Gedenkboek van den Oorlog in Zuid-Afrika Author: Compiled by contemporary regional historians and war correspondents.
Gedenkboek van den Oorlog in Zuid-Afrika (Collectible 1904 Antiquarian Africana)
A Spectacular Contemporary Dutch Pictorial Memorial of the Anglo-Boer War, Featuring Hundreds of Rare Battlefield Portraits, Maps, and a Preserved Historic Ex Libris
Bibliographic Specifications
- Title: Gedenkboek van den Oorlog in Zuid-Afrika
- Author: Compiled by contemporary regional historians and war correspondents.
- Publisher: Hollandsch-Afrikaansche Uitgevers-Maatschappij (HAUM), v/h Jac. Dusseau & Co., Amsterdam / Cape Town
- Publication Date: 1904
- ISBN-10: None Issued (Pre-ISBN Era)
- ISBN-13: None Issued (Pre-ISBN Era)
- Edition Details: First Edition, Monumental Illustrated Standard Release.
- Binding: Beautifully rebound utilizing the original publisher’s decorative illustrated cloth front cover, expertly retaining the historic exterior styling.
- Physical Format: Large Folio/Quarto (4to), 576 pages. Heavily enhanced with an expansive collection of hundreds of historical photographic plates, battlefield engravings, strategic commando sketches, leader portraits, and a large multi-colored fold-out map of South Africa at the rear.
- Language: Dutch
Official Condition Report
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The Book: Very Good (VG)
o Exterior / Covers: The book has been beautifully and professionally rebound, meaning the structural binding is absolutely perfect, completely tight, and extremely sound. The original illustrated cloth cover has been preserved on the boards; it displays honest, expected age, handling, and shelf wear from over 120 years of existence. There are some light surface markings and a slight, superficial scuff/chafe to the right-middle edge of the front cover.
o Interior: The internal text block is remarkably well-preserved. The pages remain clean, smooth, and securely attached, showing only the slightest, entirely natural touch of age-related browning at the extreme margins. The large folding map and extensive photographic sections remain intact.
o Provenance: Features a beautiful, historic Ex Libris (bookplate) belonging to the previous owner, W.S. Conradie, neatly positioned on the verso of the front cover. - The Dust Jacket: Not Applicable (As Issued)
Provenance Highlight: The Significance of W.S. Conradie
Historical analysis reveals that this bookplate represents Ds. Willem Stefanus (W.S.) Conradie (1889–1974), a highly prominent and influential Dutch Reformed (Nederduitse Gereformeerde) minister, intellectual, and cultural leader during the post-Boer War reconstruction and mid-20th-century eras. Born right before the outbreak of the war, he entered the ministry during a period defined by Afrikaner cultural healing.
Historical analysis reveals that this bookplate represents Ds. Willem Stefanus (W.S.) Conradie (1889–1974), a highly prominent and influential Dutch Reformed (Nederduitse Gereformeerde) minister, intellectual, and cultural leader during the post-Boer War reconstruction and mid-20th-century eras. Born right before the outbreak of the war, he entered the ministry during a period defined by Afrikaner cultural healing.
Ds. W.S. Conradie served with immense distinction as the leading spiritual head of vital historic congregations, including the NG Gemeente Grahamstad (Grahamstown) and the highly influential NG Gemeente Rondebosch in Cape Town. Renowned for his intellectual depth, he was a prolific writer and regular contributor to historic theological and philosophical journals, authoring key cultural discourses on the spiritual and intellectual development of the younger generation. Owning a massive, comprehensive contemporary account like the 1904 Gedenkboek would have been an absolute baseline requirement for a scholar of his caliber, making this Ex Libris a deeply meaningful mark of high-tier South African provenance.
Synopsis & Historical Value
Published in Amsterdam and Cape Town just two years after the signing of the Peace of Vereeniging, the 1904 Gedenkboek van den Oorlog in Zuid-Afrika is a vital, primary-era commemorative masterwork. Running across 576 massive, heavily illustrated pages, the text serves as a definitive contemporary visual and narrative chronicle of the entire three-year conflict. It covers the initial triumphant Boer republican offensives and the epic sieges of Ladysmith and Kimberley, before mapping out the grueling, scorched-earth guerrilla phases.
Published in Amsterdam and Cape Town just two years after the signing of the Peace of Vereeniging, the 1904 Gedenkboek van den Oorlog in Zuid-Afrika is a vital, primary-era commemorative masterwork. Running across 576 massive, heavily illustrated pages, the text serves as a definitive contemporary visual and narrative chronicle of the entire three-year conflict. It covers the initial triumphant Boer republican offensives and the epic sieges of Ladysmith and Kimberley, before mapping out the grueling, scorched-earth guerrilla phases.
The volume is highly prized by modern historians for its exhaustive reliance on immediate wartime photography and its comprehensive, unvarnished portrait galleries of Boer commanders, foreign volunteer officers, and local citizen commandos. Because original 1904 editions possess a massive, heavy footprint that frequently caused their original bindings to fail under their own weight, a copy that has been beautifully rebound back into its original cover while preserving its text block and a notable cultural provenance is an outstanding investment-grade asset for any serious collector of rare Anglo-Boer War history.
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