BORY DE SAINT-VINCENT (Jean-Baptiste). Autograph... - Lot 45 - Osenat

BORY DE SAINT-VINCENT (Jean-Baptiste). Autograph letter signed to Isidore Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire. "Napoli de Romanie" [the port city of NAUPLIE in the Greek peninsula of the Peloponnese, today Náfplio], "this 4th of August" [1829]. 14 pp. in-4, marginal tears, larger on the address leaf, prophylactic nicks of the time without hindering the reading. A BEAUTIFUL AND LONG LETTER WRITTEN IN MORAEUS, another name of the Peloponnese, where Jean-Baptiste Bory de Saint-Vincent led in 1829-1830 a scientific exploration expedition which gave rise, from 1831 to 1838 to the publication of a masterly printed account with atlas. Jean-Baptiste Bory de Saint-Vincent, while criticizing the presentations of this region previously published by François-René de Chateaubriand, François-Charles-Hugues-Laurent Pouqueville, as well as the old maps, speaks here about his travels in Laconia (by the river Eurotas and the city of Sparta), in Argolida, in the Magne. He evokes his observations on the wild and cultivated plants, the fauna, the climate, the geology, but also the habitat, the manners, the Greek warlords... He also mentions his travel companions, the naturalists Émile Le Puillon de Boblaye and Pierre-Théodorfe Virlet d'Aoust, and declares that he wants to spend the time of heat in the Cyclades before returning to the Peloponnese, in Achaia. OFFICER, NATURALIST AND EXPLORER, JEAN-BAPTISTE BORY DE SAINT-VINCENT (1778-1846) made a military career and served in the staff of Davout, Ney and Soult. Elected to the House of Representatives during the Hundred Days, he was proscribed at the beginning of the Restoration before being able to return to France. He ended his career as head of the historical office at the Dépôt de la Guerre with the rank of general. He led two important exploration missions, one in 1802, to Mauritius and Reunion Island, the other in 1829-1830 to Morée, and published numerous works on travel, history, and natural history.