81 - CARL LINNAEUS: FREDRIC HASSELQUISTS ITER PALAESTINUM ELLER RESA TIL HELIGA LANDET. STOCKHOLM, 1757

CARL LINNAEUS: FREDRIC HASSELQUISTS ITER PALAESTINUM ELLER RESA TIL HELIGA LANDET. STOCKHOLM, 1757 FIRST EDITION, in 8vo, contemporary leather over boards, boards slightly trimmed, text clean and bright, complete [16], 619p., ex libris of Margaretha Cronstedt (1887-1977) in front past down ,overall in very good condition and with fine provenance from the famous Fullerobiblioteket of the Countess Cronstedt ,one of the noblest Swedish families. The great Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus, sent his student, Fredric Hasselquist to explore the eastern Mediterranean. This work is a tragic but monumental piece of scientific history, representing one of the first systematic surveys of the Levant. Hasselquist was one of Linnaeus's apostles,a group of students sent across the globe to collect specimens and map the natural world according to the Linnaean system. In 1747, Linnaeus lamented that the natural history of the Holy Land was less known than that of the remote Indies. Hasselquist, despite being in poor health and with no money, volunteered to fix this. From 1749 to 1752, Hasselquist traveled through Smyrna, the Greek islands and Cyprus, to the Holy Land. On his return journey in 1752, Hasselquist died in Smyrna at only 30 years old. After Hasselquist died, his creditors in Smyrna seized his vast collections and manuscripts. The Queen of Sweden personally paid off his debts to have the collections brought back to Sweden. Linnaeus then edited his student's notes and published them. Only this publication in the original Swedish contains the full detailed corpus of Hasselquist’s personal letters to Linnaeus and his travel journals. He describes the people, customs, the landscapes, provides a rigorous classification of animals and plants found in the Levant and was the very first time that the modern system of naming species was applied to the flora and fauna of the Eastern Mediterranean. Particularly important for his visit to Cyprus.