SOURCE: De Beer, Edmond S. “George Sandys's Account of Campania.” Transactions of the Bibliographical Society, new series, XVII, no. 4 (March 1937): 458-65.

In the following essay, de Beer argues that the account of Campania in the fourth book of the Relation is almost entirely derived from other sources.

George Sandys's A Relation of a Iourney begun An: Dom: 1610, first published in 1615, was one of the most popular of seventeenth-century travel books.¹ The account of Campania contained in the fourth book² is probably the least important part of the work; the object of the present article is to show that it is almost entirely a compilation. General remarks applying to this part of the work should not be applied to the rest of it without proper inquiry.

In determining the sources used by seventeenth-century topographical writers there is one constant difficulty, the similarity of treatment to be found in many...