Maps and Plans Illustrative of the Canals of Irrigation in Lombardy and Peidmont. Printed by Order of the Hon. the Court of Directors of the East India Company.
Edinburgh & London: William Blackwood & Sons, 1855. Item #1046 Oblong folio. 380 x 555 mm., [15 x 21 ¾ inches]. 2, 17 pp. (title-page, list of plates, 17 plates). Bound in original printed wrappers, cloth spine; expert paper repair to the wrappers and first leaves, plates clean and in good condition. The wrappers show signs of soiling and some discoloration. Second edition, originally published in 1852 with only seven plates and two text volumes. The atlas offered her is the atlas volume only. It was published in expanded form to accompany the two volume text entitled, Italian Irrigation, being a Report on the Agricultural Canals of Piedmont and Lombardy. The first volume was devoted to the historical description of the river systems of Northern Italy and volume two discussed the practical methods of controlling river flow and legislation passed to finance the construction of river control systems. The plates in the atlas include a map of the Valley of the River Po, a map of the Province of Milan, the Head-works of river at Ticino, Head-works of the Canal Martesana at Trezzo, four plates of the Head-works proposed and constructed by Charles-Albert, plates of aqueducts and syphons, locks, dams, and modules. Each description on the List of Plates page contains a short text which offers the author’s opinion as to the purpose, technique, or success of an existing irrigation system. R. Baird Smith was a Captain in the Bengal Engineers and spent much of his career in India as part of the civil engineering branch of the East India Company. In 1849 he returned to Europe after the end of the Second Sikh War and was commission by the Company to examine the irrigation systems of Northern Italy with the intention of applying his research to the river systems of India. For is work Smith was awarded the Insignia of a Knight of the Order of St. Maurice and St. Lazarus by the King of Sardinia and his work was placed in the Royal Academy of Science in Turin. Note: I purchased this atlas three years ago and have been looking for the two volumes of text that were published with the atlas. There have been no copies on the market and OCLC lists copies 7 copies in the U. S. and a complete set of the of the 1855 edition at the University of Toronto.
Price: $3,000.00