Incidents of travel in Egypt, Arabia Petræa, and the Holy Land
By: John Lloyd Stephens ; illustraed by Frederick Catherwood and others ; edited, and with an introduction by Victor Wolfgang von Hagen.
Contributors: Von Hagen, Victor Wolfgang, 1908-
Publisher: Dover Publications
Published: 1996
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 473
Subjects: Egypt -- Description and travel.; Arabia, Roman -- Description and travel.; Palestine -- Description and travel.
Description: Perhaps best known for his discovery of the Mayan ruins in the Yucatan, lawyer-turned-archaeologist John Lloyd Stephens (1805–1852) was the author of a number of highly praised travel books. The present volume, his first effort in the genre, received wide acclaim from reviewers, including Edgar Allan Poe, who found it "written with a freshness of manner evincing manliness of feeling."
Conversational and unpretentious, the book is a delightful narrative of the author's year-long journey through the Middle East, incorporating detailed observations of such architectural marvels as the Pyramids, the temples of Karnak, the red-rock city of Petra and more, and offering charming accounts of a Turkish bath, how to catch a crocodile, the wardrobe of a Nubian damsel, a night in a tomb, the hospitality of the Arabs, desert horses, Easter in Jerusalem, and much more.
Enhanced by 38 superb illustrations by Frederick Catherwood and others, this Stephens volume will delight armchair travelers with the "easy, laughing, prose style which gives his books their charm."
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
"This Dover edition, first published in 1996, is an unabridged and unaltered republication of the edition published by the University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, Oklahoma, in 1970." -- T.p. verso.