An Extraordinary Document: The Constitutions of the Accademia dei Lincei – With Notes toward a History of the Society, A List of the Academy's Members, & A History of the Invention & Development of the Telescope
Quarto: 19.3 x 14 cm. [1]-48, [49]-64 p. With a divisional title page.
I. "Praescriptiones Lynceae Accademiae"
Prepared for publication by Johann Faber, the Chancellor General of the Lincean Academy, the "Praescriptiones" articulated the society's founding principles and detailed the nature and scope of its activities.
London: printed for the Company of Stationers, 1782
$6,500.00
5.8 x 3.8 cm. 24 one-sided engraved lvs.
The text is engraved throughout and four of the leaves form a composite view of the London Pantheon in Oxford Street, an early project of the architect James Wyatt (d. 1813). Its main rotunda was one of the largest rooms built in London up to that time. The venue hosted assemblies, masquerade balls, and concerts.
Folio: 31.5 x 21.5 cm. 30, [1] foliated manuscript leaves.
A series of notarial copies of reales cédulas, or royal decrees, from 1675, 1711, 1741, 1742, and 1758 (and with a copy of an original document from 1536), along with supporting documentation, confirming the nobility and privileges of members of the family of the ill-fated Aztec emperor Moctezuma II.
London: Printed for G. Conyers at the Golden Ring, and J. Sprint at the Blue Bell in Little-Britain, ca. 1701
$4,800.00
Duodecimo: 166, [2] p. Collation: A-G12
An early 18thc. English artisanal "book of secrets", designed for both men and women. The instructions, formulas, and recipes apply to the making of fine art (drawing, painting, sculpting, etc.), decorative objects (including metalwork), and furniture; as well as practical household information (ex.
Mexico: Por los Herederos de la Viuda de Miguel de Ribera Calderón en el Empedradillo, 1717
$9,400.00
Octavo: 14 x 10 cm. [12], 37 leaves (without the errata leaf 2¶1, apparently never bound in.) Collation: π4, ¶4, ¶¶4, A8, B-H4, I1
Ávila was a Franciscan curate of Milpa Alta in the diocese of Mexico and for twenty years he taught the Nahuatl language in the convent of the Franciscan order. It was in the course of those twenty years (as he tells us in his dedicatory epistle) that Ávila developed and tested his method.
London: printed for Joseph Knight, and Francis Saunders, 1688
$12,500.00
Octavo: 18.8 x 11.5 cm. [14], 64, 176, [4] pp. Collation: A8, a-d8, B-M8, [x]2 (Lacking blank leaf A8)
This volume –together with “Poems on Several Occasions”(1684) and “Miscellany, being a collection of poems by several hands” (1685)- is one of only three lifetime publications by Behn to include a substantial number of her poems.
O'Donnell “Aphra Behn, an Annotated Bibliography of Primary and Secondary Sources” BA4.1a; Wing T129 (under Tallemant); Case 184; Grolier, Wither to Prior, 42
Astronomy and Meteorology; Flora and Fauna: The Natural World in the Middle Ages. With 15th c. Provenance. Bound at the Monastery of St Zeno
Strasbourg: Printer of the 1481 Legenda aurea, 22 March 1482
$35,000.00
Folio: 29.2 x 21.8 cm. 274 unsigned leaves. [A-C]8, [D]10; [a-m]8, [n]6,[o-z]8, [aa-ff]8, [gg]10. Complete with the initial and final blanks.
The arrival of printed books is so often regarded as one of the inaugural moments of the renaissance that it is sometimes forgotten that the first years of print also represented the last great flowering of the Middle Ages. The “Lumen Anime” (Light of the Soul), is testament to that. Formerly attributed to the Carmelite friar Mathias Farinator of Vienna (who compiled the index), the “Lumen Anime” is now known to be Berenger of Landorra, General of the Dominican order and archbishop of Campostella from 1317 to 1325.
BMC I, 97; Hain-Copinger 10333*; Goff L-396; Proctor 413; Polain 1468; Wellcome I, 2175; Klebs 631.3; Thorndyke III, 546ff. Sources: Mary A. and Richard H. Rouse, ‘The Texts called Lumen Anime,’ Archivum Fratrum Praedicatorum, 41 (Rome, 1971), 5-113; N.R. Ker, Records of All Soul’s College Library. 1437-1600 (Oxford, 1971), 27.
Contents: The books of the Bible and prologues are very close to the standard Paris sequence (f.1), omitting Psalms, and with a capitula list for Genesis; the Interpretations of Hebrew Names in the version from Aaz to Zuzim (f.167), alphabetised to the first two letters; preceded by added notes on the four types of biblical exposition (historical, tropological, anagogical, typological) and the seven rules of theology (f.
Strasbourg: Johann Knobloch, [?January] 1524, July 1524, March 1525
$85,000.00
Folio: Three volumes bound as one. 30.5 x 20.8 cm. Vol. I: [6], CLI, [1] lvs. Vol. II: [1], CXC, [1] lvs., Vol. III: LXXXVII lvs. Collation: Vol. I: i-vi, A-Z6, Aa6, Bb8 (Bb8 blank and present.) Vol. II: A-Z6, Aa-Ii6 (Ii6 blank and present). Vol III: A-C6, D4, E-P6
A fine set of an early printing of Luther's German Old Testament, profusely illustrated. The first volume of the Old Testament, including the Pentateuch, was first published at Wittenberg by Melchior Lotter, the Younger, for Lucas Cranach and Christian Döring,in mid-1523.
London: In Paules churche yarde at the sygne of the holy Ghost, by Ihon Cawoode, prynter to the Kynge and Quenes Maiesties, 1556
$30,000.00
Quarto: 20 x 14 cm. [A]4, B-Z4, Aa-Ff4 (blank Ff4 lacking)
Dedicated to Queen Mary Tudor, Coleville’s English translation of Boethius’ masterpiece is the only early English translation to include the original Latin text, indicating that, in addition to those readers with no knowledge of Latin, the author took into consideration the more educated, Latin-literate English audience. Coleville provides interesting marginal glosses and explanatory notes, including the tale of the sword of Damocles.
London: Printed by Miles Flesher for Richard Davis, 1682
$15,000.00
Quarto: 19.5 x 16 cm. 3 works in 2 volumes (the two continuations bound first): 1st Vol. "Continuation… the I. Part"(1669) and "Continuation… the second part"(1682). Collations: *4, **4, A2, B-Z4, Aa-Dd4, Ee2. With 8 engraved plates after p. 198; A4, a4, b2, B-Z4, Aa-Cc4, Dd2. With 5 plates bound after p. 198. 2nd Vol. "New Experiments"(1682) in 3 parts. Collation: A4, a4, B-Z4, Aa-Tt4, Vv4 (-Vv4), a-o4. With 2 engraved plates. The last part is bound first.
THIRD EDITION of Boyle’s book on his original experiments on air, his first scientific work and the one on which his fame rests. This edition, like the second, includes his controversial tracts against Linus and Hobbes, the former provoking an attack to which Boyle wrote a defence that contained “Boyle’s law”, first published in the second edition and present here.
Wing B4000, B3934, B3935. Fulton 15, 16, 18. See Horblit 15, PMM 143, and the Norman catalogue 300 for the second edition. Neville I, p. 192, has the same combination of works as are present here.
The Sole Edition of Brathwait’s Satire on the Vices of Women
London: Printed by R. Bishop, for R[ichard]. B[est]. or his assignes, 1640
$9,600.00
17 x 11 cm. [48], 318, [8] p., [1] leaf of plates Collation: [A]1, a-c⁸, B-X⁸ (with blank X8), Y⁴
This copy conforms with Pforzheimer and lacks the bifolium “Postscript” (Z1-2) “Apparently supplementary and frequently wanting”(Grolier). It is found only in the Huntington and Harmsworth (Folger) copies in the U.S. Quire Y contains the poems "Menippus his Madrigall, to his coy-duck Clarabel” and “Loves Festivall at Lusts Funerall”.
London: Printed for Jo. Harris, at the Harrow, over against the Church in the Poultry, 1685
$15,500.00
Duodecimo: 14 x 8 cm. [8], 202 p. A4, B-I12, K7 (with the first blank. Lacking final blank).
Printed one year after the appearance of the second part of “The Pilgrim’s Progress” and in the same year that the Bedford magistrates ordered penal laws against nonconformists to be enforced, Bunyan’s “Discourse upon the Pharisee and the Publicane” is a fiery critique of the tyranny of the Church of England and of those among his readers who, like the residents of Vanity Fair and the Pharisee in the parable, prided themselves on superficial religiosity.
Hyginus, C. Julius (1st century A.D.); Aratus, of Soli. (c. 315-c. 245 B.C.); Proclus Diadochus (ca. 410-484)
Fabularum Liber, Ad Omnium Poetarum Lectionem Mire necessarius, & nunc denuo excusus: Eiusdem Poeticon Astronomicon Libri quatuor. Quibus accesserunt similis argumenti, Palaephati de fabulosis narrationibus, Liber I.
I. Goff C-118; Hain 4371*; Klebs 668.2; Smith (Rara Arithmetica) p. 67; Pell 3225; IGI 2427; Pr 7215; BMC VII 1068 (IB 31860). II. Wellcome I, 3377; Zinner 1592
“The Most Extensive Collection of Engravings of Sculpture Published in the 16th Century” -Thomas Ashby
Quarto: Engraved title page and 100 engraved plates. Complete.
The publishing history: According to Thomas Ashby’s classification of the editions, the first edition of Cavalieri’s book of statues appeared before April 1561. That edition, the “Liber Primus” consisted of only 58 plates, all of which were from original drawings, except for the plates of Pasquino and Marforio, which were copied from Lafrery’s “Speculum”.
London: printed by W[illiam]. B[owyer]. for Bernard Lintott at the Middle Temple Gate in Fleetstreet, 1703
$15,000.00
Octavo: 19.5 x 12 cm. [16], 125, [17], 73, [1] pp. Collation: A-O8, P4
Mary Chudleigh was a friend of Elizabeth Thomas and an admirer of Mary Astell, with whom she corresponded and whose ‘Defence of the Female Sex’ she tried to emulate. Dedicated to Queen Anne, her ‘Poems on Several Occasions’ was widely noticed, achieving a second edition in 1709. The poems include a wide range of subjects, from lyrics and satires of the age of Dryden, to philosophical and more contemplative verse in keeping with the solitary and often melancholy life that she led in Devon.
London: Imprinted in the house of Thomas Berthelette, 1549
$16,000.00
Octavo: 14 x 9.5 cm. [11], 167 [i.e. 174], [3] lvs. A-Z8, Aa4
The amusing, manuscript poem on the final leaf reads:
This booke is I knowe not wose [whose]
wherefore he may go wipe
his nose yffe he haue the pose
"The last of Elyot’s great works, 'The Image of Governance', a life of the Roman Emperor Alexander Severus, is far from being a straightforward life of an ideal emperor. The 'Image' is actually a complex, bitter, and at times savagely satirical rumination on princely power and its perversions, probably prompted at least in part by the fall of Elyot’s patron and friend Thomas Cromwell.
FIRST EDITION of Giraldi's most important contribution to literary criticism and his most lasting influence on dramatic theory and practice. Almost all the main issues in Renaissance dramatic criticism are examined somewhere in his various works and prefaces.
Giraldi rejected the Greek arrangement of plays into prologue, episodes, and choral odes and returned to the five acts of the Roman theatre.
Edit16, CNCE 21262; Adams, G-701; Universal STC, no. 833280; S. Bongi, Annali di Gabriel Giolito de Ferrari da Trino di Monferrato, stampatore a Venezia, (Roma, 1880-1897), I, pp. 427-429; B. Weinberg, A History of Literary Criticism in the Italian Renaissance, (Chicago, 1961), p. 1129.
The Rare First Edition of Lucrezia Gonzaga's Letters – The Countess of Bute's Copy
Octavo: 15 x 10 cm. 328, [6] p. Collation: A-X8 (X8 blank and present.)
"Lucrezia Gonzagawas born in Gazzuolo (near Mantua) around 1521, one of seven children. Her parents, Pirro Gonzaga and Camilla Bentivoglio, died in 1529, and Gonzaga was taken in by her relative Luigi Gonzaga of Castelgoffredo (or Castel Giuffrè).
Erdmann, A. My gracious silence, 109; Ferri, P.L. Biblioteca femminile italiana, p. 189; Melzi, G. Anonime e pseudonime, I, 468; Adams G863; STC Italian p. 309
With Four Tracts on Demons, Exorcism & Spells - In a Contemporary Nuremberg Binding
[Strasbourg: Printer of the 1483 Jordanus de Quedlinburg (Georg Husner), or Johann (Reinhard) Grüninger, or Printer of Hemmerlin (Wilhelm Schaffener?),] after 13 August 1497
$24,000.00
Chancery folio: 27 x 19.5 cm. π4, a-z6, aa-gg6. Complete with the blank leaves π4 and gg6)
Felix Hemmerlin (also known under his Latin name Malleotus), was a Swiss scholar and adherent of the reform party at the Councils of Constance (1414-1418) and Basel (1431-1449). This collection of his works was edited by the Nuremberg humanist Sebastian Brant.
Hemmerlin is well known to historians of witchcraft and demonology, and this collection includes his four works on spells, witches, demons, and exorcism: 1.
