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[TULLY, Miss].. Narrative Of A Ten Years' Residence At Tripoli In Africa: From The Original Correspondence In The Possession Of The Family Of The Late Richard Tully, Esq The British Consul. Comprising Authentic Memoirs And Anecdotes Of The Reigning Bashaw, His Family, And Other Persons Of Distinction; Also, An Account Of The Domestic Manners Of The Moors, Arabs, And Turks.

4to. pp. xiii, [2], 370. folding engraved map & 5 hand-coloured aquatints (incl frontis.). modern half calf (some scattered light foxing, plates offset). First Edition. An interesting account of Moorish manners and customs, and political events in Tripoli in the latter part of the eighteenth century, written by the sister or sister-in-law of the late Richard Tully, British Consul at Tripoli from 1783 to 1793. Tully's family was very close to that of the Bashaw, and this narrative, according to the Preface, "will be found an object of particular curiosity, from the lively and artless manner in which it lays open the interior of the Court of the Bashaw of Tripoli. It contains.the only exact account which has ever been made publicly known of the private manners and conduct of the African Despot, and details such scenes and events, such sketches of human weakness and vice, the effects of ambition, avarice, envy, and intrigue, as will scarcely appear credible in the estimation of an European." "The work is particularly valuable for its details of family life in the seraglio. The female members of Tully's family were on intimate terms with the Bashaw's family and were admitted into all the life of the seraglio. This is one of the most important records of Tripolitan life during the 18th century. The very attractive plates depict genre scenes and costumes." (Blackmer) The letters describe the plague that arrived in Tripoli from Tunis in 1785 and confined the Tully family indoors for a year and a half, the civil war in Tripoli, and the aggressions between Spain and Algeria, and Venice and Tunis. Both the Bashaw's family and the Tully's were driven out of Tripoli by the Turkish invasion of 1793. Abbey, Travel, 299. Robinson, Wayward Women, p. 248. Prideaux p. 354 (erroneously calling for 6 coloured plates) & Tooley 493 (attributing the work to Richard Tully). cfBlackmer 1682 (Third Edn.). cfGay 1496bis.

$1998 USD