Marsh Arabs.

THESIGER, Wilfred.

Item Number: 1132

London: Longmans, 1964.

First edition of the explorer’s second book, an account that follows the tribes that lives in the marshes of Iraq. Octavo, original cloth,  illustrated with maps and photographs. Signed by Wilfred Thesiger on the title page. Fine in a near fine dustjacket with light wear. Rare signed.

During the years he spent among the Marsh Arabs of southern Iraq, Wilfred Thesiger came to understand, admire and share a way of life that had endured for many centuries. Travelling from village to village by canoe, he won acceptance by dispensing medicines and treating the sick. In this account of his time there, he pays tribute to the hospitality, loyalty, courage and endurance of the people, describes their impressive reed houses, the waterways and lakes teeming with wildlife, the herding of buffalo and hunting of wild boar, moments of tragedy and moments of pure comedy, all in vivid, engaging detail. "His voyage through desert waters will remain, like his Arabian Sands, a classic of travel writing" (The Times),