Details
HARRY ST JOHN PHILBY (1885-1960).
Manuscript map of part of the Red Sea coast of Arabia from Al Birk to Al Lith, pen, ink and colours on tracing paper, rebacked, 180 x 46.5cm. The map showing the track (in red) of Philby along the Arabian coast as he travelled by donkey north towards Jiddah from 9th to 17th February 1937, marking along the way the various topographical features, wadis, sabkhas. and approximate positions of major hills and rock escarpments. (Slight discolouration and creasing of tracing paper, particularly at margins.)
An extraordinary map of part of Philby's return route to Jiddah in the spring of 1937, following his crossing of the empty Quarter from Mecca to Al Mukalla in 1936. From Al Mukalla Philby decided to return via the Hadramawt and up the Red Sea coast. This map represents a section of the journey to Wadi Lith where to his surprise he was met by a car which took him back to Jiddah and on to Mecca. This map is a fair copy traced and drawn by Philby from his four field manuscripts (these manuscripts are now in the R.G.S.) This was the first time that this part of the Arabian coast had been mapped satifactorily, and served as a basis for the British mapping of this area before and during the Second World War. As he was riding a donkey and making sketches of the terrain as he went along, he employed unusual scale "1mm = 2 minutes donkey riding (say at 6km per hour)".
Manuscript map of part of the Red Sea coast of Arabia from Al Birk to Al Lith, pen, ink and colours on tracing paper, rebacked, 180 x 46.5cm. The map showing the track (in red) of Philby along the Arabian coast as he travelled by donkey north towards Jiddah from 9th to 17th February 1937, marking along the way the various topographical features, wadis, sabkhas. and approximate positions of major hills and rock escarpments. (Slight discolouration and creasing of tracing paper, particularly at margins.)
An extraordinary map of part of Philby's return route to Jiddah in the spring of 1937, following his crossing of the empty Quarter from Mecca to Al Mukalla in 1936. From Al Mukalla Philby decided to return via the Hadramawt and up the Red Sea coast. This map represents a section of the journey to Wadi Lith where to his surprise he was met by a car which took him back to Jiddah and on to Mecca. This map is a fair copy traced and drawn by Philby from his four field manuscripts (these manuscripts are now in the R.G.S.) This was the first time that this part of the Arabian coast had been mapped satifactorily, and served as a basis for the British mapping of this area before and during the Second World War. As he was riding a donkey and making sketches of the terrain as he went along, he employed unusual scale "1mm = 2 minutes donkey riding (say at 6km per hour)".