Edited with an Introduction and Notes by
C. W. NEWBURY
ROUTLEDGE AND KEGAN PAUL
1966
Sir Richard Burton was one of the most celebrated and controversial explorers of the nineteenth century. After adventurous beginnings in India, Arabia, and East Africa, he was appointed Consul to the Bight of Benin, where he brought an enormous capacity for observation and extraordinary linguistic ability to bear on the states of Dahomey and the Niger Delta.
He made two visits to the last of the slave-trading kingdoms in 1863 and set down his record of the Dahomean court, the annual sacrificial customs, the corps of Amazons, Dahomean religion, economy, and government.
The two volumes of his Mission to Gelele which first appeared in 1864 have long been out of print and are now expensively rare items. Their integral text is reproduced here with Burton's notes, together with the editor's introduction, which reassesses Burton's contribution to West African history and the kingdom of Dahomey in the light of later studies.
372 Pages
Good condition overall
Collection from Halesowen, Cradley Heath or Dudley. Postage available at extra cost