A Description of the Shetland Islands, comprising and account of their Geology, Scenery, Antiquities, and Superstitions. [with some additions] by Samuel Hibbert, P A Munch - 1822

Edinburgh and London : Archibald Constable and Co.; Hurst, Robinson, and Co. , 1822 An unusual copy of the scarce 1st edition of Samuel Hibbert's comprehensive work on the Shetland Islands. It has been bound to order in a half leather binding with marbled boards, and includes 2 chapters in Norwegian from Det Norske Folks (1839) by P A Munch. The chapters are on Orkney and Shetland and include 2 maps. Also included are 2 charts by Captain Vetch of Fair Isle and Foula - the Fair Isle chart has become detached. The binding is splitting at the joints and has general wear. It has been given a plastic wrap which is holding the work together. Internally the original endpapers are present with a small ink signature to the front pastedown. The Hibbert work is bound first and is listed on the title label. It is complete with frontispiece, and 7 plates of which 2 are folding. There are numerous other illustrations in the text and as vignettes. There is a large folding geological map at the rear which is laid on linen. A map of Foula by Capt. Vetch has been added next to the text on Foula, and a map of Fair Isle is loose in the text. Sections of the work are very browned and or spotty which is clearly a paper quality problem as some sections are clean. The plates are browned. The map needs some repair to the paper overlay and there is a small repaired page tear to the top of p 399. A previous owner, clearly a linguist and scholar, has made a number of very neat scholarly annotations. The Hibbert is 616pp including index. There is a brown paper divider with hand written title and then chapters III and XIV from Det Norske Folks, which cover Orkney and the Shetland Isles with full page maps of both. The text is in Norwegian and is clean and sound. There is a further brown paper divider and hand-written text on the Natural History of Orkney. This mainly consists of some description and species lists. It does not look complete. A number of blank sheets are added at the end.