Blog del Instituto Cervantes de Londres

Following his interest in botany, entomology and ornithology, Henry Frederick Link visited Spain with the Count of Hoffmannfegg, in 1798. The origin of this journey was initially to do a research focused in Portugal, as Link himself underlines in the introduction of the book “to collect materials for Fauna and Flora Lusitaniae”.

However, his exploration spread out to Spain and France and he went beyond his scientific purpose and decided to write a travel book about these three countries.

 

“At the time we had no idea of publishing and account of our travels as such; our chief attention was directed to investigating the works of nature, especially the botanical riches of the country”

Nevertheless on his return, after reading numerous accounts of travels in Portugal, Link discovered so many inaccuracies that he decided to “seize the pen to defend my friends the Portugueze” and wrote Travels in Portugal and through France and Spain. With a dissertation on the literature of Portugal, and the Spanish and Portugueze Languages.

Written in 1801 and translated from the German by John Hincley the copy available in our library was published that year by Nichols and Son Printers, in London. The information related to Spain is gathered in six chapters of the book (VII-XI), from Biscay to Extremadura, through Castile and Madrid.

USEFUL LINKS

About the author:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Heinrich_Friedrich_Link

About the book:

(pdf – page 18)

http://dialnet.unirioja.es/servlet/fichero_articulo?codigo=2857118&orden=0

Online book:

http://books.google.es/books?id=Y38EAAAAQAAJ&pg=RA2-PA296&lpg=RA2-PA296&dq=henry+frederic+link+travels+in+portugal+and+through+france&source=bl&ots=qnpL23fuGw&sig=UtI5pakQXOWwLEB6mDHR8_dLhB0&hl=es&ei=RxVPS9COEJaUjAfyw6GWCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=8&ved=0CC0Q6AEwBw#v=onepage&q=henry%20frederic%20link%20travels%20in%20portugal%20and%20through%20france&f=false