PARDOE, Julia. The Beauties of the Bosphorus by Miss Pardoe, from drawings by William H. Bartlett. London, Virtue, 1839.

The British poetess, writer and traveller Miss Julia Pardoe (1806-1862) visited Constantinople with her father, Major Thomas Pardoe and resided there in the years 1836-1837. Forced to abandon the project to visit Egypt and Greece, she published her first work, "The City of the Sultan", which was a huge success, selling over 30,000 copies, and was republished in 1838, 1845 and 1854.

After Lady Montague (1717-1718), Pardoe is the first woman to penetrate below the surface and describe the everyday life, particularly of women, in the Ottoman Empire. Thus, she offered the European public another work, "The Beauties of the Bosphorus", with drawings by W.H. Bartlett and her own texts, which too was reprinted and was translated into French. She wrote a total of about thirty historical and fictional works.

This particular edition is a collection of engravings already published in Pardoe’s previous works. They depict views of regions on the Danube, in North and Central Europe, and representative views of the Bosporus and the Ottoman capital.

Written by Ioli Vingopoulou