James Cook’s voyages initiated the modern era of scientific exploration. Establishing a model for future expeditions, his three voyages had an explicitly scientific rather than political purpose, carrying artists and naturalists who brought back large collections of plants, animals, and ethnographic artifacts from the regions visited. In his second voyage (1772-75), considered by many the most remarkable voyage ever, Cook circumnavigated the world at the Antarctic Circle with the help of a chronometer, a new instrument that enabled him to determine his ship’s longitude accurately.

View enlarged images from this item:

• Image 1

Edward S. Curtis, a professional photographer in Seattle, devoted his life to documenting what was perceived to be a vanishing race. His monumental publication presented to the public an extensive ethnographical study of numerous tribes, and his photographs remain memorable icons of the American Indian. The Smithsonian Libraries holds a complete set of his work, donated by Mrs. Edward H. Harriman, whose husband had conducted an expedition to Alaska, with Curtis as photographer, in 1899.

View enlarged images from this item:

• Image 1
• Web version of this item or online exhibition available

A man of intense curiosity, Jesuit scholar Athanasius Kircher pursued research in geography, language, astronomy, mathematics, and medicine. He authored more than 40 books, including Mundus subterraneus, perhaps the earliest printed work on geophysics and vulcanology. Recent earthquakes and the 1630 eruption of Mount Vesuvius prompted Kircher’s interest. To satisfy his inquisitiveness, he climbed Vesuvius and was lowered by a rope into the crater. In this book, he speculated on the nature of phenomena that occur below the Earth’s surface, and explained and illustrated the origins of fossils, hot springs, and volcanoes.

View enlarged images from this item:

• Image 1
• Image 2

Olaus Magnus (Olav Stov), a Swedish bishop who traveled widely in Scandinavia and Europe during the mid-1500s, compiled the first major work on the peoples, geography, economy, and fauna of northern Europe. Olaus Magnus intended his work, first published in Latin (Rome, 1555), to be an explication of his great map of the lands of the north, which he created in 1539. Woodcuts show northern peoples, including Lapps and Finns, engaged in their daily occupations, which were no doubt exotic and strange to southern Europeans. The volume also includes some of the first illustrations of whaling, and readers may have readily accepted as real the various fantastical monsters depicted throughout the popular and widely translated book.

View enlarged images from this item:

• Image 1
• Image 2
• Image 3
• Image 4

This remarkable travel account by an agent of the Dutch East India Company details the culture, landscape, peoples, architecture, festivals, and cities of 17th-century China. During the age of exploration and imperialism by Western powers in the Far East, Europeans craved information on exotic lands, and this book profoundly affected them. Designers copied its illustrations of Chinese ornament and used them as inspiration for creating decorative objects and furniture.

View enlarged images from this item:

• Image 1
• Image 2

Claudius Ptolemaeus, an astronomer and mathematician living in Alexandria, Egypt, summed up the geography of the known world -- essentially the Roman Empire -- in the second century A.D. He systematically listed the latitudes and longitudes of some 8,000 places in Europe, Africa, and Asia, and described methods of projection for drawing maps. Ptolemy’s work represented a major advance in the science of mapmaking and, despite its errors, retained its authority for almost 1,400 years. It survived for centuries through manuscript copying and was put into print in 1482, all the while expanding as geographical knowledge increased. The 1511 edition is the first to include a bit of North America in the world map.

View enlarged images from this item:

• Image 1
• Image 2

Breydenbach’s account of his 1483 pilgrimage to the Holy Land is thought to be the first printed travel book to contain illustrations. Fellow traveler Erhard Reuwich, the first painter known to have published a book, created its fine hand-colored woodcuts. His illustrations include the first use of panoramas to depict cities. Panoramas, enlivened by great detail, became a popular illustrative form in early printed books.

View enlarged images from this item:

• Image 1
• Image 2

Zeiller, an Austrian cartographer, dedicated this four-volume survey of the provinces and towns of France to its king, Louis XIV. (It was part of an extensive geographic survey of many European countries.) The volume containing his 300 illustrations is one of the period's finest examples of hand-colored engraving. The finely rendered pictures preserve many details of buildings, roadways, and cities that no longer exist or have been significantly altered. Topographia is an excellent example of the art of the book in 17th-century France and one of the most comprehensive contemporary guides to its cities and structures.

View enlarged images from this item:

• Image 1
• Image 2