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  • Ketterer Rare Books
    Auction November 24th
    Ketterer, Nov. 24: M. Waldseemüller, Ptolemaeus auctus restitutus, 1520. Est: € 250,000
    Ketterer, Nov. 24: I. Newton, Philosophiae naturalis principia mathematica, 1687. Est: € 100,000
    Ketterer, Nov. 24: L. Feininger, Collection of 33 comic strips, 1906-1907. Est: € 8,000
    Ketterer Rare Books
    Auction November 24th
    Ketterer, Nov. 24:H. Schedel, Liber chronicarum, 1493. Est: € 30,000
    Ketterer, Nov. 24: K. Bodmer, Personal Sketchbook with ca. 80 pencil drawings. Est: € 25,000
    Ketterer, Nov. 24: Collection of 18 postcards “Bauhaus-Ausstellung Weimar 1923.“ Est: € 40,000
    Ketterer Rare Books
    Auction November 24th
    Ketterer, Nov. 24: Latin Book of hours on vellum, 1505. Est: € 12,000
    Ketterer, Nov. 24: G. Shaw & F. P. Nodder, Vivarium naturae, 1789-1813. Est: € 10,000
    Ketterer, Nov. 24: Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince, 1943. First American edition. Est: € 6,000
    Ketterer Rare Books
    Auction November 24th
    Ketterer, Nov. 24: Ibn Butlan, Tacuini sanitatis, 1531. Est: € 8,000
    Ketterer, Nov. 24: Hermann Hesse, Casa Camuzzi in Montagnola, 1927. Est: € 12,000
    Ketterer, Nov. 24: Pop Art portfolio Reality & Paradoxes, 1973. Est: € 12,000
  • Doyle
    Rare Books, Autographs & Maps
    November 25
    Doyle
    Rare Books, Autographs & Maps
    November 25
    Doyle
    Rare Books, Autographs & Maps
    November 25
    Doyle
    Rare Books, Autographs & Maps
    November 25
    Doyle
    Rare Books, Autographs & Maps
    November 25
    Doyle
    Rare Books, Autographs & Maps
    November 25
    Doyle
    Rare Books, Autographs & Maps
    November 25
    Doyle
    Rare Books, Autographs & Maps
    November 25
  • Pandolfini Casa d’Aste
    Books, Manuscripts, Autographs and Prints
    18 November 2025
    Pandolfini, Nov. 18: Dante. De la volgare eloquenzia. Vicenza, Janiculo, 1529. € 1.500 / 2.000
    Pandolfini, Nov. 18: San Tommaso d’Aquino. Scriptum secundum luculentissimum angelico. Legato con Problemata. Lione, Jacques Myt e Francesco Giunta, 1520. € 2.500 / €3.500
    Pandolfini, Nov. 18: Palladio, Andrea. I quattro libri dell'architettura. Venezia, de' Franceschi, 1570. € 13.000 / 15.000
    Pandolfini Casa d’Aste
    Books, Manuscripts, Autographs and Prints
    18 November 2025
    Pandolfini, Nov. 18: De Saint Amant, Pierre Charles. Voyages en Californie et dans l'Orégon. Parigi, Maison, 1854. € 400 / 500
    Pandolfini, Nov. 18: Description de l’Égypte, ou Recueil des observations et des recherches qui ont été faites en Égypte pendant l’expédition de l’armée française. Parigi, 1820-1829. € 35.000 / 40.000
    Pandolfini, Nov. 18: Allioni, Carlo. Flora Pedemontana sive enumeratio methodica stirpium indigenarum Pedemontii. Torino, Briolo, 1785. € 6.000 / 8.000
    Pandolfini Casa d’Aste
    Books, Manuscripts, Autographs and Prints
    18 November 2025
    Pandolfini, Nov. 18: First edition of John Gould's first work with uncolored backgrounds. € 5.000 / 7.000
    Pandolfini, Nov. 18: Rossini, Luigi. Le Antichità dei contorni di Roma. Roma, presso l'autore e Scudellari, 1824-26. € 2.500 / 3.500
    Pandolfini, Nov. 18: Carroll, Lewis. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. New York, Appleton & Co., 1866. € 6.000 / 8.000
    Pandolfini Casa d’Aste
    Books, Manuscripts, Autographs and Prints
    18 November 2025
    Pandolfini, Nov. 18: Hitler, Adolf. Mein Kampf. Monaco, Franz Eher, 1925-27. € 15.000 / 20.000
    Pandolfini, Nov. 18: Interesting autograph from Proust to his dear little Daudet. € 3.000 / 4.000
    Pandolfini, Nov. 18: Beautiful and rare poetic manuscript, first draft, of an airy lightness by De Saint-Exupéry. € 4.000 / 5.000

Rare Book Monthly

Book Catalogue Reviews - April - 2011 Issue

Earliest Sub-Sahara African Recordings Offered by the Voyager Press

The Sir Harry Johnston recordings.

The Sir Harry Johnston recordings.

The Voyager Press Rare Books & Manuscripts is offering a remarkable collection of an ephemeral nature, material of great historical significance. Offered is a collection of 36 wax cylinder recordings made in sub-Sahara Africa circa 1900. They not only appear to be the oldest recordings in existence of African music and language, they are likely the first such recordings ever made.

 

The use of cylinders for recording dates back to 1877 and the invention of the phonograph by Thomas Edison. As the art evolved to higher quality recording, wax cylinders continued to be used primarily for recordings in the field as opposed to the studio. They can only hold up to two minutes per cylinder, but researchers often used them for notes or to preserve voices and stories of people in out of the way locations. However, it does not appear that they were used very often in Africa. A survey done of collections a number of years back only located a handful of such recordings, the oldest being from Tanzania in 1902. Based on the travel dates of Sir Harry Johnston, who made these recordings, the Ugandan cylinders would appear to be older.

 

Sir Harry Johnston was a British explorer and diplomat of the late 19th, early 20th century. He traveled through much of Africa for the last two decades of the 19th century, starting in Tunisia, but soon thereafter into the regions south of the Sahara. In his exploring days, he hooked up with Henry Stanley in the Congo and explored Mount Kilimanjaro. He became an agent working on behalf of the British South Africa Company, as well as holding various diplomatic posts in Africa. As consul in Mozambique and Central Africa one of his duties was to help subdue the slave trade.

 

In 1899, he was sent to Uganda as a special commissioner, resigning that office in 1902. It was of this period that Sir Harry's brother wrote, "I think that Harry was the first to record native speech and song on a gramophone. It was easy to get the boisterous Masai to sing and talk into the 'little box,' but when they heard their own voices coming out of it, they turned and fled in consternation at the mocking little devil mimic." He then moved on to Liberia where in 1904 he recorded the voice of President Arthur Barclay, who had emigrated from Barbados. In his West Indian accent, President Barclay repudiates questions about the existence of cannibalism in his country. As was typical of the day of colonialists, Sir Harry believed that Europeans were superior to the "backward" people of Africa, but he was a sympathetic if paternalistic figure, rather than someone looking to subjugate and take advantage of the continent's natives.

 

What makes these recording even more remarkable is that there are only a handful of such recordings anywhere close in time to them. Cylinders were not used very often in Africa. For example, Sir Harry recorded the songs of the Kru people while in Liberia. After that, no more recordings were made of their songs until around 1929. Only a small number of cylinders of African voices from the early part of the 20th century can be found in collections anywhere.

 

Among the titles found on these cylinders is Kru Language and Broken English, Ashanti Song, Americo-Liberian chorus and solo, Masai Song and Chorus, Masai War Song, Xylophone Music, Speech with Whistles, Liberian Men and Women Talking English, Baganda Song with Flutes, Song of the Suk people, and Christmas Carol by Johnston Family.

 

After his time in Liberia, Sir Harry returned home to England and did a fair amount of writing in his later years, both novels and accounts of his experiences in Africa. He died in 1927.

 

The collection of recordings is offered for $75,000. For more information about The Sir Harry Johnston African Music Cylinder Recordings, contact the Voyager Press at 604-720-2000 or info@voyager-press.com.

 

Rare Book Monthly

  • University Archives
    Rare Autographs, Manuscripts & Books
    Now through Nov. 19
    University Archives, Nov. 19:
    Lot 308 - Bob Dylan Handwritten & Signed Lyrics to "Just Like a Woman" With Jeff Rosen & JSA Authentication
    University Archives, Nov. 19:
    Lot 455 - Isaac Newton Admiration For Judaism & Moral Continuity With Christianity! 350+ Words in his Hand - Extraordinary Content!
    University Archives, Nov. 19:
    Lot 219 - 371g Moon Meteorite, Incredible Find - Laâyoune 002
    University Archives
    Rare Autographs, Manuscripts & Books
    Now through Nov. 19
    University Archives, Nov. 19:
    Lot 448 - Scarce Einstein AM on Unified Field Theory, 180+ Words & 11 Equations in His Hand! From His Published Article, "A Generalization of the Relativistic Theory of Gravitation"
    University Archives, Nov. 19:
    Lot 159 - Woodrow Wilson Baseball Signed for WWI Red Cross Fundraiser, Ex. Forbes & PSA Authentic - Finest Known!
    University Archives, Nov. 19:
    Lot 84 - Lee Harvey Oswald ALS to Brother, Trying Desperately to Get out of Russia! Highly Important
    University Archives
    Rare Autographs, Manuscripts & Books
    Now through Nov. 19
    University Archives, Nov. 19:
    Lot 152 - George Washington Signed Discharge for MA Soldier Whose Regiment Was at Bunker Hill!
    University Archives, Nov. 19:
    Lot 88 - Abraham Lincoln Fully Signed Military Appointment for Mexican War Vet & Respected Cavalryman
    University Archives, Nov. 19:
    Lot 188 - Apollo XI Astronauts & Their Wives Signed Photo, Plus Crew Signed Cover, From Apollo XI Presidential Goodwill Tour Era, Pre-Cert Zarelli
    University Archives
    Rare Autographs, Manuscripts & Books
    Now through Nov. 19
    University Archives, Nov. 19:
    Lot 265 - Martin Luther King, Jr. TLS Re: "Stride Toward Freedom" Film Rights To Literary Agent Marie Rodell
    University Archives, Nov. 19:
    Lot 324 - John Lennon Signed Apple Records Check, PSA GEM MT 10! Possibly Finest Known
    University Archives, Nov. 19:
    Lot 79 - John & Jacqueline Kennedy Signed WH 1963 Christmas Gift Inscribed to Close Friend Joan Braden, PSA Authentic
  • Sotheby’s
    Book Week
    November & December
    Sotheby’s, Nov. 6-20: Audebert, Jean-Baptiste — Louis-Pierre Vieillot. Oiseaux dorés ou à reflets métalliques, Paris, 1801-1802. €40,000 to €60,000.
    Sotheby’s, Nov. 6-20: [Hugo, Victor] — Charles Hugo, François-Victor Hugo ou Auguste Vacquerie. Portrait de Victor Hugo. Daguerréotype réalisé à Jersey vers 1852-1853. €20,000 to €30,000.
    Sotheby’s, Nov. 6-20: Orbigny, Alcide d'. Voyage dans l'Amérique méridionale... Paris, Pitois-Levrault et Cie et Strasbourg, Levrault, 1834-1847. €10,000 to €15,000.
    Sotheby’s, Nov. 6-20: Chelidonius, Benedictus. Passio Jesu Chriti. [1526?]. Maroquin bleu de Niédrée. 37 bois inspirés par Dürer. €3,000 to €5,000.
    Sotheby’s, Nov. 6-20: Cassini de Thury, César-François. Carte générale de la France faite en 1744. Paris, 1756-1788. 178 cartes entoilées, réunies dans 28 emboîtages. €15,000 to €20,000.
  • Swann
    Printed & Manuscript Americana
    November 20, 2025
    Swann, Nov. 20: Lot 9
    George Catlin. O-Kee-Pa: A Religious Ceremony; and other Customs of the Mandans. London, 1867.
    Swann, Nov. 20: Lot 17
    Benjamin Beal, Unpublished diary of a lieutenant serving in the Invasion of Quebec, 1776.
    Swann, Nov. 20: Lot 23
    George Washington, Autograph Letter Signed anticipating the coming British campaign against Philadelphia, 1777.
    Swann
    Printed & Manuscript Americana
    November 20, 2025
    Swann, Nov. 20: Lot 35
    Matthias C. Sprengel, Allgemeines historisches Taschenbuch, the first published appearance of the American flag, [1784].
    Swann, Nov. 20: Lot 120
    Portfolio of lithograph Civil War portraits by Ehrgott, Forbriger & Co. and others. Cincinnati, OH, circa 1863.
    Swann, Nov. 20: Lot 130
    Eleazar Huntington, engraver. Early broadside engraving of the Declaration of Independence, circa 1820-24.
    Swann
    Printed & Manuscript Americana
    November 20, 2025
    Swann, Nov. 20: Lot 175
    Jeremiah B. Taylor, Letterbook of a frontier Baptist missionary in Kansas with tales of friendly Indians and unfriendly Confederate raiders, 1839-1887.
    Swann, Nov. 20: Lot 188
    Jonas Rishel, The Indian Physician, Containing a New System of Practice, Founded on Medical Plants, 1828.
    Swann, Nov. 20: Lot 201
    Brigham Young and the First Presidency of the LDS, Commission issued to two Church representatives, 1849.
    Swann
    Printed & Manuscript Americana
    November 20, 2025
    Swann, Nov. 20: Lot 293
    Kuonraden's Vart (Kuonrad's Travels), an illustrated western travel memoir set to verse, circa 1914.
    Swann, Nov. 20: Lot 311
    Hermann Stieffel, Early watercolor view of the ruins of a Spanish mission in the Manzano Grant. Manzano, NM, circa 1860-67.
    Swann, Nov. 20: Lot 343
    Vida de San Felipe de Jesus, protomartir del Japon, y patron de su patria Mexico.

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