Maritime

Polynesian Navigation – A Symposium on Andrew Sharp’s Thoery of Accidental Voyages – Edited by Jack Golson

Andrew Sharpe certainly stirred up the debate as to hoe the Pacific Islands may have been settled.

A symposium in the 1960’s brought together some pretty good minds on the subject.

Published by the Polynesian Society, Wellington, New Zealand in 1963. Being Memoir No 34, a Supplement to the Journal of the Society. Softcover, octavo, 153 pages plus bibliography. Three useful maps, two of which are folding. A little age, still a very good copy.

Cartographic expert, Thomas M Perry’s copy with his discrete stamp top of front cover.

The body of the work review the “Accidental Voyage Theory”’ – Parsonson; Primitive Navigation – Captain Hayen and Captain Hilder; Sailing Characteristics of Oceanic Canoes – Bechton; The Geographical Knowledge of the Polynesians and the Nature of Inter-Island Contact – Dening; Geographical Knowledge of Tahitian etc etc

The Pacific Solved – Maybe

$35.00

Updating cart…

Lure of the Southern Seas – The Voyages of Dumont D’Urville 1826-1840

Large perfect bound soft cover (30cm x 24cm) a good size for showing off the many illustrations from artwork created at the time and photographs of displays from the voyage collection held in France.

Published by the Historic Housed Trust of NSW in association of a exhibition held at the Sydney Museum in 2003.

Well researched and produced making an important contribution to works on the two voyages undertaken by Dumont D’Urvillle in the first half of the 19th Century.

Following and introductory chapter “Southern Discomfort” and excellent map, we gain an understanding of the man and what drove him. His voyage towards the Polar Ice; the Anthropology and “Harvest of Curiosities” and the more defined Natural History Catalogue. Some notes on the artists without whom the wonder could not have been so well revealed. Data back up in the form of routes and statistics of the Voyage are followed by the great man’s correspondence and of all things “his will” … references, bibliography.

Dumont D’Urville well presented historical account, some new information and special images.

$35.00

Updating cart…

A World of My Own – Robin Knox-Johnston – First edition 1969.

A fine copy of the first edition 1969 of a then young Robin Knox-Johnston’s single-handed non-stop voyage around the world.

Published by Cassell, London. Octavo, 240 pages, end paper charts and illustrated very nicely.

Humble thorough account although he does point out his vessel Suhaili at 32 feet was smaller than Alec Rose’s Lively Lady at 36 feet and the relative monster Gipsy Moth II of Francis Chichester at 53 feet. Great technical information and tips for overcoming a number of practical difficulties.

We like the extensive lists of stores and instruments at the rear and especially his extensive onboard library which included … Boswell, Bronte(Wuthering Heights), Carlyle, Cherry-Garrard (Worst Journey), Darwin (Voyage of Beagle), Dostoevsky (Crime and Punishment), Laurence Sterne (Tristram and Sentimental), Thackery, Gilbert White (Selbourne) and from modern time interesting to see David Lewis (Daughter of the Wind) and [Voyager Hero] Hiscock (Wanderer III) …. Must have shopped at Voyager!

Knox-Johnston made his name on Suhaili deservedly so!

$30.00

Updating cart…

The Living Sea – John Crompton

A first edition of this interesting easy to read book about the natural history of the oceans. Quite broad in content … starts with prehistory and then moves into Whales (nice content), Manatee, Sharks, Rays back to Caelacanth .. all the good stuff.

Published by Collins, London in 1957. Octavo, 256 pages, some sketch like illustrations. And the dust jacket … we had to have it just for

Good period all rounder dressed to impress.

$25.00

Updating cart…

Shipwreck Archaeology in Australia – Michael Nash

A fine copy of Michael Nash’s all embracing Australian shipwreck book.

Published by the University of Western Australia Press in 2007. Squarish large octavo, 244 pages, very nicely illustrated throughout, end paper illustration of the dreadful goings on at the Batavia camp.

Pulled together by Nash with contributions from a number of other experts in the field, or the water really.

The fifteen wrecks dealt with in detail are presented chronologically starting with the Batavia (1629) .. then a leap to Hunter’s Sirius (1790) .. the Pandora (1791) all the way to the Tasman (1883). We say fifteen but the last is a place for wrecks Garden Island (1906-1945). Notes, glossary etc finish what is a really good reference or stand alone work.

The other dimension with this book is the back history of many of wrecks – First Fleet; Bounty Related; Slavers; Walers etc and for some another aspect such as Experimental Reconstruction (Zanoni 1867); Timber Shipbuilding techniques (Water Witch 1842).

Australian Wrecks – the way in to the subject – no better presentation.

$50.00

Updating cart…

The Russians in Hobart 1823 – Glynn Barratt

Published by the University of Tasmania in 22004, Glynn Barratt being an exert and author on Russian activity in and around Australia and the Pacific in the 19th Century.

Soft cover, perfect bound, 161 pages, illustrated. A fine copy.

Unusual, an most interesting, having a book focusing on Russian activity in isolation.

May 1823 two Russian ships the Kreise and Ladonga came up the Derwent and stayed for three weeks. Even then there was a curiosity about Russia and the Russians. They were well received, maybe more because of the money they could put into the economy than anything else. The officers mixed with the well heeled and dances and parties ensued. Both ships carried natural history scientists. The content here is based on reports of the voyage and later publications of a midshipman Dmitrii Zavalishin later on.

Whilst the book focuses on this expedition [the date is in the title], there is a fair amount of the previous voyage of Bellingshausen in the Vostok [the one where he had returned from the Antarctic]. After sighting Van Diemen’s Land he sailed on the Sydney. His second vessel Mirnyi was much slower and took more careful note of Tasmania …

Russian interest in Tasmania in the early 19th Century.

$30.00

Updating cart…

Polynesian Navigation – A Symposium on Andrew Sharp’s Thoery of Accidental Voyages – Edited by Jack Golson

Lure of the Southern Seas – The Voyages of Dumont D’Urville 1826-1840

A World of My Own – Robin Knox-Johnston – First edition 1969.

The Living Sea – John Crompton

Shipwreck Archaeology in Australia – Michael Nash

The Russians in Hobart 1823 – Glynn Barratt

Product Categories