Lot 104
Orlich, Leopold von
Travels in India, including Sinde and the Punjab
Auction: India in Ink: The Library of Dr Raj Krishna | 01 October 2026 from 10am | Lots 79 to 208
Description
Translated from the German by H. Evans Lloyd. London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1845. First edition in English, 2 volumes, 8vo, original green cloth, spines lettered in gilt, covers decoratively panel-stamped in blind, xv [1] 278, vii [1] 314 pp., half-titles, chromolithographic frontispiece to each volume, wood-engraved illustrations in the text (mainly depicting Indian trades and professions), 2 folding letterpress tables, 2 + 32 pp. advertisements to volume 1 (the 32 pp. catalogue dated April 1846), 2 pp. advertisements to volume 2, binder's ticket to volume 1 rear pastedown, engraved armorial bookplate of Charles Finch Foster, spines slightly faded and rolled, nicks to headcaps, a few marks to covers, inner hinges superficially cracked, very occasional light spotting (2)
Provenance
INDIA IN INK: THE LIBRARY OF DR RAJ KRISHNA
Footnote
The author was a Prussian army officer who travelled to India hoping to served with the British in what he expected to be a lengthy war with the Afghans in response to the disastrous 1842 retreat from Kabul, but only succeeded in joining up with the British at Ferozepor in the Punjab after their return from Afghanistan, and embarked instead on a personal voyage across India. His narrative is especially important as an eyewitness account of Sindh and the Sikh Empire on the eve of the British conquest of Sindh and of the First Anglo-Sikh War. The work was first published in German the same year as Reise in Ostindien in Briefen an Alexander von Humboldt und Carl Ritter.