impressions. In his preface, Fraser summarily rejects factual material as 'insignificant', preferring to describe the manners of a people seldom encountered by Europeans. The work captures both the sights and sounds of bazaars and cities, and the characters of the people, from princes to peasant boys; and Fraser provides facts on topics ranging from rice cultivation to the architecture of ancient tombs and methods of cooling water.

Cornish-born writer, traveller and controversialist James Silk Buckingham (1786 1855) spent much of his early life as a sailor in the Atlantic and the Mediterranean and went on to publish accounts of his extensive travels to India, Palestine and Persia. His criticisms of the East India Company and the Bengal government led to his expulsion from India in 1823. In the 1830s he became a Member of Parliament and campaigned for social reforms. He founded several journals, including the periodical The Athenaeum. This illustrated two-volume work, published in 1829 and reprinted here from its second edition of 1830, recounts Buckingham's journey through Assyria and Persia en route for India, giving vivid descriptions of its ancient sites and his views on the modern inhabitants of the region. In Volume 1 he starts his narrative at Baghdad, describing Isfahan and the Achaemenid capital, Persepolis, before arriving at Shiraz.

The Scottish twin sisters Agnes Lewis (1843 1926) and Margaret Gibson (1843 1920), heiresses of an extremely wealthy man, between them learned numerous languages, including Modern Greek, Arabic, Hebrew, Persian and Syriac, and became pioneering biblical scholars and explorers at a time when women rarely ventured to foreign lands. Their initial desire to travel to the Holy Land was encouraged by their Presbyterian minister. Setting out with their former teacher, Grace Blyth, in 1868, they travelled across Europe to Greece, Turkey, Egypt and Palestine. In this 1870 account, Lewis vividly describes the discomfort of long-distance travel, especially for women, and their encounters with the people they met on the way. At Constantinople they were struck by the beauty of Hagia Sophia, and saw whirling dervishes. They had some difficulties with their guide in Egypt, but this did not deter them, and they continued on to Palestine before returning to Europe.

Moritz von Kotzebue (1789 1861), son of the German dramatist and an experienced seaman and soldier, who had faced Bonaparte's troops on the battlefield, travelled to the court of Fath Ali Shah Qajar (1772 1834), the king of Persia, with a Russian embassy in 1817. His account of the journey was published in German in 1819, and an English translation was published in the same year, claiming to offer a different perspective from the ordinary run of British writings on Persia. Covering the journey from St Petersburg through the Caucasus and down to Soltaniyeh, where the embassy meets the Shah, the work is a compilation of day-to-day observations on people and events. The author is astute and witty, and the book is not only an interesting read but also a useful source for the region's social history; a lengthy description of the Shah's court is particularly impressive.

Clarke Abel (c.1780 1825) was Chief Medical Officer accompanying Lord Amherst's unsuccessful diplomatic embassy to China in 1816. Encouraged by Sir Joseph Banks, he acted as official naturalist to the expedition, which penetrated further into China than had been possible for previous western visitors. Although most of his large collection of botanical and mineralogical specimens was lost during the return voyage, survivals included several new species, some of which were named after him. This work, published in 1818, made Abel's reputation, and he was elected to the Royal Society the following year. His geological survey of the Cape of Good Hope, studied on the outward journey, is particularly impressive. Abel's account of Chinese society and culture is an important record of a country which was then largely inaccessible to Europeans. An appendix by Robert Brown (Banks' botanist) lists the specimens that survived the shipwreck, which is itself dramatically described.

Kate Marsden (1859 1931), the youngest of eight children from a poor family, was a highly committed nurse. She cared for soldiers in the Russo-Turkish War in 1877 8, and undertook missionary travels to various countries, but she was especially concerned about the plight of those suffering from leprosy. This volume, published in 1893, describes her remarkable journey to Siberian leper colonies. At first she travelled by sledge with a friend, but continued alone on horseback, facing appalling weather conditions with her customary courage. Her commitment to leprosy sufferers led her to found the St Francis Leprosy Guild in London in 1895, and she organised a leprosy hospital in the remote Siberian town of Vilyusk in 1897. She was made a Member of the Russian Imperial Red Cross Society, and she was also one of the first women to be appointed a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society.

Published in 1876, this vivid, action-packed account describes the experiences of David Kennedy Jr (1849-85) as he toured the world with his musician father and family choir between 1872 and 1876 performing 'The Songs of Scotland'. Kennedy travelled through 'nearly every town and village in Australia, New Zealand and Canada', and over a three-year period wrote articles recording his impressions for publication in Edinburgh newspapers; this book is an edited and expanded compilation of those pieces. Kennedy describes places and events including Sydney Harbour, floods in Melbourne, the New Zealand volcanic country, a violent storm at sea, the cosmopolitan, frenetic atmosphere of San Francisco, the American trans-continental railway and a Canadian snowstorm. His closely observed vignettes of local society are particularly fine, and depict entertainments and pastimes, education and worship, and indigenous traditions as well as individuals such as innkeepers, stage-coach drivers, travellers, miners, and particularly his fellow Scots.

Sir Henry Holland (1788-1873) was a passionate and intrepid traveller from a young age. In addition to a distinguished career as court physician - first to Caroline of Brunswick, then to Queen Victoria and Prince Albert - he sought to keep two months of each year free to travel. His trip to Greece formed part of a European tour that Holland undertook in 1812-13 after having taken his medical degree at Edinburgh. Holland focuses on the lesser-known islands and parts of Macedonia and Albania, and gives a unique first-hand account of the Albanian vizier Ali Pasha (1740-1822), whom he befriended while visiting his court. The publication of Holland's travelogue in 1815 enhanced his reputation greatly and he was elected Fellow of the Royal Society that year. The book contributed to the early nineteenth-century fascination with Greece that would later lead Lord Byron to join the Greek War of Independence.

Sir Reginald Fleming Johnston (1874 1938) was a colonial administrator and oriental scholar. He travelled extensively in the Far East and developed a deep interest in Chinese culture and religion. His fourteen-year posting to Weihaiwei, a quiet naval base, allowed him to travel to places not usually visited by Europeans, and to begin writing. In 1906 he spent six months travelling across China to Burma, publishing this illustrated account of his arduous journey in 1908. In it he comments on the economic and political state of China, but the book's main theme is the beauty of the country and the character of its people. His understanding of the language, religion and culture make this a valuable description of Chinese society at the beginning of the twentieth century. Johnston's Lion and Dragon in Northern China (1910) and Twilight in the Forbidden City (1934) are also reprinted in this series.

This two-volume English translation of part of a longer travel narrative by the Ottoman aristocrat Evilya Celebi (1611-c.1680) was translated by the Austrian scholar Joseph von Hammer (1774-1856) and published in 1834 by the Oriental Translation Fund of Great Britain and Ireland, set up to make 'Eastern' texts more widely available in English. Celebi was highly educated, had served the Ottoman court both as a diplomat and as a soldier, and as he says, had in his travels 'seen the countries of eighteen monarchs and heard 147 different languages'. His lifetime encompassed the highest point of Ottoman expansion into Europe, and his indefatigable curiosity about everything he saw makes this work a fascinating assemblage of topics varying from the fountains of Istanbul to a journey to Georgia. Volume 2 includes Celebi's eye-witness account of the siege and conquest of Canea (Khania) in Crete in 1645.

The Scottish twin sisters Agnes Lewis (1843 1926) and Margaret Gibson (1843 1920) between them spoke modern Greek, Arabic, Hebrew, Persian and Syriac, and were pioneering biblical scholars and explorers at a time when women rarely ventured to foreign lands. The sisters made several journeys to the Monastery of St Catherine on Mount Sinai, and their first two visits there are described in this 1893 publication. Using her sister's journals, Margaret Gibson tells how Agnes discovered a version of the Gospels in Syriac from the fifth century CE. This text is immensely important, being an example of the New Testament written in the eastern branch of Aramaic, the language that Jesus himself spoke. Meanwhile, Margaret Gibson studied other manuscripts in the library and photographed them; the sisters later transcribed and published many of these. Controversy over the circumstances of the discovery led to Margaret publishing this account in 1893.

Robert Edwin Peary (1856 1920), the distinguished American Arctic explorer, is usually credited as the first person to have reached the geographic North Pole, in 1909. First published in 1898, this two-volume work recounts Peary's expeditions across the interior ice-cap of Northern Greenland in the years 1886 and 1891 7. It describes Peary's contacts with the local Inuit tribes and the valuable scientific discoveries he made in geography, and natural history. Peary also documents the discovery and conveyance to the United States of the Cape York meteorites, from which the Inuit had extracted iron, but whose whereabouts had been a secret. In Volume 1, Peary recounts his first two expeditions in Greenland. On the first, in 1886, he travelled over the Greenland ice sheet for 100 miles. On the second, in 1891 2, he and seven companions (including his wife) sledged 1300 miles to North-East Greenland.

Ornithologist and clergyman H. B. Tristram (1822 1906), who became both a Fellow of the Royal Society and Canon residentiary of Durham, began his literary career with an account of his ventures into the desert of Algeria, where he had travelled seeking a salubrious winter climate. This subsequent book, published in 1865, narrates his journey through Palestine in 1863 4. An engaging account, written for a popular audience, it combines detailed observations of antiquities, geography, and the native wildlife with scriptural quotations; its stated aim is to demonstrate that the Bible accurately describes the region. Tristram was one of the earliest public supporters of Darwin's theories, noting their relevance to his own studies in his 1859 paper 'On the Ornithology of North Africa'. This book, and his later work of 1873 The Land of Moab (also reissued in this series), illuminate the complex contemporary relationship between religion and the natural sciences.

First published in 1896, this work by Agnes Bensley (d. 1900), wife of the Orientalist and biblical scholar Robert Bensly (1831 93), describes the journey undertaken by a party of scholars to St Catherine's Monastery on Mount Sinai in 1893. In the previous year, sisters Agnes Smith Lewis and Margaret Dunlop Gibson had discovered the Sinai Palimpsest, the earliest-known Syriac version of the Gospels. The purpose of the Bensly's mission was to aid them in transcribing and deciphering the Palimpsest. Beginning with the party's arrival in Cairo, the book describes the preparation for the trip, their journey across the desert, and life in the monastery. However, relations between the members of the party deteriorated; Gibson and Lewis wrote their own accounts of the expedition (also available in this series), and Mrs Bensly's narrative is defensive of the role of her husband, who died days after their return to England.

Polar explorer John Ross (1777 1856) sailed with William Edward Parry in 1818 to seek a North-West Passage from Baffin Bay. The attempt was unsuccessful, and Ross was widely blamed for its failure. In 1829, he set out on a privately funded expedition on the steamship Victory, accompanied by his nephew James Clark Ross, to try again, returning to England in late 1833. Using survival techniques learnt from the Inuit he befriended, Ross kept his crew healthy through four icebound winters. While the voyage once again failed to find a North-West Passage, it surveyed the Boothia Peninsula and a large part of King William Land. It was also valuable for its scientific findings, with J. C. Ross discovering the magnetic pole. Ross published this two-volume work in 1835. Volume 2 contains scientific reports, ethnological information on the Inuit, an Eskimo vocabulary, and comments on natural history.

Sir Thomas Graham Jackson (1835-1924) was one of the most distinguished architects of his generation, particularly renowned for his work in Oxford for the University and the Military College. Jackson was also a prolific author, producing numerous books relating to the history of architecture, often illustrated with his own sketches. Originally published in 1923, this book is formed from a series of personal accounts describing experiences during the author's extensive travels. The text also contains illustrations by Jackson from a wide variety of locations. This is a highly readable volume that will be of value to anyone with an interest in travel writing and architectural history.

Charles Lewis Meryon (1783 1877) was the personal physician to the unconventional and adventurous Lady Hester Stanhope (1776 1839), who left England in 1810 to travel to the Middle East. She eventually settled in Lebanon and by the time she died no longer had contact with any Europeans. Meryon's Travels of Lady Hester Stanhope (also reissued in this series) recounted her journey during the first seven years he spent with her before returning to England to complete his medical training. Over the next twenty years, they remained in contact and he stayed with her on two more occasions before she died. In this three-volume work, first published in 1845, Meryon presents letters he received from her and recounts their conversations, giving a remarkable insight into the woman he describes as 'out of humour with all mankind'. Volume 3 covers the period from 1838 until her death, including reflections on her isolated final months of life.