Den Norske Polarfærd 1893-1896

By Nansen, Fridtjof and Otto Sverdrup

Kristiania (Oslo): H. Aschehoug and Co.s, 1897. First Norwegian Edition. Large 8vo – 23.4cm. Two volumes, Half-titles. 43 plates, 3 folding coloured maps and numerous illustrations in text; Publisher’s teal-green decorative cloth with bright gilt graphic images and titles on spine and cover. Original gilt-floral end leaves, no prior ownership markings, gutters reinforced, pages clean. The first Norwegian edition of Nansen’s famous “Fram” expedition. A very good set in its original published state. Arctic Bibliography 11988

The English language version of this publication was published as “Farthest North; Being the Record of a Voyage of Exploration of the Ship “Fram” 1893-96 and of a Fifteen Month’s Sleigh Journey by Dr. Nansen and Lieut. Johansen”, also in 1897. Nansen’s first-person account of his journey to prove that a drift-current sets across the polar regions from the Bering Strait and the neighborhood of the New Siberia Islands towards the east coast of Greenland. Nansen’s theory was based on a number of indications, not the least of which was the discovery of portions of the wreck of the “Jeannette” which had been lost off the New Siberia Islands in 1881 but were found on drift ice off the south-west coast of Greenland. His ship, the “Fram”, was specially built of extraordinarily strong materials and of a design to be lifted by rather than crushed by the ice. The validation of the theory, the expedition and the trek made northward over the ice on foot to a point farthest north are well documented in these two volumes.

$400.00 - S O L D