[Luzon: Obere Savannengegend] [Upper Savanna Landscape]

Description

UNBELIEVABLY RARE. very few copies known to exist. View from “Vierundzwanzig Vegetations-Ansichten” Tafel 24 [pl. 24 of “24 Views of Flora”]. Title of this print is taken from the album text.

Of all the great European voyage accounts in the Pacific in the 19th century, perhaps the rarest are the Russian publications, prized treasures for any collection.

The second Russian expedition into the Pacific for scientific exploration, sponsored by Count Romanzoff, took place from 1815-18, commanded by Lt. Otto von Kotzebue (1787-1846).

Commissioned by Czar Nicolas I., Count Fedor Petrovich Lütke (1797-1882) commanded the Corvette ‘Seniavine’ on a three year expedition whose primary mission was to explore the lands around the Bering Strait. Chiefly scientific in nature, the circumnavigation included noted Russian painters Aleksandr Postels and Baron Friedrich Kittlitz, scientists Dr. Karl Mertens and Dr. Johann von Brandt (the latter all of German descent) who collected thousands of natural history specimen and made many cartographic and scientific contributions.

The publication ‘Voyage autour du monde, exécuté par ordre de Sa Majesté…pendant les annees 1826…1829’ comprised two parts, the nautical and the historical, both with text and an atlas.

However, outside of this voluminous publication, Baron Kittlitz also published a separate series of plates on the various types of landscapes in the countries explored, including two of the Philippines – this plate being one of them.
(Source: Lietz: The Philippines in the 19th Century)