Russell - Tour through Sicily - 1819

SICILY 1815 – A RARE ENGLISH GRAND TOUR BETWEEN VOLCANOES, ANTIQUITIES AND AQUATINTED SCENERIES
A rare testimony of the British Grand Tour in Sicily in the early 1800s, published in London in 1819. George Russell recounts his journey of 1815 through a land of extraordinary beauty and ancient civilizations. An enchanting itinerary among Mediterranean landscapes, classical monuments, historic towns, and Sicilian traditions. The work is enriched by a folded and colored map of Sicily and by evocative aquatint plates. A precious document of the island’s Romantic rediscovery, weaving archaeology, geography, and travel literature.

ABSTRACT
Rare English travel work devoted to Sicily, published in 1819 under the title A Tour through Sicily in the Year 1815, in which George Russell conveys the impressions and observations gathered during an itinerary carried out on the island in 1815. The volume belongs to the grand tradition of Grand Tour literature, when Sicily, with its Greek vestiges, volcanic landscapes and the richness of its historical testimonies, exerted an ever-stronger fascination on British travelers. The narrative combines geographical observations, descriptions of the territory, considerations on ancient and modern history, and testimonies of local life. Of particular interest is the iconographic apparatus, including a folded and colored map of Sicily placed in the front matter, and plates executed with the aquatint technique, especially appreciated in British travel publishing between the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The illustrations help recreate the atmosphere of the Mediterranean landscapes and the picturesque character of Sicilian views. Published a few years after the journey, the work constitutes a significant testimony to British perceptions of Sicily in the immediate post-Napoleonic War period.

WHY TO BUY
A work of particular interest for Grand Tour collectors, travels in Italy, the history of Sicily, Mediterranean topography, and early nineteenth-century English illustrated books. The 1819 publication marks an important moment in the history of British travelers in the Mediterranean, when Sicily began to establish itself as an autonomous destination apart from traditional Italian itineraries. The appeal of the copy lies in the combination of a relatively early travel narrative, a folded and colored map, and an apparatus of aquatint plates. This latter technique, capable of reproducing delicate tonal gradations and evocative atmospheric effects, was especially used to depict landscapes, monuments, and picturesque views. The presence of the colored map constitutes a further bibliographic and cartographic attractor. The work also offers a historical testimony of Sicily before the great political and social transformations of the nineteenth century, preserving descriptions and impressions tied to the island’s culture, landscapes, and antiquities. A title of specialist interest for libraries dedicated to Sicily, British travel literature, and the Romantic rediscovery of the Mediterranean.

MARKET VALUE
Illustrated British travel works about Sicily published in the early decades of the nineteenth century occupy an interesting sector of the antique market, especially when they preserve the original maps and aquatint plates. Valuation depends on the bibliographic rarity of the specific edition, the completeness of the illustrative apparatus, any colorization of the plates, and the general condition of the copy. The folded and colored map represents a positive element. An indicative antique market range could be roughly between 450 and 700 euros for a complete and good condition copy.

PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION AND CONDITION
Brown half-leather binding with corners reinforced in the same leather, spine and covers covered in cloth and marbled paper. Illustrative apparatus including an engraved, folded, and colored map of Sicily placed in the front matter, and additional plates out of text produced with the aquatint technique. Pages with some browning and physiological foxing. In old books with a history spanning centuries, some imperfections may be present, not always detectable in the description. This listing contains AI Visualizations. Refer to the original photographs to verify the actual condition of the object. Images are an integral part of the description. Pp. (2); 10; 2nn; 290; (4).

FULL TITLE AND AUTHOR
Russell, George.
A Tour through Sicily in the Year 1815.
London, Printed for Sherwood, Neely, and Jones, 1819.

CONTEXT AND SIGNIFICANCE
At the beginning of the nineteenth century Sicily occupied a special position in the imagination of European travelers. Considered one of the cradles of Western Greek civilization, the island safeguarded an archaeologic heritage of extraordinary importance, alongside natural landscapes dominated by Etna, spectacular coasts, and cities where Greek, Roman, Arab, Norman, and Baroque traditions overlapped. For British travelers, Sicily had assumed an even more significant role during the Napoleonic Wars, when the island became an important strategic center of English presence in the Mediterranean. The British military protection of the Bourbon monarchy and the presence of officers, diplomats, and travelers fostered a more intensive knowledge of the Sicilian territory.
George Russell’s journey in 1815 sits precisely in this moment of transition, at the end of the Napoleonic era and the beginning of a new cultural interest in the Mediterranean. Sicily was no longer regarded merely as a remote appendage of the Italian Grand Tour, but as a destination capable of offering archaeological, naturalistic, and landscape experiences of exceptional intensity. Descriptions of ancient monuments were accompanied by curiosity about social conditions, local customs, and the characteristics of the landscape. The presence of aquatint illustrations met the picturesque taste of the time, privileging evocative views, luminous contrasts, and scenographic settings capable of arousing emotion in the reader. The folded map also allowed readers to follow itineraries in their minds and place the described locations within the island’s geography. The work thus represents an interesting testimony to the encounter between Enlightenment geographical observation and Romantic sensitivity in British travel literature.

BRIEF BIOGRAPHY OF THE AUTHOR
George Russell was a British author and traveler active in the early decades of the nineteenth century, remembered in bibliographic circles for A Tour through Sicily in the Year 1815, published in 1819. His account fits into the tradition of English travelers who visited southern Italy and the Mediterranean for historical, artistic, and geographical interest. Through the description of Sicily, Russell contributed to the diffusion of information about the island among the British public, in a period characterized by growing interest in classical antiquities and Mediterranean landscapes. His work reflects the tastes of educated travelers of the era, who sought to combine direct observation, historical references, and picturesque descriptions. Precise biographical information about the author is limited and does not, given current available data, allow for secure dating of birth and death or a detailed reconstruction of his professional activity. The 1819 volume remains therefore an important testimony of his travel experience and his contribution to British literature dedicated to Sicily.

PRINTING HISTORY AND CIRCULATION
A Tour through Sicily in the Year 1815 was published in 1819, four years after the journey narrated, during a period of particular British interest in the history, archaeology, and landscapes of the Mediterranean. The production of illustrated travel works had seen a notable expansion from the late eighteenth century to the early nineteenth century, thanks to the refinement of copper-engraving techniques and the growing demand for publications aimed at a cultured and affluent public. Aquatint, developed during the eighteenth century, allowed tonal effects particularly suited to representing landscapes, architectures, and topographical views. The production of the plates required different handling than the typographic printing of the text, increasing the complexity and cost of the publication. The folded and colored map also represented a significant editorial element, meant to facilitate the understanding of itineraries and to enhance the volume. The 1819 publication belongs to the first phase of nineteenth-century British publishing dedicated specifically to Sicily. No verified data are available here regarding the print run, possible different issues, or the number of surviving copies. The original consistency of the illustrated apparatus should be checked against a documented bibliographic collation before declaring the copy complete.

BIBLIOGRAPHY AND REFERENCES
Russell, George, A Tour through Sicily in the Year 1815, 1819. Pine-Coffin, R. S., Bibliography of British and American Travel in Italy to 1860, Florence, 1974, a foundational survey for Anglo-American travel literature in Italy. Schudt, Ludwig, Italienreisen im 17. und 18. Jahrhundert, Vienna/Munich, 1959, general historical reference for the Italian travel tradition. Blackmer, Henry Myron, Greece and the Levant: The Catalogue of the Henry Myron Blackmer Collection of Books and Manuscripts, London, 1989, comparative corpus for travel literature in the Eastern Mediterranean. Abbey, J. R., Travel in Aquatint and Lithography 1770–1860, London, 1956–1957, important repertoire of British illustrated travel publications. The indicated references constitute tools for the bibliographic and historical framing of the work; the possible presence of the specific Russell edition in the individual repertoires requires direct verification. For a final description, the complete transcription of the title page, the collation, the original number of aquatint plates, and the binding characteristics still need to be ascertained.