Mr. Ray's travels, Vol. 2 : A collection of curious travels and voyages.…
"Mr. Ray's travels, Vol. 2 : A collection of curious travels and voyages.…." by John Ray is a collection of travel narratives and natural history observations written in the mid-18th century. It gathers translated journeys and reports focused on the Levant and wider Ottoman world—Greece, Asia Minor, Egypt, Arabia, and Ethiopia—emphasizing geography, customs, trade, and plants. Readers will find firsthand itineraries enriched with ethnographic detail and long botanical lists compiled from multiple
travelers. The opening of this volume lays out an extensive table of contents and then begins Dr. Leonhart Rauwolf’s travelogue into the Eastern Mediterranean. He states his botanical aims, travels overland from Augsburg to Marseilles noting towns and plants, and then undertakes a stormy, wind-driven passage past Sardinia, Sicily, Crete, and Cyprus, including a brief audience with an Ottoman officer at Salamis, before reaching Tripoli. On arrival he describes a scuffle at the gate and then sketches Tripoli’s setting, irrigated gardens and fruits, flat-roofed houses, narrow paved streets, caravanserais, and especially the public baths and their routines (washing, depilation, and massage). He surveys trade and governance: European consuls and fondiques, bustling bazaars, silk and raisin commerce, soap and potash making from local halophytic plants, coinage, and the roles of Ottoman officials and courts, with examples of both punishments and corruption alongside avenues of appeal. Rauwolf also notes everyday manners—dress, music and games, washing habits, women’s seclusion and cemetery visits, and funeral customs. The section closes by starting a catalog of local flora around Tripoli, from shore plants to ricinus, squills, and sugar-canes. (This is an automatically generated summary.)
Mr. Ray's travels, Vol. 2 : A collection of curious travels and voyages. Containing Dr Leonhart Rauwolf's journey into the eastern countries, viz. Syria, Palestine, or the Holy Land, Armenia, Mesopotamia, Assyria, Chaldea, &c., translated from the Original High Dutch, by Nicholas Staphorst. And also, travels into Greece, Asia minor, Egypt, Arabia felix, Petræa, Ethiopia, the Red Sea, &c. Collected from the observations of Mons. Belon, Prosper Alpinus, Dr. Huntington, Mr. Vernon, Sir George Wheeler, Dr. Smith, Mr. Greaves, and others. To which are added three catalogues of such trees, shrubs, and herbs, as grow in the Levant. By the Rev. John Ray, F.R.S.
Edition
Second edition corrected and improved
Original Publication
London: J. Walthoe : D. Midwinter : A. Bettesworth et al, 1738.
Note
Stirpium orientalium : Rariorum catalogi tres. (44 pp. at end of work)
Credits
Charlene Taylor, Adrian Mastronardi, David Garcia. and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
Reading Level
Reading ease score: 64.4 (8th & 9th grade). Neither easy nor difficult to read.
