Nouveaux Memoires sur l'Etat Present de la Grand Russie ou Moscovie

1725. [WEBER, Friedrich Christian]. Nouveaux Memoires sur l'Etat Present de la Grand Russie ou Moscovie. Two volumes. With 2 large folding maps, one of the Russian empire and a plan of the town of Saint Petersburg. xxiv, 438; [6], 426, [4] pp. misnumbering throughout. 12mo., 162 x 90 mm, bound in full French contemporary speckled calf, five raised bands, gilt-tooled compartments, edges stained red. Paris: Chez Pissot, 1725. First Edition in French. The work first appeared in a German edition in Frankfurt 1721. Friedrich Christian Weber was an ambassador from the Hanovarian court of Brunswick-Lunebourg at Moscow representing English interests at the time of Czar Peter the Great. Weber was not credited with being a brilliant diplomat during his sojourn in Russia from 1714 to 1720, however, his Memoires are considered to be one of the most important accounts of the period in Russia during the reign of Peter the Great. "While there [Weber] observed city development, improvements in industry, cultural identification, and the spread of Russian hegemony in Northwestern Europe... [in this publication] Weber details the Russian improvements in politics, economics, and social aspects of the Baltic region with admiration. In doing so, he provides evidence that the region was still profitable to Britain, even when under Russian rule… Weber first arrived in Riga in 1714 finding it a desolate center of trade; tired and distraught from plague, famine, and war while in the hands of a new ruler…. Weber saw that the power of Russia had yet to culturally affect the indigenous people of the region. The aspects of life in Russia's Baltic region that Weber commented on were religion, alcohol, language, innovations, and assimilation. Religion was emphasized in Riga in 1714 as a practice that people would be free to commence with as they had been doing so in the past. But at the same time, it was Peter I's goal to spread Christianity through his dominions. During Weber's travels he saw the conversion as a slow process….One of the most present aspects of the Czar's diplomacy was in mimicking the French and the British. He introduced entertainment, dress, and health practices that followed after the places he admired most for their success. The Russian high culture was fond of parties where dancing, card playing, smoking, drinking, and entertainment were present. However, unlike the parties of the French, Peter I regulated the gatherings in print by restricting how to conduct one self as a host, invitee, and how the party should be organized in order to ensure the barbarities of the Russians did not come out" (Jennifer Donogh, British Interest in the New Russia (1714-1720). In the second volume a large section (pp 89- 144) contains the Journal de Voyage de Laurent Lange à la Chine." Lange was originally in China with the Ismailov embassy. His problem was to get himself accepted, to cope with official worries about the frontiers, Manchu xenophobia, imperial megalomania, court intrigues. He blundered by making contact with Koreans, thus rousing suspicions about Russian designs, and about their export of articles for use, as against mere chinoiserie (which would conflict with court tribute supplies)." See: Lust. A fine set. PROVENANCE: Sieur de Sailly, or C. de Sailly, perhaps the family of Charles de Sailly, the famous Huguenot who tried to resettle large numbers of Huguenot-Walloon refugees in Ireland and then in Virginia, with his signature on title of each volume. Quérard X, 494. Cordier, Sinica 2471. See: Cox I, 193.