#R21
1914
First Edition. Quarto (ca. 30x21,5 cm). [2], 182, [2 - errata] pp. With a photogravure frontispiece, two maps and many photo illustrations in text. Original publisher’s brown quarter sheep with decorative carved ornaments on wooden boards with a gilt lettered title on the front board; decorative endpapers. Binding rubbed on extremities, several pages loose from binding but overall a very good copy.
Very rare. Interesting original account of a Russian hunting safari expedition to British East Africa (Kenya) in November 1911 - January 1912. A party of three Russian hunters travelled across the “Serengeti Plains” of the Tsavo River basin (modern-day Tsavo West National Park) down to Lake Jipe on the border with German East Africa (Tanzania), and later on hunted in the basin of Mukumba, Machakos and Athi Rivers southwest of Nairobi. The book contains detailed notes on the organization of the trip (lists of necessary supplies and guns, the necessary quantity of servants and guides), describes the travel on the Uganda Railroad to the Voi station; vividly depicts hunting, African landscapes and animals, Mombasa, Nairobi, Swahili villages, notes about the spread of the sleeping sickness near the shores of the Great African Lakes etc. The two maps outline the routes of the hunting party, marking their camps. The author, Vladislav Gorodetskii ( (1863-1930) was a notable Russian architect of Polish origin who became one of the most important contributors to the 19th-century architectural face of Kiev (Gorodetskii designed the House with Chimaeras, St. Nicholas Roman Catholic Cathedral, the Karaite Kenesa, and the modern-day National Art Museum of Ukraine). In 1920 he immigrated to Poland and later on to Persia where he designed the Tehran railway station in 1928-29. The book is illustrated with the reproductions of Gorodetskii’s photographs from the trip and numerous vignettes, headings and endings after his original drawings. His two travel companions were one “M. – a member of the Kiev Russian Society of Proper Hunting <…>, and “R.” – a member of the Kiev Branch of the Imperial Society of Proper Hunting” (V Dzhungliakh Afriki, p. 5).
Overall a rare interesting account of a private Russian safari trip to Africa in the early 20th century.
Only one paper copy found in Worldcat (Northwestern University, IL).
