A Collection of Original Voyages: Containing I. Capt. Cowley's Voyage Round the Globe. II. Captain Sharp's Journey over the Isthmus of Darien, and Expedition into the South Seas, Written by Himself. III. Capt. Wood's Voyage Thro' The Streights of Magellan. IV. Mr. Tobert's Account of their way of Living; Description off the Archipelago Islands, Taking of Scio, &c.

First Edition.

London: Printed for James Knapton, 1699. [16],45,[1],1-16,33-100,53,[3]pp. plus folding world map, five folding charts and plans, and a small plate of coastal profiles.,contemporary tan calf.

Scarce first edition of this famous collection, one of the important works issued by the publisher Knapton to capitalise on the best-selling account of Dampier’s first voyage to the South Seas.

The first three voyages recounted here all deal with English buccaneers in the Pacific, perhaps the most important being that of Cowley, who sailed for many months with Dampier in the early 1680s. Cowley’s narrative is accompanied by a fine world map which marks his track across the Pacific to Guam, China and then through the Straits of Sunda and the Cape of Good Hope.The work was prepared by William Hacke, who was himself a buccaneer. Although he is now known chiefly for this compendium, he had made his living selling rutters, manuscript atlases copied from the “derroteros” plundered from Spanish vessels.

Hacke’s collection brings together the accounts of four voyages which provide important source material, particularly for the history of the buccaneers. Although the voyages of the buccaneers were private enterprise expeditions, they were responsible for considerably extending geographical knowledge: Cowley sailed further south than had previously been done, and named some of the Galapagos Islands. Similarly, Sharp provides perceptive observations on Panama and the west coast of South America and was the Captain responsible for carrying off a Spanish atlas in 1680, ‘from which Hacke made several highly important manuscript atlases’ (Hill). The two concluding voyages which make up the collection are those of Wood, who was with Sir John Narborough during his crucial navigation of the Magellan Straits and the straight-talking Roberts, press-ganged onto a corsair in the Levant.

The account of Dampier and of his cohort Cowley were fractionally different in the mapping of the Sebald de Weerts (now the Falklands).

Hacke claimed to have sailed with many of the buccaneers and pirates and, as a chartmaker in Wapping he certainly must have known many of the British pirates. Indeed, it was from Sharpe that he was supplied with the captured Spanish Waggoner atlas from which he made several manuscript copies for presentation to those who could influence the fate of Sharpe, the returned pirate. Of the four narratives contained in this work, two are piratical accounts. The first, Sharpe’s own account, here printed for the first time, describes his freebooting cruise in the Pacific, including the attempted sack of New Panama in 1680. There are five other accounts of this cruise (i.e. Wafer, Ringrose, Dick, Dampier, and Cox). The second piratical memoir contained in the above is that of Roberts’ account of his adventures with the Greek pirates, his subsequent escape, and his final participation with the Venetian fleet at the battle of Scio.

The maps are by Herman Moll, and the world map shows California as an island. Moll collected a lot of new information for his atlases from Hacke, Dampierand other buccaneers. The three unnumbered pages at the end are ads for other books printed by Knapton, including works by Dampier and Wafer, works on commerce and trade, and Latin classics.

One of the classics of British buccaneering literature.

Hill 741; Sabin 29473; NMM 4:239; Wing H168