{"title":"Early Books","description":"\u003cp\u003eEarly printing history, including incunabula, early editions, and foundational printed works.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"aesop","title":"AESOP","description":"\u003cp\u003eOne of the rarest and most sought after editions of the early Aldine press and in practice the earliest obtainable of the author's original text. The volume comprises the Aesopian Fables in Latin and Greek, together with a life of the author, similarly the 34 fables of Gabrias, Phurnutus on the 'nature of the Gods', Palaephatus on disbelieving histories, Heraclides on the allegories of Homer, the hieroglyphs of Horapollo, a collection of proverbs drawn from Tarraeus and Didymus, Aphthonius and Philostratus' de fabula in Latin and Greek, those of Hermogenes translated by Priscian, and finally an Apologia for Aesop 'de Cassita apud Gellium'. Almost all of these, apart from the Aesop, are in their first edition or editio princeps, Praz p. 373 particularly notices the Horapollo. \u003cbr\u003e\n Aesop is the traditional composer of the oldest and most important collection of Greek Fables, which are probably the earliest examples of popular and maybe children's literature still extant. Herodotus, writing in the fifth century BC already knew of Aesop as an author from the past. Aesop's life has been overlaid by many romantic fictions but it is fairly certain that he was a Thracian, a house slave and likely a family tutor on the island of Samos at the beginning of the 6th century BC. His Fables are one of the most enduring works of European literature, of which the earliest written compilation probably dates from three centuries later and is now lost. The earliest surviving version is Roman, made by Babrius, tutor to the children of Alexander Severus in the 3rd century AD, though stories from other, especially oriental sources, were probably added. The collection we now recognise was compiled and edited by Maximus Planudes and from which the popular fables of modern Europe have been derived. Whatever their exact origin they have constituted a delightful source of amusement and instruction for children of all ages since they were popularised by the printed editions of the C16, of which none is more important than this printed and edited by Aldus.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"AESOP","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816065999183,"sku":"L1283","price":59500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L1283-6.jpg?v=1781795331"},{"product_id":"bessarion-cardinal-johannes","title":"BESSARION, Cardinal Johannes","description":"\u003cp\u003ePart I comprises the second much expanded Aldine edition of Bessarion s great defense of Plato and Platonism, written in response to the translation of the  Laws  by George of Trebizond who had taken advantage of its publication to print a sharp criticism of Plato and exalt Aristotle. Bessarion, one of the great humanists and Hellenists of the mid C15 had studied philosophy under Gemistus Pletho and imbibed from him a love of Plato, happily shorn of Gemistius  hatred of Aristotle. Bessarion rather advocated a synthesis of the two systems of learning, perceiving and appreciating their many points of contact and in the present work (ch. 5) demolishes Trebizond s attack by the simple device of enumerating verbatim all the errors of his translation and faults in his commentaries. The second part of the present work, here printed for the first time, comprises Bessarion s own translation of Aristotle's metaphysics and book one of those of Themistius. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n It is said that Bessarion, the greatest scholar - statesman - diplomat - ecclesiastic of his age, had three aims in life: the reunion of the Latin and Eastern Church, the rescue of Greece from Moslem occupation and the triumph of classical literature and poetry, especially the Greek. He succeeded temporarily in the first, partially in the second , and beyond all expectation in the third - paving the way for the great revival that was to follow. In between his many extraordinary labours in the public field, organizing crusades, restoring the City and University of Bologna, dominating great international councils, he became patron of the very first Renaissance Accademia (actually founded in his house) and amassed an extraordinary library of more than eight hundred codices of ancient Greek ms. - which he gave to form the basis of the Marciana in Venice.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"BESSARION, Cardinal Johannes","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816066097487,"sku":"L1198","price":15000.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/Bessarion-L1198-1.jpg?v=1781795331"},{"product_id":"bible","title":"BIBLE","description":"\u003cp\u003eRare edition of this book of Psalms beautifully bound in a London  sombre  binding of finely worked blind tooling on black morocco. This binding is very similar in style to a binding by the  Sombre binder  illustrated in the Henry Davis gift Catalogue (vol II, 116) and shares the same tools as another  Sombre  binding in the online British library catalogue of bindings, BL Shelfmark c72e7, an Eikon Basilike printed in London in 1649. These bindings were most often made in Puritan London where ostentation was frowned upon though a dislike of display did not deter people from wanting to own sumptuous bindings on books that they would use in public. The richness of the binding was effectively disguised with this  black on black  work. It is also thought that Restoration period,  sombre  bindings, using only blind stamps, were produced for periods of mourning at Court; with the great plague of 1665 and the fire of London a year later many were mourning in London. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n The design, tooling, work and materials on this copy are of the highest quality. The style of the binding heavily influenced the arts and crafts movement and the tooling on this binding is reminiscent of the work of Cobbden Sanderson at the Doves Press bindery at the end of the C19.  Another fashion which first begins to be notable around 1670, and which remained in Vogue well into the first half of the eighteenth century, was a taste for  Sombre  bindings, typically found on bibles, prayer books and other devotional texts.  Pearson English Bookbinding Styles, 1450-1800. A rare book of Psalms; containing the prose text of psalms and canticles without commentary and includes the  Canticum D. Ambrosii et Augustini  at the end. The engraved title page, with a portrait of King David, is altered from a plate occasionally used as a frontispiece to the Sternhold and Hopkins psalms where it has 4 lines of text below the portrait. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n The Psalter was published to the order and probably at the cost of the chapel of Peterhouse, where Cosin, Master of the College, was engaged in the reformation of worship in the newly built chapel; Young was also his publisher. Dispersals of chapel furnishings were made in the 1650s, presumably as a result of religious changes following the Civil War. A number of copies bear similar annotations. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n Our thanks to Scott Mandelbrote, Fellow of Peterhouse for providing this information.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"BIBLE","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816066228559,"sku":"L1118","price":3250.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/Psalter-1.jpg?v=1781795330"},{"product_id":"catholic-church-curia","title":"CATHOLIC CHURCH, CURIA","description":"\u003cp\u003eAn exceptional ms. copy of the papal bulls and statutes setting out the duties powers and privileges of the Apostolic Protonotaries of the Roman Church from the 1560 s until the early C19th. This was the, or an official copy used either by the Protonotarial office or by one of their number, perhaps the figure depicted in the gilt oval on the upper cover. The papal Bulls forming and reforming the office from Callistus to Adrian VI occupy the first 21 pages, the relevant statutes pp. 23-43 and further Bulls of Urban VIII and Alexander VII from pp 43-59. Pp. 60-64 comprise the agreement of the protonotaries drafted 21st September 1661 concerning the division of their emoluments, signed by each of them and formally attested by the Curial pro-secretary Giovani Manfroni and the final pages the reforms of Gregory XVI. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n The Protonotaries Apostolic were members of the highest college of prelates of the Roman Curia, deriving their office from the seven regional notaries of Rome in late antiquity, and the senior lawyer-administrators of the C16 Catholic church charged with the issue of Papal Bulls and other legislative or quasi legislative Papal documents. On the further development of Papal administration , secular and religious, they remained the supreme palace notaries of the Papal Chancery and in the middle ages were very high ranking officials. Sixtus V increased their number to 12, though  honories  were also appointed, Gregory XVI re-established the college of real protonotaries with seven members in 1838. The pronotarial office is of particular interest as at the same time the precursor of the modern state bureaucracy and a functional link with the ancient world. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n This remarkably beautiful almost  treasure  binding is an extremely scarce survivor of a binding style typical of de luxe presentation copies from the mid C15 to mid C17 centuries . Unfortunately plush velvet is not a durable material and gilt ornaments tended to part company with their binding at the first opportunity. It is of the utmost rarity to find one on the market intact with all its ornaments in place. The eight cornerpieces (approximately 4 x 41\/2  including frame) recount sequentially the events of the Passion from the Garden of Gethsemane to Burial in the Tomb. The representations are life like, the action vivid and the relief and general condition is excellent. They were probably made for and are certainly contemporary with the binding. They are almost certainly Roman (cf Rossi Placchette 65 -151 and may derive from the frescos of Sebastiano del Piombo in the church of San Pietro in Montorio in Rome, at least one of which according to Vasari is according to designs given him by Michelangelo. The four clasps are likely to form part of the same set. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n The two central ornaments are somewhat lighter in style and of sharper execution on finer metal, the work of a gem carver or expert goldsmith. The designer was clearly influenced by Renaissance Mannerism but the approach of the baroque is sensible. The upper cover figure may well be modelled on a monumental sculpture of the period whilst the lower suggests a copy of a sculptural stemma, perhaps from the wall of the Protonotarial office itself. The feeling for the monumental and architectural combined with a fineness of detail points towards the body of work generally attributed to Guglielmo de la Porta 1490-1577. There is stylistic similarity too betwenn the cornerpieces and certain of De la Porta s known work eg. the silver plaque of the flagellation now in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Interestingly De La Porta also worked under the influence of Michelangelo and his workshop specialised in the manufacture of bronzes of contemporary art.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"CATHOLIC CHURCH, CURIA","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816066556239,"sku":"L1159","price":49500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_8222.jpg?v=1781795329"},{"product_id":"du-fouilloux-jacques","title":"DU FOUILLOUX, Jacques","description":"\u003cp\u003eExcellent, charmingly illustrated, first and only edition of Cesare Parona s translation into Italian of Du Fouilloux s famous and seminal text on hunting, and the first and only early edition in Italian. illustrated with forty charming and vigorously drawn woodcuts that often use blocks of black to great effect. The work is translated from the Paris edition of 1606 and is dedicated to Ercole Visconti. Du Fouilloux (1521-1580) was a very keen, knowledgeable and experienced hunter and his work created a considerable stir amongst the many enthusiastic hunters of the C16; it was the earliest scientific treatment of the subject in modern times and undoubtedly one of the best. The work deals on hunting in general and particularly that of the deer, hare, wild boar and wolf. It also deals with the management of the hunt and hounds, hound welfare and ailments, training, breeding and types and the habits of all their various quarries. The last chapter deals specifically with the welfare of dogs and gives twenty seven  recipes  for curing ailments ranging from rabies to snake bite. It swiftly became a standard work and editions in various languages were still being published into the mid 19th century.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"DU FOUILLOUX, Jacques","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816066621775,"sku":"L1105","price":4500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_0742.jpg?v=1781795330"},{"product_id":"francois-i-with-arena-antoine","title":"FRANCOIS I [with] ARENA, Antoine","description":"\u003cp\u003eA rare, handsome and important compilation of laws relating to the administration of justice in the south of France under Francois I, with reforming edicts for particular places, such as Marseilles. They cover all aspects of practice and procedure, the initiation of proceedings, appeals, vacations, relative jurisdictions, rights and duties of all sorts of officers and counsel and the exercise of Royal authority. There is a particular abundance of material on those perennial legal topics of costs, charges and fees. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n The court of the Parlement of Aix was established by Louis II of Provence in 1415, but after the union of Provence with the crown in 1498, Louis XII decided to reform its administration of justice, using the Parlement of Paris as model. At first, the Count of Provence s administration remained essentially in place, and the new Parlement remained subject to the Governor of Provence. This intermediary situation provoked some unrest and anxious to better ensure his authority, Francis I introduced these edicts in 1534 (first published in 1535), restricting the powers of the Governor, and bringing the Parlement directly under Royal control, which lasted until the Revolution. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n These edicts cover administration of the Parliament at every level, the election of officials (from the President down), raising and organizing the  Gendarmerie , the organization of the  Legions , and the fining and punishment of criminals. The work finishes with an interesting edict on the running of the justice system in the town of Marseille with its special privileges and exemptions. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n For some reason the Ordonnances are quite often found bound with one or more other works, including Arena's, which lists the remuneration and privileges of lawyers and judges at the Parlement of Aix. A list of the names of all the towns subject to the jurisdiction of the Parlement d Aix is given at the end, introduced in Provençal. A very good copy of a rare work.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"FRANCOIS I [with] ARENA, Antoine","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816066818383,"sku":"L1262","price":10500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_9008.jpg?v=1781795329"},{"product_id":"frois-luis","title":"FROIS, Luis","description":"\u003cp\u003eRare first edition of these two important and detailed letters by Frois, the first concerning the state of the Christian leaders and Jesuit missions in Japan in 1595 and the second dealing with the death of Hidetsugu the nephew and retainer of Hideyoshi (referred to in this letter by his common name Taicosama). The Portuguese Jesuit Frois was one of the leading members of the Jesuit mission in Japan and his reports are highly esteemed for their attention to detail and concrete data. By the 1590 s the predominately Jesuit Christian mission in Japan had made considerable progress, with nearly three hundred thousand converts. Frois worked for some years under the Provincial of India in charge of reporting on East Asia to the church in Europe, and in 1563, at the age 31, he arrived in Japan, at Nagasaki. In 1565 he journeyed to Kyoto, but with the downfall of his protector, Ashikaga Yoshiteru, he was forced to take refuge in Sakai. In 1569 he met Nobunaga, (the first of the great Japanese Generals who nearly unified Japan under his leadership) and received permission to proselytize. He spent the ensuing years in missionary work while writing The History of Portuguese Territories in East India. In his capacity as interpreter he travelled widely in Japan, was party to much inside information on affairs of State and witnessed many of the events that shaped Japan for some 250 years. The first letter is a general review of the year recounting events of especial importance with respect to the Society, dealing with particular places and Jesuit residences, providing detailed accounts of their political, social and religious circumstances. The second work is an extraordinary account of the death of Hidetsugu who was nominally the regent of Japan or Kanpaku, though all power effectively resided with his uncle Hideyoshi. Hideyoshi had made Hidetsugu, his only relative, his heir, though with the birth of Hideyoshi s son in 1593 to his mistress, this situation became untenable. Finally, in 1595, Hidetsugu was accused of plotting a coup and ordered to commit suicide, his allies were banished and his children and mistresses executed, with the exception of his one month old daughter. Frois  account is particularly detailed and knowledgeable giving much detail on the complex political background to the events and paints a picture of Hideyoshi as a cruel and vindictive leader. A good copy of these important letters from a most important period in Japanese history.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"FROIS, Luis","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816067014991,"sku":"L1081","price":3950.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_1971.jpg?v=1781795329"},{"product_id":"gaffarel-jacques","title":"GAFFAREL, Jacques","description":"\u003cp\u003eA rare clandestine edition of an important and influential work on Oriental Talismans, Hebrew, Egyptian and Arabic Astrology, the Cabala and Star-writing, (the theory that the starts are arranged in the form of Hebrew letters, which can be read by those with the specific knowledge), with two beautiful folding celestial charts depicting the theory the constellations could be read as a book. Gaffarel was a follower of Pico de Mirandola and one of the chief exponents of Christain Kabbalism, and as such came into conflict with the Sorbonne and particularly with Mersenne who unambiguously rejected his work as impious and published  De Gaffarello Judicio  attacking him, though he recognized Gaffarel s profound knowledge of Kabbalah.  Jaques Gaffarel,.... was born in Provence in 1601, educated at the Universities of Valence and Paris where he received the degree of Doctor of canon law, became a priest and chaplain of Richelieu, and had a wide knowledge of Oriental languages - Hebrew, Arabic, Syrian and Persian. ... (This) is Gaffarels main work, the first appearance was in Paris 1629 and then it was repeatedly reprinted into the early 18th century and translated into Latin and English. It divides into three parts, of which the first defends orientals, especially Hebrews, from Christian charges, and the third deals with ancient Hebrew and oriental astrology. The second part, on the talismanic sculpture of the Persians, especially interests us for its close connection with natural magic..... He further contends that the astrology of the ancients was neither idolatry nor the cause of of idolatry, and accuses Scaliger and others of having misrepresented the astrology of the ancient Hebrews, Egyptians and Arabs. On August 1, 1629, the faculty of theology at Paris condemned Gaffarel's book as \"entirely to be disapproved\", and called its doctrine false, erroneous, scandalous, opposed to Holy Writ, contumelious towards the Church Fathers, and superstitious besides.  Thorndike. Gaffarel duly signed a retraction, but couched it in vague and general terms, stating that he was merely recording the opinions collected from the writings of the Arabs and Hebrews. The book enjoyed great success, Descartes and Sir Thomas Browne read it with interest and Pierre Gassendi defended it. Richelieu made Gaffarel his librarian and he travelled extensively, first to Italy, where he met Campanella, then to Greece and Asia in search of rare books. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n A most appropriate provenance: Carl Aurivillius was professor of oriental languages at Uppsala, Swedish linguist, translator and orientalist [b. 1717, d.1786]. He wrote several dissertations of profound scholarship on subjects connected with biblical and Oriental literature, of which thirty were published by J. D. Michaelis. Aurivillius studied at Uppsala, then at Paris, Leiden and Halle, where he became friends with great contemporary Orientalists, such as Michaelis, Fourmont and Albert Schulten. He was part of Gustav III's Biblical Commission, and helped translate almost the entire Old Testament into Swedish. A very good, unsophisticated copy of this work, with the two folding plates in excellent condition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"GAFFAREL, Jacques","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816067047759,"sku":"L1321","price":2950.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_3451.jpg?v=1781795328"},{"product_id":"godwin-francis","title":"GODWIN, Francis","description":"A handsome copy of the FIRST EDITION of these detailed collected biographies of the English bishops and a valuable source book of English history. It is the best known work of Francis Godwin (1562-1633), which so pleased Queen Elizabeth that she made Godwin bishop of Llandaff with immediate effect. The text is important as an Anglican attempt to establish a continuous history of an independent English church from the first arrival of Christianity to the end of the 16th C. Although partisan in purpose it is reasonably even-handed in its treatment of its subjects and is significant in the development of English historical scholarship; it is also eminently readable. Diocese by diocese, a broad survey of the incumbents of the ancient bishoprics and archbishoprics is conducted, covering Canterbury, London, Winchester, Ely, Lincoln, Coventry \u0026amp; Lichfield, Salisbury, Bath \u0026amp; Wells, Exeter, Norwich, Worcester, Hereford, Chichester, Rochester, Oxford, Gloucester, Peterborough, St. Davids, Llandaff, York, Durham, Carlisle and Chester. Proceeding chronologically, where possible the history of appointments are given, along with any highlights of episcopal incumbency and accounts of particular bishops - e.g. of St Cuthbert of Durham: \"He was a very personable man, well-spoken, and so mighty in perswading, as none that ever he delt withall was able to withstand the force of his words,\" - with a few final words about the length of his office and eventual death. In instances where nothing but a name survives, it is duly noted. The work comprises a very valuable history of the sees and bishops of England throughout the middle ages, though prudently 16th C figures are dealt with much more briefly than earlier appointments. Fisher's career is noted in five laconic lines and Rioleg's in only two. Each section concludes with the value of the See, first in the books of the Crown and second of the Papacy.","brand":"GODWIN, Francis","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816067178831,"sku":"L705","price":2850.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_0238.jpg?v=1781795327"},{"product_id":"hermogenes","title":"HERMOGENES","description":"\u003cp\u003eRare and important edition of the rhetorical works of Hermogenes complete with the separately paginated commentary which is often missing (see Brunet). This is the first edition of the translation of Gaspard Laurent, and of his extensive commentary. Laurent, a French Huguenot in origin, established himself at Geneva where he taught literature (1597) and in 1600 became Rector of Academy. He published principally on religious topics but he had a particular interest in public theological disputations and may well have been attracted to Hermogenes as a practical manual of reference. The especial importance of the volume however lies with the binding which is at once unusual, lovely and skilfully executed. It must be one of relatively few volumes in De Thou's extraordinary collection (Bibl. Thuanae part II, p.241) that he did not have rebound with his own arms - really the highest compliment. An early typed note in the book states that at W.H. Corfield's sale in 1904 the binding was described as French and there are common elements but there seems no reason to suppose that the volume travelled very far from the press before it was bound. Despite the unusual huntsman tool however we have been unable to find a comparable or identify the binder, so the only description we can offer is 'probably Geneva' 1614 or shortly thereafter.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"HERMOGENES","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816067539279,"sku":"L1013","price":4750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_9052.jpg?v=1781795327"},{"product_id":"magini-giovanni-antonio","title":"MAGINI, Giovanni Antonio","description":"\u003cp\u003eA handsome, very well margined copy of the second edition of the premier early Italian atlas, which dominated Italian cartography for at least the next half century. Most of the main C17 cartographers, including the Dutch compiler-editors, followed, copied, or incorporated Magini's regional maps, even Ortelius (with whom Magini corresponded) as well as Brahe and Kepler's and Blaeu used some of them. Magini (1555-1617) Paduan astronomer, astrologer, cartographer and mathematician studied at Bologna and famously was appointed to the chair of Mathematics there in preference to Galileo. His chef d'oeuvre however was the present atlas, designed to include a detailed map of every region of Italy with exact nomenclature and historical notes. Began in 1594 it soon proved ruinously expensive and Magini assumed the posts of astrologer to Vincenzo Gonzaga, Duke of Mantua, and tutor to his sons to pay for it. The Duke Ferdinando, to whom the atlas is dedicated, provided assistance for the project and allowed for maps of the various Italian states to be brought to Mantua, the governing authorities of Messina and Genoa also financially helped. Magini was not an engraver and had considerable problems from the mid-1590s onwards in keeping the service of those, such as the Dutch Arnold brothers, who were. Eventually he engaged the Englishman Benjamin Wright who completed the series in between his habitual bouts of drunkeness. The process took so long that Magini did not live to see its completion and the atlas was eventually published by his son Fabio, after a good deal of further revision. The result, according to Almagia (cit. inf.) eliminated numerous earlier errors in longitude and latitude, accurately indicated political boundaries and physical features and added numerous topographical names.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"MAGINI, Giovanni Antonio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816067637583,"sku":"L1211","price":22000.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L1211-3.jpg?v=1781795327"},{"product_id":"porcacchi-thomaso","title":"PORCACCHI, Thomaso","description":"\u003cp\u003eRare first edition of the most celebrated book of islands, by the Italian scholar Thomaso Porcacchi, beautifully illustrated with the delicate engraved maps and plans, one for each place, of Girolamo Porro, who also produced the maps for Ruscelli's translation of Ptolemy's Geographia in 1574. The first 15 illustrations begin with Venice and her surrounds, then pass from east to west through the Mediterranean, from Corfu, Crete and Cyprus via Rhodes, Sicily and Malta, to Corsica, Elba and the Balearics. The next six are from Northern Europe, the British Isles, Scotland, Ireland, the Frisian islands, Iceland and Gotland. Across the Atlantic are Hispanola, (with a lengthy account of the arrival of Columbus), Cuba and St Lawrence, the islands ending with Ceylon and the Moluccas. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n The last four illustrations comprise a remarkably important and detailed map of North America, a smaller version of Forlani's, and the first depicting that landmass as a single continental entity; it is also the first printing of the first atlas map of North America, followed by a detailed plan of Mexico city at the time of the Spanish conquest. The last two are very attractive and complete world maps, the second specifically designed for the use of navigators. Each of the illustrations is accompanied by a few pages of topographical and geographical description of the subject matter, including principal places, physical features, climate, customs and produce. The Isole is interesting both as a fine example of the most elegant Italian cartography but also as one of the most sophisticated responses to the increasing demand for reliable information about far away places. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n Albert Parre√±o was an alumnus of Princeton and a well-known collector of travel books.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"PORCACCHI, Thomaso","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816067998031,"sku":"L993","price":9500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_00031.jpg?v=1781795327"},{"product_id":"reisch-gregorius","title":"REISCH, Gregorius","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst edition of Gallucci s translation of Gregorius Reich s celebrated and beautifully illustrated encyclopedia with additional material in this edition by Gallucci and including the revisions by the mathematician Oronce Fine from 1535, and some of the additions of the 1512 Strasbourg edition, such as Martin Waldseemüller's treatises on architecture and perspective, and Masha'allah's composition of the astrolabe. The Margarita philosophica (the Philosophic pearl) is a beautifully illustrated encyclopedia which was widely used as a university textbook in the early sixteenth century, particularly in Germany; it takes the form of a dialogue between master and pupil - the pupil asks elementary questions and the master answers them in depth. It gives us an intriguing insight into the university curriculum and state of learning and scientific knowledge at the start of the C16th and here in a much revised form in the late C16th. Its author, Gregor Reisch (c.1467-1525), a Carthusian monk and a friend of many of the most celebrated Humanists of his era including, Erasmus, Beatus and Rheananus, was prior of the Charterhouse of St John the Baptist near Freiburg-im-Breisgau from 1503 to 1525 and was confessor and counsellor to the Emperor Maximilian I. He was educated at the University of Freiburg where he received the degree of magister in 1489 and also taught there. The Margarita was conceived as a textbook for his students at Freiburg, among whom were many influential figures of the German Renaissance, notably the theologian Johann Eck. Reisch's text is divided into twelve chapters. The traditional subjects of the trivium (grammar, logic, rhetoric) and quadrivium (arithmetic, music, geometry, astronomy) each have a chapter devoted to them. Four of the five remaining chapters are concerned with natural philosophy and cover such things as the elements, meteorology, alchemy, the plant and animal kingdoms, optics and memory as well as heaven, hell and purgatory. The final chapter concerns moral philosophy. The additions in this edition are added at the end, a further 300 odd pages, each supplementing a chapter of the main work. The usefulness of the book as an educational tool is much enhanced by a detailed index and the liberal use of marvelous woodcut illustrations. There are two issues of this edition, with apparently no priority, one with Barezzi's imprint, and another with Somascho's which is more common institutionally. A very good copy of this wonderful and beautifully illustrated educational encyclopedia.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"REISCH, Gregorius","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816068096335,"sku":"L1138","price":7250.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L1138-1.jpg?v=1781795327"},{"product_id":"saulnier-jean","title":"SAULNIER, Jean","description":"\u003cp\u003eRare first and only edition of this curious astrological work which Saulnier describes in his prefatory epistle, his dedication to Mademoiselle Louise d'Anssienville, as an epitome in imitation of Livy and Valerius Maximus. The work is a description of the globe and heavens so as to better understand divination, in other words a description for the purposes of astrology in the guise of a cosmology.  Nous commencerons par le traict é de la Sphere, comme estant la plus necessaire, pour en apres entendre mieux le peu que nous dirons de ce qu avons promis  The work is divided into three chapters, the first and longest, entitled  Traicte de L Astrologie Naturelle  starts with a description of the size of the heavens and then describes the major constellations and the origins of their denomination. He then describes the  Cercles de la shpere  concentrating on the Zodiac and follows with a  Theorie des Planettes  and a description of the nature of the zodiac and planets. The second chapter is a description of the earth (including a list of the principal provinces of the New World) and its four elements fire, water, air and the earth. There is an interesting section on tides and the effects the moon has on the earth and a description of each of the parts of the world and its oceans. He also includes a section on the rising and falling of astrological signs. The last and most curious chapter is a description of  Time and the Calendar , and the division of time into days months and years. He finishes with a series of predictions for the weather for each year from 1619 to 1643 based on his description of the solar cycle, and gives a table of the calendar from which he makes these predictions. We have been unable to discover the owner of the monogram on both covers. A very good copy of this most interesting and rare work.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"SAULNIER, Jean","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816068260175,"sku":"L1129","price":1950.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/Saulnier-L1129-2.jpg?v=1781795327"},{"product_id":"vergilius-maro-publius","title":"VERGILIUS MARO, Publius","description":"\u003cp\u003eRare first collected edition of the works of Vergil in French, in the verse translation of Guillaume Michel de Tours for the Eclogues and Georgics and Octovien de Saint-Gelais for the Aeneid. The individual titles had been published in separate editions, all three of which are exceptionally rare; 'Les Eneydes' by Octovien de Saint-Gelais in 1509, 'Les Bucoliques' in 1516 and 'Les Georgicques' 1519 both by Guillaume Michel. This collection of the works was republished in 1532 and 1540. Both the translators were poets of some note, both Rhetoriqueurs, the name generally given to the group of poets active from approximately 1450 to 1530, between Villon and Clement Marot (including Chastellain, Meschonot, Molinet, Gringore, Cr étin, Jean Lemaire de Belges, Jean Marot, and Jean Bouchet, who was still writing in 1550). St.-Gelais and Michel shared an intense preoccupation with rhetoric; it was as 'l'art de seconde rh étorique' that they classified poetry. Both were prolific and extremely influential translators of classical texts. Octovien de Saint-Gelais had considerable, knowledge of the literature of antiquity, and an eagerness to display it, sometimes leading to an excessive use of Latinisms in pursuit of a high style. His work in general concentrates on purely formal devices, such as elaborate rhyme schemes (rimes l éonines, couronn ées, encha√Æn ées,  équivoqu ées), alliteration, puns, rebus, and other types of puzzles. All this is sometimes (inevitably) at the expense of clarity. The Rhetoriqueurs influence on Renaissance poetry, with all its formal experimentation, was considerable. Rabelais too, with his love of puns and lists, can be seen as a direct heir. There had been an earlier anonymous translation of The Aeneid published before Saint Gelais' but it was really a reworking of the text rather than a translation. \"Influenced by the philological impulse of the earlier Humanists, sixteenth-century translators are almost universally concerned to demonstrate the fidelity and accuracy of their versions. The prose 'remaniement' of Vergil, close to a romance, which appeared anonymously in 1483 was challenged in 1509 by the posthumous publication of Octavien de Saint-Gelais' verse translation composed with the intention 'to translate this book from its lofty distinguished Latin word-for-word and as closely as possible'.\" The Cambridge History of Literary Criticism. The works of Vergil had been published numerous times in France but no edition was more influential on French Renaissance literature than this poetical translation that brought Vergil's work to a much wider audience. It was unequalled until Clement Marot's version was published in 1577.  Most, if not all, of the woodcuts used in this volume are incunable blocks from V érard's general stock, giving the work immense visual charm. The large and fine woodcut depicting an author at his desk that accompanies the prologue to the Aeneid had also been used by Couteau in 'La l égende des Flamens' in 1522. The present work is very rare, Renouard cites thirteen copies in public libraries worldwide (mostly in provincial France) but we have been able to locate far fewer and no copies at auction in the last thirty years. An important, rare and extremely influential work from the exceptional library of the Earls of Macclesfield.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"VERGILIUS MARO, Publius","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816068325711,"sku":"L871","price":14500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_00112.jpg?v=1781795325"},{"product_id":"de-bourgogne-antoine","title":"DE BOURGOGNE, Antoine","description":"\u003cp\u003eAn emblem book with a uncommon didactic twist: the typical pairing of each image with an instructive motto has been split in two, one describing the scene untruthfully ('vanitas'), the other its reality ('veritas'). For instance, surrounding an image of a printing house (p. 10) it is said that Verborum copia and Nihil copia, sed usus: although there is an abundance of words and writing, abundance means nothing without use. In fifty chapters, the book provides a dual commentary over subjects as diverse as memory, marriage, political power, fame, and eating habits. As de Bourgogne argues in the preface, the exercise proves that poor judgement sometimes allows vain conclusions to be drawn from truth. The work is critical of its own tradition, since other books of emblems encourage forming many different possible interpretations of word and image, both religious and profane. De Bourgogne's recognizes both tendencies in the genre, and his commentary reveals to readers not only which he takes to be true, but instructs them how to arrive at truthfulness for themselves. The volume is a fresh and innovative continuation of his earlier emblem book, Linguae vitia et remedia (1631) which focuses on remedies for the abuse of language through insults, lies, blasphemies, and calumnies. It was popular into the 18th century, reaching several other editions and translation into Dutch and German. \u003cbr\u003e\n Little is known about Antoine de Bourgogne (1594 - 1657), Canon and Archdeacon of Bruges, although in one of the five laudatory poems at the beginning of the Mundi Lapis, he is connected by his friend the poet Olivarius Vredius, with the ancient House of Burgundy, through his namesake Anthony, bastard of Burgundy to Anthony's father Philip the Good (1396 - 1467), and finally Philip's father John the Fearless (1371 - 1419).\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"DE BOURGOGNE, Antoine","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816068489551,"sku":"L1227","price":2250.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/De-Bourgogne-L1227-1.jpg?v=1781795325"},{"product_id":"peucer-caspar","title":"PEUCER, Caspar","description":"\u003cp\u003eLast edition published before Peucer's death, with a new, lengthy preface by the author. Going through four previous Latin editions, and later translated to French, \"it seems to have been the most influential of his numerous writings which were concerned with the varied fields of medicine, astronomy, mathematics, natural history, and psychology\", (Thorndike VI p. 493). On the whole the work approves of divination in natural circumstances - reading dreams, for instance, or the stars, but agrees with the Bible in condemning certain branches of divination related to demons and witchcraft. Peucer's bias is unflinchingly Protestant, denying the possibility of Miracles, and he attributing the successfulness of relics and invocations of saints to demons rather than divinity. \"After discussing divination in general, he turns to oracles and theomancy, then to magic - which he thus incorrectly implies is a variety of divination, whereas the opposite is true - then to divination from entrails, to augury and aruspicina, to lot-casting under which he puts geomancy and divining from names and numbers and to dreams and their interpretation. Next he considers medical prognostications, meteorology and weather prediction, physiognomy and chiromancy, astrology, and last prodigies and portents\" (Thorndike VI p. 495). He is highly suspicious of Alchemy as a purely devilish art on the one hand, but on the other entirely approving of Astrology - which he himself put to practice and considered essential to the study of medicine. \u003cbr\u003e\n Kasper Peucer (1525 - 1602) was a prominent physician and scholar who studied with Melanchthon (and married his daughter) at the University of Wittenberg where he was appointed in turn professor of philosophy, mathematics, and medicine - his pupil John Garcaeus called Peucer the \"most celebrated professor of mathematics in this academy\". Peucer's religious views were influenced by his close relationship with Melanchthon, which deviated from the local Lutheranism in its Calvinist colourings, and when Melanchthon died in 1560 Peucer became a prominent religious authority. Although he climbed the academic ranks quickly, and gained appointment as physician to Augustus I, Elector of Saxony, his \"Crypto-Calvinist\" beliefs were his downfall. In 1574, letters discovered by his patron that expressed a desire to convert Augustus to Calvinism led to a twelve year imprisonment in Königstein Fortress, an experience he talks about at length in the introduction to the present work. After his release from prison in 1586, he became physician to the duke of Anhalf, where he remained until his death in 1602.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"PEUCER, Caspar","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816069341519,"sku":"L1314","price":2250.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/Peucer-L1314-1.jpg?v=1781795325"},{"product_id":"caviceo-jacomo","title":"CAVICEO, Jacomo","description":"\u003cp\u003eRare, beautifully printed and illustrated popular edition of Francois Dassi s French translation of Caviceo s  Libro del Peregrino , first published in the author s native Parma in 1508, and remarkably popular, both in Italy and France, where it went through more than twenty editions during the following fifty years, though it has not been reprinted in its entirety since 1559, perhaps due to its robust attitude to physical love. Caviceo introduces his romance with the appearance of Boccaccio s shade who praises the book s dedicatee, Lucrezia Borgia; unsurprisingly the Peregino is full of echoes of Boccaccio s writings, and is also imbued with the atmosphere of the Ferrarese court of Ercole I d Este which Caviceo knew well. He appears also to have used Colonna s Hyperotomachia as a model, as the Peregrino similarly contains a multiplicity of digressions on a diverse range of subjects in a Latinate prose full of classical allusions. As the title suggests much of the romance is concerned with travel, based on the author s own experiences, including voyages to the middle east, Mount Sinai and Cyprus. These adventures often serve as a pretext for a display of humanist erudition, courtly speeches, with disquisitions on natural philosophy and neo-platonic theories of love. A good deal of the work is comic, sometimes unsubtle, as in the episode when Peregrino steals, via a sewer, into what he believes is his ladies chamber only to discover, at a critical moment, that he entered a neighboring house and is in the wrong bed. All these disparate elements are woven into the story of Peregrino, an ardent lover, who after many trials on behalf of his love Ginevra, eventually wins her hand, only to witness her death shortly after the birth of her first child. The story is innovative firstly in its narrative technique, the entire story is told by the hero s shade and is in the first person, (much of the book is composed of dialogue) and secondly in its inclusion of a host of famous contemporaries in his fictional narrative, some recently dead, but most still living at publication. It is therefore quite surprising that the work was so popular in France where few of this gallery of local figures would have been known to its readers. The book was translated into French by Francois Dassi, a lawyer and secretary to Henri d Albert king of Navarre. The first French edition appeared in 1527, at a time when there was considerable interest in France for all things Italian. Dassi made no attempt to modify the passages of the original which deal with specifically Italian figures, and his translation is complete and faithful. Like the Fairfax Murray copy, this copy lacks the final leaf, 'probably blank'. This Paris edition appears to have been shared by many printers, P. Sargent (BL copy), F. Gilbert (Fairfax Murray copy), A. Lotrian (BNF copy) as well as Jean Petit, all of which are extremely rare; we have not found a copy of the Petit imprint recorded online.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"CAVICEO, Jacomo","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816070390095,"sku":"L1289","price":9750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L1289-2.jpg?v=1781795324"},{"product_id":"epistolae-graecae","title":"EPISTOLAE GRAECAE","description":"\u003cp\u003eA lovely copy of this rare Aldine incunable, the editio princeps of the majority of the letters it contains, including the editio princeps of the letters of Plato and the first printing of any of his writings in the original Greek, edited by Marcus Musursus, perhaps the most influential figure in the progress of the Aldine Greek Press, and beautifully printed by the incomparable Aldus Manutius. Musurus brought together 35 authors in his extensive collection, ranging from Plato, Isocrates and Aeschines from antiquity to 4th-century authors such as Gregory of Nazianzus and later to Procopius of Gaza. Also included are Synesius, Aristotle, Alexander the Great, St. Basil, Phalaridis Tyranni, Bruti Romani, Apollonius of Tyana, and Julian Apostate (Emperor Flavius Claudius Julianus); other letters are spurious or of doubtful authorship, such as those by Hippocrates and Euripides. The book is printed in Aldus's second and better Greek type (2:114), designed by Francesco Griffo da Bologna. In his dedication to Antonio Urceo Codro (1446-1500) professor of Greek and Latin at Bologna, Aldus states that he has set up in type whatever letters he could procure of some thirty-five Greek writers. A total of twenty six authors were published in these vols. Those that do not appear in this edition he reserved for a later publication, which was never realised. Letter-writing was an art and study allied to rhetoric, which formed part of a humanistic education, and compendia of letters circulated as model precedents. The letters published in this volume however are of interest far beyond mere examples of letter-writing. An example is Plato s seventh letter, the longest and most important. It is addressed to the associates and companions of Dion, most likely after his assassination in 353 BCE, in the form of an open letter, and contains a defence of Plato s political activities in Syracuse as well as a long digression concerning the nature of philosophy, the theory of the forms, and the problems inherent to teaching. Toward the end of the letter he gives an explanation of the perfect circle as an existing, unchanging, and eternal form, and explains how any reproduction of a circle is impossible. He suggests that the form of a perfect circle cannot even be discussed, because language and definition are inadequate. This collection was of great influence; Copernicus taught himself Greek using this work with the help of a Greek-Latin dictionary; the manuscript of his De Revolutionibus contains a suppressed passage from Lysis s letter to Hipparchus found in this collection. Introducing the text of the letter Copernicus mentions  Philolaus believed in the earth s motion.. (and) Aristarchus of Samos too held the same view . From 1493, Musurus was associated with Aldus Manutius and belonged to the Neacademia (Aldine Academy of Hellenists), a society founded by Manutius and other learned men for the promotion of Greek studies. Many of the Aldine classics were published under Musurus' supervision, and he is credited with the first editions of the scholia of Aristophanes (1498), Athenaeus (1514), Hesychius of Alexandria (1514) and Pausanias (1516). Musuros' handwriting reportedly formed the model of Aldus' Greek type. Works printed by Aldus Manutius have become synonymous with all that is best with  late fifteenth century and early sixteenth-century book production, particularly with typographical elegance and editorial quality and this rare and beautifully produced incunable is no exception. The Aldine Epistolae Graecae 'was not replaced by an equally useful collection until 1873, the date of R. Hercher's Epistolographi graeci' (Wilson, Byzantium to Italy, p.150). \u003cbr\u003e\n A fine copy with tremendous provenance; Bound for the 1st Duke of Sutherland (1758-1833), described by Charles Greville as a \"leviathan of wealth\" and \"...the richest individual who ever died\". Then in the collection of the great bibliophile Martin Bodmer.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"EPISTOLAE GRAECAE","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816070422863,"sku":"L1344","price":35000.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_8227.jpg?v=1781795323"},{"product_id":"laet-johannes-de-with-abelin-johann-philippx-cootwijk-johannes-van-drechsler-wolfgang-farghani-sionita-gabriel-hesronita-johannes","title":"LAET, Johannes de [with] [ABELIN, Johann Philippx, COOTWIJK, Johannes van, DRECHSLER, Wolfgang, FARGHANI, SIONITA, Gabriel, HESRONITA, Johannes]","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst editions of these two interesting works on Persia and Arabia, designed for of investors interested in the opportunities afforded by the trade opening up in the New World and the East, especially clients of the relatively new Dutch West and East India companies. De Laet (best known for his History of the New World), was a founding director of the Dutch West India Company, and remained a director until his death. He dedicated the first work to the English antiquary William Boswell, having spent some time in London, to learn the trade of a merchant; he corresponded regularly with William Camden, Sir Henry Spelman, Sir Simonds D Ewes and other English scholars. His work is divided into two parts, the first gives a general description of the region, including eight charming and accurate full page woodcuts of Persians in costume, probably inspired by earlier works such as Nicolay s on the Turks. The second part gives short and important accounts of various travels into into the east, some taken from Ramusio, including the journeys of several Englishmen such as Cartwright, Joseph Salbank and Robert Covert, Richard Steele, and John Newberry. \"Cet ouvrage, dit Boucher de la Richardie, est plus recherch é pour les relations que J. de Laet a jointes √† sa description de la Perse, que pour sa description m√™me, qui est très-superficielle. . Les  écrits g éographiques de Laet sont r édig és avec beaucoup de soin et d'exactitude; ils ont encore de int éret aujourd'hui, parce qu'ils servent √† faire connaitre les changements survenus depuis dans divers pays de l'Europe.\" Schwab. The second work is an interesting compilation of descriptions of the habits and customs of Arabic countries, Islamic and Arabic history, topography and laws, including an account of the travels to Jerusalem and Syria by Johannes Cootwijk, and an appendix on the Muslim calendar. It includes the description of numerous Arab cities such as Baghdad, Bokhara, Damascus, Medina, Mecca, Aleppo, etc. and also contains; Gabriel Sionita, \"De nonnullis orientalium urbibus, nec non indigenarum religione ac moribus, tractatus brevis\" (pp. 3-90); Christophe Richer, \"De moribus atque institutis turcarum, arabum, aliarumque, quae Mahumedem sequuntur, gentium\" (pp. 91-112); Johannis Cotovici, \"Itinerario hierosolymitano et syriaco, de sacris, ritibus, moribus et institutis mahometaeorum\" (pp. 113-228); Johann Ludwig Gottfried, \"Excerpta ex Lodovici Godofredi archontologia cosmica\" (pp. 229-242); \"Arabiae topographia et alia, ex Adriani Romani theatro urbium\" (pp. 243-257); Wolfgang Drechsler, \"Historia arabum\" (pp. 258-297). Printed by Janssonius in almost exactly the same style as the first, it was undoubtedly meant to complement it though, strangely, they are rarely found together. Very good copies of these two important first editions.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"LAET, Johannes de [with] [ABELIN, Johann Philippx, COOTWIJK, Johannes van, DRECHSLER, Wolfgang, FARGHANI, SIONITA, Gabriel, HESRONITA, Johannes]","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816072618319,"sku":"L1322","price":1750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/titlepage2_87f3e6b5-9fbe-43cd-83f8-a7d57ddb8c55.png?v=1781795324"},{"product_id":"bochius-joannes","title":"BOCHIUS, Joannes","description":"\u003cp\u003eFIRST AND ONLY EDITION of this magnificent festival book celebrating the entry of Archduke Ernst of Austria into Antwerp on 14 June 1594. The condition and detailing of the engravings indicates this must have been one of the earliest copies off the press. They were executed by Pieter van Der Borcht after drawings by Cornelius Floris II and Joos de Momper from the designs of Martin de Vos. The first double-page engraving depicts Ernst's parade approaching the city, images of the city entrance, the columns, stages, and arches erected in the town in honour of the occasion, the city theatre, and a two-page musical score for 6 voices of the song performed to welcome the Archduke. The pageantry continues with an engraving of the 27-foot statue erected in the marketplace of the giant Antigonus who once controlled Antwerp and was known for cutting off the right hands of mariners who did not pay him tribute. The city was liberated by another giant, Brabo, who cut off Antigonus' own hand - the legendary origin of the hands on the city's heraldic arms. The festivities end with nautical displays, fireworks and jousting, each frozen in time by their own splendid double-page engravings. Each is accompanied by descriptions of the festivities, and a commentary on their allegorical significance, by Joannes Bochius (1555-1609), a prominent lawyer and poet from Brussels who was an active official in the local government. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n The work provides a vivid depiction of the pageantry of the age and, the exuberant showmanship of a hopeful city: Antwerp had suffered sack, siege and plunder at the hands of Spaniards and Italians throughout the 1570s and 80s, its population halved to 55,000 by 1589. \"What is unmistakable, once the real plight of the city is realized, is the extent to which the various spectacles prepared for 1594 convey the city's desire to put a brave front on its position, asserting, particularly, through the allegories on the arches of the foreign merchant communities, that the golden age which the city had enjoyed under Charles V was not lost beyond recall...\" Whether or not Ernst, a minor member of the Hapsburg family could deliver the town remains to be seen: \"His relative unimportance is emphasized by the fact that Ernst was never invested with the titles of Margrave of Antwerp or Duke of Brabant\" and thus was not entitled to the full ceremonial welcome. (Davidson and Van der Weel, cit. infr.). To add to the misfortune, Ernst died in Brussels 8 months later in February 1595, so the work ends with a funeral oration, a memorial as well as a tribute.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"BOCHIUS, Joannes","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816076124495,"sku":"L1502","price":11500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_6829.jpg?v=1781795324"},{"product_id":"briggs-henry","title":"BRIGGS, Henry","description":"\u003cp\u003e1st edn. of the first complete set of trigonometrical tables, \"containing the natural sines, tangents and secants to the one hundredth part of a degree and to 15 places, which have never been superseded by any subsequent calculations\". The work arose out of discussions between Briggs, professor of geometry at Gresham College, and the great Scots mathematician John Napier, the inventor of logarithms, who in 1614 had published his 'Mirifici Logarithmorum Canonis Descriptio'. Napier agreed to suggestions by Briggs for adapting his invention more readily to the construction of tables, and the result, entailing prodigious labour, was Briggs's 'Arithmetica Logarithmica' (1624) and the present work. It is clear that the scale of logarithms now in use, in which 1 is the logarithm of the ratio 10 to 1; 2 that of 100 to 1, etc., is due to Briggs, and that Napier's role consisted simply in advising him to commence at 1 and make the logarithms increase, rather than decrease, with the natural numbers. Briggs is certainly the originator of the principle of logarithms having 10 for their base. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n On his death in 1630 the 'Trigonometria' was still unfinished, but was completed by his friend Henry Gellibrand, professor of astronomy at the same college, who added a preface explaining the application of logarithms to plane and spherical trigonometry. They also proved highly useful in the advance of systematic geography and navigation, and among the pioneers in this field who benefited from Briggs's friendship and special knowledge were Samuel Purchas, Capt. Luke Fox and Edward Wright. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n \"He [Briggs] was a man of the first importance in the intellectual history of his age  He published many books on arithmetic, geometry, and trigonometry, as well as tables for navigation . But, significant though Briggs was as a mathematician in his own right, his greatest importance was as a contact and public relations man\". He was at the center of a group that included William Gilbert, Edward Wright, Thomas Blundeville, Aaron Rathborne, Mark Ridley, Robert Hues, Hackluyt, and John Pell amongst many. \"Briggs seems to have been the first person to appreciate the significance of Napier's invention of logarithms  and from his interview with Napier onwards Briggs used all Gresham College's resources to popularise this discovery  It has recently been claimed that in calculating his logarithms Briggs used results equivalent to the Binomial Expansion, whose discovery is normally attributed to Newton.\" ..\"Gellibrand (1597-1637) another friend and prot ég é of Brigg's, completed his master's work on logarithmic trigonometry tables: wrote on navigation; and demonstrated the secular variation of magnetic declination. His work was known to Mersenne. \" C. Hill. Intellectual Origins of the English Revolution. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n A very good copy with excellent provenance; Lord Arundell of Wardour (1606- 1694) commanded gallantly for Charles I in the civil war, was employed by Charles II in arranging the negotiations for the secret Treaty of Dover with Louis XIV, was imprisoned for five years in the Tower during the Titus Oates hysteria, appointed Keeper of the Privy Seal under James II and remarkably died in his bed at the age of 88.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"BRIGGS, Henry","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816077599055,"sku":"L1000","price":5750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L1000-Briggs-3.jpg?v=1781795323"},{"product_id":"caracciolo-marino-ii-prince-of-avellino","title":"CARACCIOLO, Marino II, Prince of Avellino","description":"\u003cp\u003eThis splendid late humanist document conferring a law degree from Naples University to the 21-year old Giovanni Tomaso Compara (of the Neapolitan family now known as Acampora, or D Acampora) was issued under the auspices of Marino Caracciolo, member of one of the most powerful Neapolitan patrician families. Marino II was Lord High Chancellor of the kingdom, and as such had the right to grant the doctor s cap or laurea. As Prince of Avellino (1617-30) his Southern Italian town grew considerably and developed into a regional cultural centre. The court attracted artists and writers, such as Giambattista Basile, renowned for one of the earliest collections of fairy tales in Europe, the Neapolitan Cunto delli cunti. Campora passed his degree of canon and civil law  summo cum honore, maximisque laudibus  and this certificate, intended for display, entitles him to  lecture on both laws, interpret, comment and practice it . One of the coat-of-arms is that of Caracciolo, it contains a depiction of the golden fleece of the Imperial order of which he was a knight. The other is most likely the Compara family. In the upper corners are portraits of Saint Francis Xavier, the co-founder of the Society of Jesus, depicted as usual with his hands crossed in front of his chest. The other   fictitious   is that of Thomas Aquinas, one of the most notable alumni of the University of Naples.   Mss of this type are not uncommon but the dimensions, richness, and quality of the decoration of this example are exceptional.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"CARACCIOLO, Marino II, Prince of Avellino","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816077631823,"sku":"CJS3","price":3750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_6779.jpg?v=1781795322"},{"product_id":"danti-egnatio","title":"DANTI, Egnatio","description":"First edition of Egnatio Danti s translation of Proclus   Sfera  and his companion treatise on the use of the sphere, and second edition of Piccolomini s treatise on the proportions respectively of water and dry land of the Earth. According to Graesse there was a 1540 edition of the latter, but from Ziletti s dedication a Venetian senator, it is clear that the book was first published in 1558. Houzeau \u0026amp; Lancaster lists a  very rare  1571 first edition of Danti s translation and treatise, but it is probably confusing the latter with Danti s commentary upon the translation of Sacrobosco s  Tractatus de Spaera  made by his grandfather Pier Vincenzo Rainaldi (called  Dante  after the author of the  Divine Comedy ) and first published in 1571. Egnatio Danti (1536-86), referred to as  Cosmographer of the Grand Duke of Tuscany  on these title-pages, was an outstanding scientist who taught at Pisa and Bologna, drew maps for Cosimo de  Medici, designed a number of astronomical instruments (two of which were set up in Santa Maria Novella, Florence), brought about the reformation of the Gregorian calendar after having detected a 11-day error, wrote the first book to be published in Italy on the astrolabe (1569), and was appointed Papal Cosmographer and Mathematician by Gregory XIII (1580). His translation of Proclus   Sfera , dedicated to Isabella de  Medici, opens with a two-page life of Proclus and contains long and detailed annotations, often flanked by diagrams, for each of the fifteen chapters of the book. It ends with a five-page essay on how to study the stars without using scientific instruments. Proclus (412-485), illustrious Neo-Platonic philosopher from Constantinople, was also a fine astronomer who expounded the division of the celestial sphere with modern accuracy. Danti s treatise on the use of the sphere is divided into thirty short chapters dealing with, i.a., how to make a sphere, determine the various positions of the sun and stars and the corresponding times of day and night, and study the Zodiac.\r The proportions of water and dry land was a much debated topic of the time. Like Aristotle, Leonardo was convinced that the quantity of water exceeded that of the land, and that a great quantity of water was collected in caverns underneath the surface of the Earth. Piccolomini was one of the first scientists to maintain the opposite. In his fifteen-chapter essay he provides detailed explanations of why, from the antiquity, the amount of water on the Earth had been thought to exceed that of the land, followed by the exposition of his own revolutionary theory. Alessandro Piccolomini (1508-1578), a typical Renaissance polymath, wrote poems along with scientific, philosophical and legal works. An important scientific collection in a very attractive contemporary Spanish binding - a charming example of 'encuadernaci√≥n plateresca', most widespread in university town in the C16. Both the Danti and the Piccolomini are also of interest as early Americana.","brand":"DANTI, Egnatio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816078287183,"sku":"L48","price":7500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L48-8.jpg?v=1781795322"},{"product_id":"garimberto-girolamo","title":"GARIMBERTO, Girolamo","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst edition of Garimberto  s important treatise on the art of warfare with the splendid and most appropriate provenance of Emanuele Filiberto, Duke of Savoy, and a particularly rare example of a painted binding with the Duke s arms; a few examples are at the Bibliotheque Nationale; none, it appears, in Turin, or elsewhere in Italy. On the death of his brother Louis (1536), Emanuele Filiberto became successor to the throne of Savoy. He inherited in 1553, an almost empty honour, as the vast majority of his hereditary lands had been occupied and administered by the French since 1536. He started a most distinguished military career in 1543 when he entered the service of his uncle Charles V, with the aim of recovering his Duchy, and took part in the imperial victories in Ingolstadt (1546) and Mühlberg (1547). He later joined his cousin Philip II in Spain participating in the defence of Barcelona from French maritime attack in 1551 and he served with Ferrante Gonzaga in the guerrilla war between the Spanish and French in Piedmont. He was also a suitor to the future Queen Elizabeth I. In 1553 he was appointed lieutenant-general and supreme commander of the Spanish army in Flanders, and in 1556 governor of the Netherlands. In 1557 he won a decisive and brilliant victory against the French troops led by Anne de Montmorency and Gaspard de Coligny. In the subsequent Treaty of Cateau-Cambresis (1559) Emanuele Filiberto was rewarded with the return of his estates. The peace was sealed by his marriage to Margaret, daughter of Francis I. A skilled political strategist, he took advantage of various squabbles in Europe to slowly regain territory from both the French and the Spanish, including the city of Turin which he made the capital of his new Kingdom. He is considered one of the chief founders of the state of Savoy. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n Garimberto s treatise on warfare and government, based on the work of Machiavelli, would have been most useful to him. When he came to compose his book on warfare it was largely to the  Discoursi  and the  Arte della guerra  that he turned for inspiration, method, and subject matter - although he makes effective use of Fourquevaux s  Instructions  for more up to date information on modern battles... His procedure is to follow a general discussion of a particular issue with ancient examples especially from the Career of Julius Ceasar, and then to add modern and contemporary instances. The plan is not slavishly executed. Individual examples are themselves subjected to further scrutiny; and Garimberto is not unwilling to challenge Machiavelli. ... He comments on how military virtu has enabled men to rise from humble origins to high position; and he devotes a whole chapter to the preparations necessary to bring off a military coup.  Sydney Anglo, David Cressy.  Machiavelli - the First Century. . A most prestigious copy \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n Carlo Richa is most probably the distinguished Piemontese professor and physician who published a major work  Morborum vulgarium historia  on the plague, in Turin in 1721, later translated into English.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"GARIMBERTO, Girolamo","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816080056655,"sku":"L1434b","price":9750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L1434b-Garimberto-2.jpg?v=1781795321"},{"product_id":"hayward-sir-john","title":"HAYWARD, Sir John","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst edition of Sir John Hayward s posthumous  Life and Raigne of King Edward VI,  the earliest biography of the last Tudor king, reprinted in 1636, and again in White Kennett s Complete History of England in 1706. Considering the environment in which Hayward wrote, the influence this pioneering work has had on attitudes toward the mid-Tudor period is marked. Although few contemporary scholars would accept Hayward s interpretation of the reign at face value, his work influenced historical thinking for over three centuries. Hayward was imprisoned by Elizabeth I for his controversial book on Henry IV and his involvement in the conspiracy of the Earl of Essex in 1600. Edward VI (1537-53), the only son of Henry VIII, ruled in a period, not only of dramatic religious change, but also of warfare, political intrigue, and popular rebellion. Hayward wrote his biography of Edward at the end of the Jacobean period when major challenges were facing the monarchy. He proclaimed that his narrative was intended to be a  monument  to the  un-perishable fame  of the king and focused his efforts on court politics, foreign policy, and military affairs.  Sir John Hayward s full-scale  Life and Raigne of King Edward the Sixt, .. first circulated in manuscript in the 1620 s before its publication in 1630. As Lisa Richardson has demonstrated in her recent study of Hayward, he was soaked in the writings of Tacitus... Hayward also knew well Foxe s work in  Acts and Monuments , and used him much elsewhere in his historical work, yet here, in account of a reign dominated by violent religious change, his only substantial debt to Foxe is his admiring description of the King himself. ...What interests him most is Foxes anecdote about the king s supposed efforts at clemency for Joan Bocher and George van Parris, contrasting with the more bloodthirsty attitudes of Edward s advisers. ... One of the contemporary sources which Hayward was particularly ready to use was Edward VI s personal chronicle. .. the Chronicle minimizes his preoccupation with religion and gives the impression of a boy-king with primarily secular concerns. Overall, Hayward s distaste for what happened in the Edwardian reformation is clear.  Diarmaid MacCulloch.  The Boy King: Edward VI and the Protestant Reformation . An entirely unsophisticated and untrimmed copy of this important history.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"HAYWARD, Sir John","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816081498447,"sku":"L1488","price":1650.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_9087.jpg?v=1781795320"},{"product_id":"livy-titus-and-sigonius-carolus","title":"LIVY, Titus [and] SIGONIUS, Carolus","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst edition of Sigonius  classic and handsome edition of Livy s monumental history of Rome and the first edition of his Scholia.  Livy s history begins with the landing of Aeneas in Italy and ends with the death of Drusus in 9BC though it was probably intended to continue to the death of Augustus.  Of the original 142 books, only 35 have come down to us and of these two are incomplete; nevertheless Livy remains the first authority for the history of ancient and Republican Rome down to the conquest of Macedonia in 167 BC.  It is a state history, military and political, arranged strictly chronologically, recounting all the major events with accounts of their principal participants.  Inevitably, given the extent of the ground covered there is little philosophical reflection, but the work is saved from being a dry recitation of fact by the author s considerable literary talents.  Livy s elegant Latin, masterly portraits of great men, impressive speeches and skilful depiction of the play of emotion made him a favourite with Roman readers equalled only by Cicero and Virgil.  His history, the greatest narrative history of antiquity, provided the groundwork of almost everything subsequently written on the subject and constituted a textbook for schoolboys from his day to modern times.  Sigonius  edition is the first in which scholarly criticism is applied to the chronology of Roman history was the best and most accurate of the day. Sigonius (1524-1584) was professor of literature at Venice and produced a number of works for the Aldine press   he was then the most significant classical scholar in Italy and probably rivalled only by Scaliger elsewhere.  Doubtless because of its size and consequent cost this edition is rare, and was almost unfindable in good condition, even by the mid C19.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"LIVY, Titus [and] SIGONIUS, Carolus","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816082186575,"sku":"L1518","price":3850.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_0223.jpg?v=1781795320"},{"product_id":"lomazzo-paolo","title":"LOMAZZO, Paolo","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst edition, second issue with a new title page, of this seminal work of art theory by the Italian painter and writer Lomazzo.  Lomazzo, the Milanese painter (1538-1600), wished to give in his theoretical writings the final and conclusive argument for the nobility of painting. By demonstrating that the painter s primary and most important activity was intellectual, and that that his manual activity was in all cases simply an execution of ideas mentally conceived, he extended to painters the dignity hitherto enjoyed by poets and rhetoricians. By supplying rules for the seven parts of painting that he had logically deduced from careful definition, he  reduced painting to an art,  and elevated it to an academic subject. These demonstrations were to result in a single and complete treatise that covered theory, technique, and subject matter. ... Lomazzo s publications were not motivated simply by his vanity as a painter or his ambition as a writer. During the century and a half previous to his career, enormous changes had taken place in the art of painting, which made his arguments for the higher station of painting both necessary and valid. Painters had developed techniques and rules that could be systematized and taught like those of the liberal arts, and they had increased the range and seriousness of the thematic matter of the art in a way to rival literature. The technical accomplishments of the Renaissance painters are still admired and studied in an age that abjures their employment, and the full extent of the intellectual content of Renaissance painting will remain a matter for inquiry, discovery and synthesis through many more years of iconographical studies.  Gerald Ackerman. The Art Bulletin Vol. 49, No. 4 (Dec., 1967).  It is the summa of late Renaissance theory of art, a book Schlosser called the  bible of Mannerism . ..Lomazzo s art theory reached many readers... Still in the sixteenth century a translation of the Trattato appeared in Oxford,  englished by Richard Haydock, student of Physick  (1598). A treatise by the English miniature painter Richard Hilliard is so closely related to the Trattato that it has been considered a paraphrase of Lomazzo s text. Here was finally the longed -for, articulate, complete system of painting - and Lomazzo constructed a system perfectly fitting the intellectual and emotional atmosphere prevailing among the public he addressed. His claim to providing a system rests, to begin with , on what he believes to be a complete enumeration of the constituents, or  parts  of paintings. The art of producing images consists of seven parts, and to each of them a book of the Trattato is devoted.  Moshe Barasch.  Theories of Art: From Plato to Winckelmann . The book is also full of first-hand information about Milanese artists, quoting extensively from lost sources. The seventh and final book includes a veritable dictionary of the iconography of the period. A lovely copy of this important first edition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"LOMAZZO, Paolo","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816082252111,"sku":"L1426","price":3950.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/Screenshot-2024-08-06-at-12.06.23.webp?v=1781795319"},{"product_id":"meursius-johannes","title":"MEURSIUS, Johannes","description":"\u003cp\u003eRare first edition of this neo-pythagorian treatise on numbers by the renowned classicist Johannes Meursius in a lovely contemporary armorial binding from the extraordinary collection of Jacques Auguste de Thou. De Thou (1553-1617), scholar and historian, the greatest French book collector of his day, of whom it was long said that a man had not seen Paris who had not seen the library of de Thou. He of course died before 1631, but his son frequently added to his father s collection and continued to use the final form of his father s arms on the bindings of his acquisitions. Johanne Meurius (Van Meurs) was a Dutch classical scholar and antiquary. In 1610 he was appointed professor of Greek and history at Leiden, and in the following year historiographer to the States-General of the Netherlands. As a result of the upheavals caused by the eighty years war he accepted the offer, in 1625, of Christian IV of Denmark to become professor of history and politics at Soro, in Zealand, combined with the office of historiographer royal, in which role he produced a Latin history of Denmark (1630 38), Historia Danica. This rare and unusual neo-pythagorian work is a short treatise on the significance of numbers.  Photius, in his Bibliotheca, has preserved to us part of a valuable work, written by Nicomachus the Pythagorean, entitled Theological Arithmetic; in which he ascribes particular epithets, and the names of various divinities to numbers, as far as to ten. There is likewise a curious work of the same title, by an anonymous writer, which is extant only in manuscript. From these two, and from occasional passages respecting numbers according to Pythagoras, found in the Platonic writers, Meursius has composed a book, which he calls Denarius Pythagoricus; and which is an invaluable treatise to such as are studious of the ancient philosophy.  Thomas Taylor.  The hymns of Orpheus.  George J Agar-Ellis, 1st Baron Dover, (1797-1833) was a British politician and man of letters. He was elected a Fellow of both the Society of Antiquaries and the Royal Society in 1816. In 1824 Agar-Ellis was the leading promoter of the grant of ¬£57,000 for the purchase of John Angerstein s collection of pictures, which formed the foundation of the National Gallery. A very good copy with most distinguished provenance.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"MEURSIUS, Johannes","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816083628367,"sku":"L1529","price":2750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/Screenshot2026-06-27at6.30.22PM.png?v=1782581507"},{"product_id":"perotto-niccolo","title":"PEROTTO, Niccol√≤","description":"\u003cp\u003eAn excellent copy of the third Aldine edition of this monumental collection of grammars, including one of the most important Renaissance Latin dictionaries, by Niccolo Perroto, together with three influential classical grammars by Varro, Festus and Nonius Marcellus, dedicated to the condottiere Federico da Montefeltro of Urbino. Although the date 1513 is shown on the final colophon as if it was the second Aldine edition, this is in reality a reprint carried out in May 1517, as the colophon at the end of Perotti's work indicates (col 1064 [i.e. 1054]). The largest section of the work is taken up by Perroti s Cornucopia. Written as a commentary on book I of Martial, it includes a discussion on almost every word of Martial's text, becoming a standard work of reference on the Latin language.  a massive encyclopedia of the classical world. Every verse, indeed every word of Martial's text was a hook on which Perotti hung a densely woven tissue of linguistic, historical and cultural knowledge  Brian Ogilvie,  The Science of Describing: Natural History in Renaissance Europe.   The work was revised and expanded by Perotto's son Pyrrhus and the first edition was published in Venice by in 1489; the first Aldine in 1499. The text has been carefully numbered by page and by line so that the index can be precisely keyed, marking the inception of a modern scholarly system of reference. Niccol√≤ Perotto (1429-1480) was an Italian cleric and humanist, born and died in Sassoferrato. From 1451 to 1453 he taught rhetoric and poetry at the University of Bologna. In 1452 he was made Poet Laureate by the Emperor Frederick III, in acknowledgment of his speech of welcome to the city. He was the papal secretary from 1455 and archbishop of Siponto in 1458. Although his later career was as a papal governor, he continued his scholarly pursuits, editing the works of the Roman writers Pliny and Martial. Apart from his Cornucopia, he wrote a Latin school grammar, Rudimenta Grammatices (Pannartz and Sweynheim 1473), one of the earliest and most popular Renaissance Latin grammars, which attempted to exclude many words and constructions of medieval origin. To the Cornucopia are added the three most important classical texts on the grammar and etymology of the Latin language.  Varro s treatise is the earliest extant work on Grammar. This great work which was finished before Cicero s death in 43 BC, owes much to the Stoic teaching of Aelius Stilo. .. The first three of the surviving books are on Etymology, book V being on names of places, VI on terms denoting time and VII on poetic expressions.  Sandys I p. 179. Sextus Pompeius Festus  epitome in 21 books of the encyclopedic treatise  De verborum significatione  of Valerius Flaccus is added next. Festus gives the etymology as well as the meaning of many words, and his work throws considerable light on the Latin language, mythology and antiquities of ancient Rome. The work ends with Nonius Marcellus s compendia. A lovely fresh copy of these important texts.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"PEROTTO, Niccol√≤","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816085528911,"sku":"L1543","price":3950.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_5651.jpg?v=1781795319"},{"product_id":"pistofilo-bonaventura","title":"PISTOFILO, Bonaventura","description":"\u003cp\u003eRare first edition of this work on the use of pike, halberd and musket with 53 very precise and beautiful engravings, somewhat like Callot's in style and fineness. 34 plates are dedicated to the pike, 4 to the halberd and 15 to the musket. they seemed to have been engraved by Bertelli (Francesco(?)), who worked at Padua between the end of the sixteenth and the beginning of the seventeenth centuries (Benezit). The text explains the history and use of each of these weapons and the particular action or manoeuvre depicted in each plate. Each of the figures illustrated is numbered, corresponding to a numbered paragraph of the explanatory text, making the manual of very practical application. \u003cbr\u003e\n Bonaventura Pistofilo from Pontremoli was a notary for the Este family, then chancellor to Duke Alfonso I d Este, and a close friend of Ariosto. This work was dedicated to Sir Kenelm George Digby with his striking youthful portrait, probably done during his three years in Europe between 1620 and 1623. Digby (1603-1665) was an English author, diplomat, naval commander and one of the most fashionable figures of his day. He was known for his esoteric approach to science and advocacy of the  powder of sympathy , a  healing  powder of vitriol applied to a bandage taken from the wound which healed without any contact with the patient. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n Ferdinando Palasciano (1815 - 1891) was an Italian physician and politician. He argued that any wounded or sick soldier was neutral on the battlefield and should be helped by any available doctor. Palasciano's speech at the International Congress at the Accademia Pontoniana of Naples (1861), had widespread influence and was the basis of the First Geneva Convention which founded the Red Cross (1864).\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"PISTOFILO, Bonaventura","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816085594447,"sku":"L1503","price":7950.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_5351.jpg?v=1781795318"},{"product_id":"semedo-alvaro","title":"SEMEDO, Alvaro","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst edition of the French translation of Semedo s seminal work on China, dedicated to Cardinal Mazarin. Semedo, born in 1586, entered the Jesuit Novitiate in 1602 and in 1608 departed for Goa where he completed his studies. He arrived in Nangking in 1613 and remained in the south of China throughout his many years of residence. In 1636 he was sent back to Europe to secure further assistance for the mission and new recruits. Between 1640 and 1644 he visited Lisbon, Madrid and Rome and published this work to further those aims. It was first published in Portuguese in 1641, then translated, rearranged and republished at Madrid in 1642. It was from this text that the work was then translated and published in Italian (1643) French (1645) and English (1655). He returned to China where he occupied the important post of vice-provincial of the China mission, remaining in Canton until his death in 1659. The generally sympathetic manner in which Semedo presented China to European readers shows this work was part of the Jesuit policy of accommodation in China. It is divided into two parts; the first, occupying two thirds of the book, deals with the temporal state of China and includes a great variety of topics. The second treats the spiritual state of China and is really a history of the Jesuit mission since the arrival of Francois Xavier in 1552. Semedo describes ia. the geography of China, its people and their habits, language, education and examination system, degrees, books and sciences, banquets, games, marriage, funerals, religions, superstitions and sacrifices, weapons, nobility, government, prisons and punishment, as well as the Moslems, Jews and other nationalities resident in China and the history of Christianity before the arrival of the Jesuits. Although Mendoza s and the Ricci-Trigault histories had contained brief descriptions of the language, Semedo s greatly expanded on these with much new material. His 23 year residence had given him considerable fluency in Chinese. He stressed the great antiquity of the Chinese language considering it to be one of the languages created at the destruction of Babel, and noted its relative grammatical simplicity, suggesting that it would be a good model for constructing a universal language, and gave a brief description of the composition of Chinese characters. His detailed descriptions of such things as the literati examinations, degrees, Buddhists, Taoists, Confucians and Eunuchs reflected a broad range of contact with Chinese society. His descriptions have a ring of authority and his attitude was markedly sympathetic to the Chinese and was far less critical of Chinese religions. He presented a very sympathetic, almost idealised portrait of Chinese education, noting the early role of moral teaching, good manners and obedience, and accurately stated the role of calligraphy and composition in the traditional Chinese curriculum. His description of the Eunuchs in China was equally colourful and detailed, describing their broad distribution in Ming Society and their specific roles in palaces, colleges and tribunals. He gave a very favourable assessment of Confucius and his teachings, describing his works in detail, and the tripartite division of Confucian cosmology. A good copy of this most interesting work, one of the first genuine and sympathetic pictures of China presented to an occidental audience.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"SEMEDO, Alvaro","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816087396687,"sku":"L1312","price":3750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_6562.jpg?v=1781795317"},{"product_id":"resurrection","title":"RESURRECTION","description":"\u003cp\u003eThis initial might have introduced the Easter antiphon \"Et respicientes\", as the representation of the Resurrection suggests. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n The strength and beauty of this work is due to its fresh simplicity. The style, essential and genuine, with its palette of colour is evocative of 14th century illumination from the central regions of Italy, perhaps Tuscany.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"RESURRECTION","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816088445263,"sku":"L840","price":3750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/Untitled-11_ad2b4be0-e311-4e23-bbd4-7cd21dffb419.jpg?v=1781795317"},{"product_id":"thevet-andre","title":"THEVET, Andre","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst edition of the Italian translation by Giuseppe Horologgi of Les Singularitez de la France Antarctique, first published at Paris in 1557, a most important first hand account of Thevet s journey to Brazil. Thevet, a Franciscan, accompanied Villegagnon on a French expedition in 1555 to establish a colony on the coast of Brazil. This important narrative of that unsuccessful venture contains one of the earliest descriptions of tobacco and its use by the Indians, as well as descriptions of Peru, Cuba, and Canada, the latter account derived from Jacques Cartier. Giolito reissued this translation in 1584. An English translation appeared in 1568. Thevet s first travels occurred in about 1550, when he accompanied the Cardinal Jean de Lorraine on a journey into Italy and the Mediterranean basin. His experience as a traveler attracted the attention of Nicolas Durand, Chevalier de Villegagnon, who was preparing to found a colony in what is today Brazil. He asked Thevet to accompany the expedition as its confessor. Thevet fell ill during the voyage and had to return to France after only ten weeks in Brazil. Using his own observations, however, combined with information gained from other travellers, Thevet quickly produced his  Singularitez de la France Antarctique  on his return. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n Thevet writes here in detail of that attempt to form a colony, and includes vivid descriptions of the manners and customs of the natives whom he met. It seems probable, however, that his accounts of North America, which form a large portion of this book, and which he claims are based on first hand knowledge, derived mainly from conversations with Jacques Cartier, Sebastian Cabot, and the Sieur de Roberval. Nevertheless he gives one of the earliest descriptions of Canada, one of the earliest accounts of Newfoundland and Labrador, and one of the earliest discussions of the customs and ceremonies of the Indians, including a marvellous description of tobacco-smoking (p. 333). Andr é Thevet traveled extensively and wrote prolifically. Few sixteenth-century writers covered more territory or wrote more ambitiously. While today Thevet is seen largely as a compiler and editor of experiences that belonged to others, his work on Brazil remains important to those studying the first encounters with the New World. A good, unsophisticated copy of this important work.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"THEVET, Andre","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816088707407,"sku":"L1366","price":13500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_5085.jpg?v=1781795317"},{"product_id":"valerianus-joannes-pierius","title":"VALERIANUS, Joannes Pierius","description":"\u003cp\u003eThe first book printed by Blado in his signature Italic (its one or two predecessors were in old fashioned Gothic) and the first edition of this uncommon cosmographical\/astrological text. Valerianus (1477-1558) from a poor noble family studied at Venice under Valla and Lascarius before being taken up by Pope Leo X and entrusted with the education of his nephews. He continued in the service of the Medici until the late 1530 s when he returned to study and write. This is Valerianus  first published work. Dedicated to Giulio de' Medici, the present work  on the meaning of storms , discusses both their scientific causes and their influence as portents on human affairs, including a particularly interesting account of the cosmography of the Etruscans, as well as Roman soothsayers whose purpose was to interpret thunder and lightning as omens. For example he tells the story of the lightning which struck the gates of Florence, interpreted as auguring the election of one of its citizens to the Pontificate. Valerianus also produced a popular and successful edition of the Sphaera of Sacrobosco. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n Antonio Blado, official printer to the Papacy from 1535 to 1567, and one of the greatest printers of 16th century Italy, acquired in 1537 the celebrated Italic type of the calligrapher Lodovico Arrighi, used here by him 10 years earlier. It is one of the most elegant and famous typefaces of all time and interesting to compare with the Aldine developed in Venice at roughly the same time. Apart from its beauty it is clear, simple and easy to read. All 16th century printing on vellum is rare, and in the field of science, almost unknown. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n  Sir John Heyford Thorold (1773-1831) was a truly great collector. From 1828 until his death, he built up in an incredibly short time a beautiful collection of incunables and Aldines , deRicci p 160. Thence to the incomparable scientific library of Robert B. Honeyman (sale May 1981).\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"VALERIANUS, Joannes Pierius","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816090640719,"sku":"L1563","price":45000.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L1563-2.jpg?v=1781795316"},{"product_id":"beughem-cornelius-von","title":"BEUGHEM, Cornelius von","description":"First edition of the first printed bibliography of incunabula compiled by the preeminent Dutch C17 bibliographer Cornelius (or Cornelis) van Beughem. This groundbreaking pocket sized volume (you could easily take it with you when visiting your favorite bookshop) lists more than 3000 incunables, helpfully in strict authorial alphabetical order, rather than first by subject matter, unlike most bibliographies of the period; the full title is usually given. In some cases, several editions are listed with date and place of printing, sometimes with names of editors and translators and sizes. In the case of editions of particular importance the printer may be also identified. At the end are appendices of anonymous editions and those of uncertain date or imprint. This was a remarkably comprehensive and useful volume, providing modern style bibliographical information on more than ten percent of now known incunabula, including many more obscure works.\r \r Beughem (c. 1637-1710) of Prussian origin, worked as a bookseller in Amsterdam for Jansson before setting up his own shop in Emmerich. He was  without doubt the foremost bibliographer of the seventeenth century  (Breslauer \u0026amp; Folter) who  provided for his contemporaries a series of bibliographies of outstanding usefullness, full, accurate, and intelligently compiled  (Besterman). Beughem can be justly considered the precursor to the great bookseller-bibliographers of the 19th century, although they were largely critical of his pioneering efforts.","brand":"BEUGHEM, Cornelius von","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816091197775,"sku":"L1570","price":3850.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/Beughem-2.jpg?v=1781795316"},{"product_id":"boodt-anselmus","title":"BOODT, Anselmus","description":"\u003cp\u003eSecond corrected and improved edition (including new illustration) by Adrianus Toll, of this important work on gemstones and minerals, first published in 1609, the definitive work of the Belgian mineralogist, alchemist and physician, Anselmus Boodt. \"In his Gemmarum et Lapidum Historia, Boodt made the first attempt at a systematic description of minerals, dividing the minerals into great and small, rare and common, hard and soft, combustible and incombustible, transparent and opaque. He uses a scale of hardness expressed in three degrees and notes the crystalline forms of some minerals (triangular, quadratic, and hexangular). Boodt criticizes some of the views of Aristotle, Pliny, Paracelsus, and others. He also mentions atoms. He enumerates about 600 minerals that he knows from personal observation, and describes their properties, values, imitations, and medical applications. There are also tables of values of diamonds according to their size and a short description of the polishing of precious stones. Boodt cites nineteen authors and, besides the minerals known to him, gives a list of 233 minerals whose names he knows from Pliny and Bartholomeus Anglicus, among others.\" D.S.B., II, p. 293. From 1583 Boodt lived Bohemia as physician to Wilhelm Rosenberg, the burgrave of Prague. In 1584 he was nominated physician in ordinary to Rudolf II (with a considerable salary) and retained this position until 1612. There is no evidence however that he ever seriously practiced as a physician; Rudolf clearly saw him as one of his alchemists. Boodt was placed in charge of Rudolf's collection of gems in his  Kunstkammer . The  Naturalia  (minerals and gemstones) were in a 37 cabinet display with the gems and minerals systematically arranged, the large uncut gemstones held in strong boxes. De Boodt was an avid mineral collector and travelled widely on collecting trips to the mining regions of Germany, Bohemia and Silesia, often accompanied by his Bohemian naturalist friend, Thaddaeus Hagecius. This work also gives us our most important source of knowledge of Renaissance gem cutting, the carving of precious stones, the making of jewelry, forgery and trade of precious stones.  De Boodt assembled virtually all of the knowledge then extant  by far the most thorough and complete up to date  [his work] is further distinguished by its intimate knowledge of the art of the lapidary and must therefore be regarded as the first treatise to offer more than the briefest views of gem cutting  Sinkankas. The woodcuts include illustrations of corals, geodes, fossils, gems, minerals, along with tools and methods of working them. A very good copy of this seminal work.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"BOODT, Anselmus","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816105189711,"sku":"L1023b","price":3250.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L1023B_6.png?v=1781795311"},{"product_id":"manutius-paulus","title":"MANUTIUS, Paulus","description":"\u003cp\u003eExpanded edition, revised and corrected of Manutius' celebrated commentary on the 16 books of Cicero's letters to his closest friend T. Pomponius Atticus and the starting point of all modern editions of the text. Written over the course of many years from 65BC onwards and compiled by Cicero's personal secretary Marcus Tullius Tiro, the letters are frequently written in a subtle code to mask their political content. In his impressively detailed commentary Manutius is clearly aware of this, discussing the implications of certain names and places thoroughly, explaining their relationships to each other and explaining historical and social significance as appropriate. A valuable edition in a fine copy. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n \"Perhaps the most valuable of Cicero's surviving works are the letters, such a vivid commentary on the last years of the Roman Republic as we have of no other period of ancient times. Here alone, devoid of formality, the character of Cicero can be seen.\"\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"MANUTIUS, Paulus","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816107417935,"sku":"L802","price":1500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/2013-11-27-23.11.42.jpg?v=1781795310"},{"product_id":"fulbecke-william","title":"FULBECKE, William","description":"\u003cp\u003eFulbecke (1560-1616), dramatist, lawyer, legal writer and historian was educated at Oxford and then Grays Inn where he practised. His legal writings have long been highly regarded but he has been attracting renewed interest as the author of Shakespeare sourcebooks. It is likely that Fulbecke and Shakespeare were acquainted through one of the Inns of Court plays, masques or revels, in which it is believed both were involved and there is evidence that Shakespeare was acquainted with at least two of Fulbecke's works; an acquaintance discernible particularly in King Lear. \u003cbr\u003e\n That apart, Fulbecke was one of the first pioneers in the field of comparative and international law, especially the first English writer to deal with them in English. Most previous works on those topics, from wherever, had been written in Latin, indeed even on the common law which until Fulbecke's influential comparative work had remained sturdily impervious to the influence of other legal systems. But the most significant text here is the 'Pandectes', the earliest substantive original contribution in English to the law of nations, now more commonly known as 'public international law'. \u003cbr\u003e\n \"What Fulbecke appeared to be doing in his introduction of these controversial issues was suggesting a need for compromise. No doubt he realized the issue of authority was a critical problem that would probably escalate further upon the death of the Queen. His arguments were an idealistic attempt to please the various groups concerned. He took political ideas from men of such opposing views as Sir John Fortescue and Jean Bodin and developed them into a theory of authority. He attempted to check the power of the monarch further, not by emphasising parliament's role, but rather by giving the common law an independent status and associated it with the law of reason. Finally he resolved the debate over the origins of the common law by offering a moderate opinion. Overwhelmingly, the mood of compromise created in the introduction was carried over into the dialogues\". Terrill \"The Application of the Comparative Method by English Civilians\", Journal of Legal History 1981 II p 177.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"FULBECKE, William","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816108597583,"sku":"L1500","price":3750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/2013-12-05-01.13.04.jpg?v=1781795310"},{"product_id":"acosta-emanuel-with-maffei-giovan-pietro","title":"ACOSTA, Emanuel [with] MAFFEI, Giovan Pietro","description":"\u003cp\u003eRare first edition of the first attempt to write a detailed history of the Jesuit missions in the East, especially in Japan, and one of the most important and diverse compilations of letters relating to the Jesuit mission in the Far East; prefaced by Acosta's important \"Commentarius\", the work includes some 39 letters dating from between 1548-1564, most of which relate to Japan. As early in the 1550 s influential Jesuits argued for an official synthesis of letters from the missions, motivated in part by the fear that someone else would do it for them, and in part to promote their enormous successes in the east. The text is based on a manuscript  Historia dos missiones do Oriente at é o anno de 1568  written by the Portuguese, Manuel da Costa. Da Costa, a Jesuit missionary and bibliographer who taught at Coimbra where most Jesuit letters were available in uncensored form. His manuscript was sent to Rome, translated into Latin, and was given to the young novice Giovanni Pietro Maffei (1533-1603) to prepare for publication. Maffei added the  De Japonicis rebus epistolarum  containing abridged Latin translations of letters sent from the Jesuits working in Japan until the year 1564. In his introduction Maffei congratulates Da Costa on his effort in summarizing the contents of the letters together in the commentary. Maffei was later to write the hugely successful  Historiarum Indicarum libri XVI , much praised for its excellent treatment of Japan. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n The letters begin with the Japanese convert Paul's letter from Goa written in December 1548, followed by two famous letters of St. Francis Xavier published here for the first time. The first of these is written from Malacca in June 1549, the second on his arrival in Japan dated Kagoshima, November 1549. Letters by Frois (1532-1597), Vilela (1525-1572), and Almeida (1525-1583) are of particular interest in that they give much detail of Japanese religion, culture, and customs. This work was reprinted and translated many times, and made a significant contribution to early European perceptions of the east. A very good copy of the rare first edition of this seminal work that paints one of the earliest detailed pictures of Japan, from the Jesuit college in Mainz now the Johannes Gutenberg University.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"ACOSTA, Emanuel [with] MAFFEI, Giovan Pietro","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816110563663,"sku":"L1082","price":9500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/Acosta-L1082-4.jpg?v=1781795309"},{"product_id":"fitzherbert-sir-anthony","title":"FITZHERBERT, Sir Anthony","description":"\u003cp\u003eFitzherbert (1470-1538) of Gray s Inn, justice of the Court of Common Please, was one of the most notable legal writers of the C16th, producing many of the most authoritative and enduring English law books for practitioners and students alike. The present work was more or less continuously in print between its first appearance in 1534 and 1794 and his Boke of Justice of the Peace enjoyed a similar life. Fitzherbert s knowledge of the law was profound, he had a strong logical faculty and the rarest of legal writers gifts, the power of clear and lucid exposition. His explanations and directions were comprehensible even to those with the most basic knowledge of the law. The Nouvelle Natura Brevium is basically a manual of procedure in which are set out the forms of writ for all the different varieties of action. No less an authority than Coke called it  an exact work exquisitely penned . Getting the right writ, and getting the writ right were the basic essentials of Elizabethan litigation. If either were wrong the litigant was going nowhere - except back to the start to try again. A valuable volume for students and practitioners alike.  The Natura Brevium is esteemed an exact work, excellently well penned and had been much admired by the noted men in the Common law  Ant. √† Wood.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"FITZHERBERT, Sir Anthony","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816111055183,"sku":"SN2616","price":1850.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/Fitzherbert-L2616-1.jpg?v=1781795309"},{"product_id":"moleti-giuseppe","title":"MOLETI, Giuseppe","description":"\u003cp\u003eMoleti (1531 - 1588) studied mathematics at the Jesuit college in Messina where he was a pupil of Maurolico, and published several works on geography and astronomy prior to his appointment as scientific tutor to the young prince of Mantua, Vincenzo Gonzaga. His important Dialogue on Mechanics discusses the problem of the speed of falling bodies of different weights and anticipates the famous Tower of Pisa experiment of Galileo. In 1577 he took up the chair of mathematics at Padua and that year was asked his opinion by the Roman Congregation appointed  by Pope Gergory XIII to reform the Calendar: His response was the second work comprised here, composed to provide technical arguments in support of the exact correction of the calendar and its astronomical tables he named the 'Tabulae Gregorianae' in deference to the Pope. This treatise was then published as an appendix to the astronomical tables of the motions of the fixed stars, the sun and the moon, accompanied by an explanation of the rules of astronomical calculation of the Canons for the Gregorian Tables' proper use. Moleti rejected the traditional computation cycles, rebasing the calendar on the real motions of the stars. Moleti's work did not find favour with his scientific peers but was much appreciated in Rome (to the tune of 300 Ducats) where the Pope asked him to continue his computations with the motions of the other planets. Moleti's tables were calculated on the basis of the Copernican system which, he was the first to realise, Copernicus had based on the exact movements of the heavenly bodies, which was not the case with the earlier Alphonsine tables. This was the earliest practical use by an Italian astronomer of Copernican theory. The resulting Gregorian calendar of course, remains standard to this day. A most attractive copy of an important and very handsome book.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"MOLETI, Giuseppe","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816113611087,"sku":"L1734","price":5750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_0078.jpg?v=1781795309"},{"product_id":"marconville-jean-de","title":"MARCONVILLE, Jean de","description":"\u003cp\u003eRare second edition of this curious work on the pros and cons of marriage, first published in Paris in 1564, concurrently with another work examining the good and evil of Women; both are mentioned in the privilege given to Jean Dallier at the end of this book and were probably complementary. Marconville published many works which presented arguments, for and against, in a tradition derived from Erasmus, and prefiguring Montaigne s Essais. The present work addresses such things as adultery, marriage ceremonies both christian and pagan, degrees of consanguinity, how to punish a wife, jealousy and the unhappiness caused by being married to a  Mauvais Femme .    Some French Catholics who began cautiously endorsing marriage were Jean Bouchet, Jean de Marconville and Francois de Billon. Jean de Marconville was a Catholic who sought the unity of the Church, but objected to the use of force against the Protestants. He addressed the issue of marriage in his  De l'Heur et malheur de mariage  , published in 1564. The stated premise was that men and women were meant to be married. He advocated marriage as security    .. against the disordered affections of the flesh and against the vices of incontinence and sensuality.   Yvonne Petry.  Gender, Kabbalah, and the Reformation.  This was taken in part and reworked from a French translation of Mexia s   Diverses Lecons  by Claude Gruget.  Marconville conceals Mexia as a source, juggles the order of Mexia s three linked chapters on marriage and leaves his reader with a false impression of his source material. Marconville borrowed and compiled from Mexia s  Diverses Lecons , but more importantly he changed the meaning and context of the examples. Marconville transformed Mexia s writings on variety and diversity into an argument for monogamous Christian marriage. .. Marconville s work .. echoes Mexia and copies his phrases, but alters them slightly to emphasise the more formal requirements of the public ceremonies required for a legitimate marriage. For Mexia, the consent alone (seul consentment) of the couple suffices, helped along by ceremonies. For Marconville a more public (solonnel) arrangement is required to demonstrate this consent that he emphasises as  mutual . Lyndan Warner  The Ideas of Man and Woman in Renaissance France: Print, Rhetoric, and Law    Very little is known of Marconville's life.  A country gentleman born about 1540, he was a fairly prolific writer in the popular philosophical vein and a friend of a number of better known literary contemporaries such as Thevet and Belleforest.  Hofer (NBG) describes his works on women as \"recherch és pour leur singularit é\".\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"MARCONVILLE, Jean de","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816113971535,"sku":"L1752","price":1950.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_0097_2cf2a566-48c2-47ac-a784-17b87e7b96e5.jpg?v=1781795309"},{"product_id":"perrault-francois","title":"PERRAULT, Francois.","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst edition of this rare and most interesting work on demonology in general with a highly unusual second part recounting the author s personal experience of a haunting, or poltergeist, in which he and his household were subject to a series of unremitting attacks from an evil spirit; the work was written by Perrault (or Perreaud) in 1613 but not published until 1653, when he was already 81 years old. It was translated into English and German and reprinted several times. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n  The Demonologie was not written as a free standing treatise. Its significance therefore derives from its being a preface to L Antidemon de Macon, a highly personal account of an extended haunting which Perreaud explains by referring to maleficent magic. After describing the poltergeist activity at length, he then informs the reader that some people thought the trouble lay with his wife s maid who was already suspected of being a witch and came from a suspect family. .. His favoured explanation, however, involves a third person altogether. The previous owner (of the house) had had to be dispossessed by judicial judgement in order to make way for the Perreauds, and naturally she was resentful ... Perreaud tells us she was discovered one day kneeling beneath the chimney calling upon the devil to do harm to him and his family. Perreaud s experience, then, reluctantly published so long after the event, provides us with a reminder of seventeenth-century Protestant attitudes towards preternatural phenomena. L Antidemon along with the prefatory Demonologie, supports traditional Protestant views on possession and witch-craft, for it acknowledges that Satan s power is real but limited and that his attacks are part of God s plan for humanity .. .. Perreaud s Demonologie, then, neatly summaries the principal lines taken by a Protestant divine when discussing magic, its manifestations in the created world and the way humans may cope with these. The Antidemon which follows gives a particular instance of a preternatural happening and an illustration of how a devout Calvinist family dealt with it. Most significantly, perhaps, while the Demonologie had reiterated orthodox teaching against Satan s tendency to work through illusion, Perreaud was in no doubt that his ghostly experiences had been real and had been caused by a deliberate operation of maleficent magic. Orthodoxy and experience, it seems, were not necessarily always in agreement.  P. G. Maxwell-Stuart.  Religion and Superstition in Reformation Europe.  \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n A very good copy of this extremely rare work from the library of the noted neurologist and collector of early medical books and works on demonology and witchcraft, Dr. Maurice Villaret.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"PERRAULT, Francois.","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816114004303,"sku":"L1711","price":3500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L1711.jpg?v=1781795308"},{"product_id":"venusti-antonio-maria","title":"VENUSTI, Antonio Maria","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst edition of Venusti's work about generation, birth and brevity of life. There are two lists of contents: the first lists the headings of the 139 chapters into which the text is divided, the second lists the most interesting topics. Included are abortion, why the good die young and teeth can't be destroyed by fire; the definition of the hermaphrodite, famous dwarfs of that time in Milan, Turkish men having more wives and why lust is especially characteristic of the hairy and the lame. The author starts from the viewpoint of the dignity of marriage, describing the relationship of husband and wife and the treatment of moral, social and sexual behaviour. He moves on to pregnancy - medical prescriptions and superstitions -, birth and children - how to cure, care and educate them-, often referring to the opinions of Avicenna, Aristotle, Averroes, Cicero, Plato, Homer and to the Bible. The result is a mixture of medicine and philosophy. The last section is about natural and unnatural ways of dying and time, its division into years, days and hours, the origins of this division and some philosophical speculations on it.  Oratius Luccesinus was a member of a family prominent in Lucca in the first half of eighteenth century belonging to the noblesse de la robe of the city. The decoration of the binding is unusual combining the Renaissance and the beginnings of Neoclassicism.  Antonio Maria Venusti (1529 - 1585) was a doctor from Grosio, a village near the city of Sondrio. He descended from a poor branch of the Venosta family, the Earls of Tirolo, which in the CXIV ruled that region. He lived in Milan at the court of Dadda family who undertook his education since his father had died during his boyhood and Venusti dedicated this work to the ten sons of Erasmo Dadda. Their motto, NEC VI NEC SPONTO, on p. b2v, is represented in the centre of a chain made up of ten diamond rings, compared in verse by Giovanni Battista Porro to the valour and strength of the Dadda family.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"VENUSTI, Antonio Maria","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816115642703,"sku":"L659","price":1950.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L659.jpg?v=1781795308"},{"product_id":"zuchetta-giovanni-battista","title":"ZUCHETTA, Giovanni Battista","description":"Rare first and only early edition of this handsomely produced, important, arithmetical textbook devoted to practical and commercial arithmetic and a leader in its field. Although described as 'Prima Parte' it is in fact the only part ever printed.\r \r Zuchetta was a mathematician from Genoa; in his preface he apologizes to the reader for writing in his provincial 'Genoese' rather than the by now general Tuscan. \"The 'Prologo' is a curious dissertation on the 'Arti Scienze, \u0026amp; altro,' with some ninety-eight arguments to show the need for arithmetic on the part of all classes of humanity. The farmer, the musician, the thief, the cook, the prelate, all are shown to have need of number; and Nature, Intelligence and even God himself make use of it. The book presupposes a knowledge of the arithmetic of integers, and opens with a treatment of fractions. The rule of three, in all of its forms, and with the most unbusinesslike numbers, is then discussed at great length and this is followed by various complications of the Regoladel Cattaino, 'cosi detta da gli Arabi inventori di quello, ch'in lingua nostra significa falso posizione'. The latter part of the book [everything after p. 175] treats of such topics as partnership, barter and alligation.\"(Smith, cit. infra) Much of the text deals with mercantile transactions, especially those involving more than one currency and tables of exchange rates are given for all the major trading centres likely to be of interest to Italian merchants - a full page is given of the currency rates in London, 'sterlini' against the principal Italian currencies. Apart from its obvious mathematical interest (though it produced or developed no new theories) the work is obviously of considerable interest to the social, economic and legal historian.\r \r Antonio Orsetti evidently had a significant library, particularly of scientific and mathematical works, as an appreciable number can still be traced. He was clearly acquiring quite systematically in the first part of the 17th C, regrettably however we have discovered nothing more about him.\r \r Scevolini Domenico, mathematician of XVI century was one of the last and most thoughtful proponents of judicial astrology in Italy before the suppression of the art by the index and the inquisition.","brand":"ZUCHETTA, Giovanni Battista","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816116429135,"sku":"L946","price":4750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L946-1.jpg?v=1781795307"},{"product_id":"monstrelet-enguerran-de","title":"MONSTRELET, Enguerran de","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst edition of the chronicles of Monstrelet with the continuation up until 1516, beautifully printed in lettre B√¢tard by Regnault with fine woodcut illustration. This fourth edition follows two undated editions by V érard (circa 1500 and 1508) and a 1512 by Jean Petit and Michel le Noir, but is the first to contain the additions from 1498 to 1516 bringing the History up to the reign of Francois I. These additions were mostly taken from the  Mer des Histoires . The work imitates the V érard editions with the use of large grotesque calligraphic initials on the title pages and several large woodcut illustrations. Intended as a supplement to Froissart, the first book begins at about 1400 and goes up to 1422. The second begins with the reign of Charles VII and continues up to 1444. The last probably owes little to Monstrelet and is usually attributed to Mathieu D Esscouchy; so far as 1467. The work recounts, in considerable detail, i.a. the civil war between the houses of Orleans and Burgundy, the occupation of Paris and Normandy by the English (the Agincourt expedition) and their expulsion, the exploits of Joan of Arc and the ending of the Hundred Years War. European events as far away as Poland are also recorded. Monstrelet (c. 1390-1453) was in the service of Jean de Luxembourg throughout much of the period he describes; his work includes, and in some cases comprises the sole surviving source for, large numbers of documents of the period, and much of what he relates he saw either at first hand or heard from an eye-witness. He was at Cambrai when Joan of Arc was captured and was actually present at her subsequent interview with the Duke of Burgundy. With the exception of matters concerning his master (where it would have been foolhardy) Monstrelet is by and large an impartial observer, merely recording what he saw and heard, and recounting it in very considerable detail. His work is the preeminent source book for the history of events in France, and especially of the English in France, in the C15. A lovely copy with excellent provenance: The Chatsworth copy from the library of William Cavendish, 7th Duke of Devonshire. Devonshire was Chancellor of the University of London from 1836 to 1856, and of Cambridge from 1861 to 1891. At Cambridge he endowed the building of the Cavendish Laboratory, named after him.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"MONSTRELET, Enguerran de","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816116691279,"sku":"L1736","price":17500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC0065.jpg?v=1781795307"},{"product_id":"missal","title":"MISSAL","description":"\u003cp\u003eA rare, elegantly decorated and sumptuously bound altar missal in the Tridentine rite, produced and embellished with no expense spared, 'Ad maiorem Dei gloria'. Crimson or purple velvet bindings were often used on presentation copies for princes of the state or church, all the more so when elaborate silver decoration was added. In the present case the arms demonstrate that the owner was the child of the union of two European families of the high nobility, but unfortunately we have been unable to discover more. The armorial bearings (fleur de lys, lions passant, etc) are pretty standard though the orb above the latter is less usual but not indicative. The silver work, which is early baroque, is quite monumental and very richly carved, like an early Grinling Gibbons. The workmanship is not easy to place but there appears to be a mixture of French and German influences which suggests the Netherlands (a centre of book silverwork) or the borderlands of Eastern France and Western Germany, though we doubt the workmanship French. The whole was most likely bound for the family chapel of the Castle of the noble whose arms it bears. The ms addition of the mass of St Anne may be a clue to at least the Christian name of that individual. \u003cbr\u003e\n Gaultier's dramatic engravings are here in very striking clear impression, contrasting with the delicate watercolouring of the historiated initials. A beautiful and historic artefact.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"MISSAL","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816116887887,"sku":"L1645","price":9500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/2014-03-04-16.49.48.jpg?v=1781795306"},{"product_id":"bardi-girolamo","title":"BARDI, Girolamo","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst edition of Girolamo Bardi's important guide to the paintings in the Palazzo Ducale in Venice; the work is very rare, only one copy (Cambridge UL) is recorded in Adams. Little is known of Bardi's life, save that he came from a prominent Florentine family, which produced a number of authors and scholars. The present work is dedicated to Giovanni I Cornaro (1551-1629; Doge from 1625). \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n In 1577, a huge fire damaged the Sala dello Scrutinio and the Great Council Chamber in the Palazzo Ducale, causing serious structural damage and destroying numerous important paintings. Architectural reconstruction work was completed by 1579-1580, and a committee was formed to commission new works of art and devise the iconographic programme which they should follow. Bardi was a member of this committee; the present work reveals not only his 'insider knowledge' of the practical implementation of the restoration project, but also his deep appreciation of art and the care with which the new decorative schema was devised. Many of the paintings from this mass commissioning were inevitably workmanlike, never wholly adequate replacements for the lost works by artists such as Gentile da Fabriano, Pisanello, Alvise Vivarini, Carpaccio, Bellini, Pordenone and Titian. But there were also inspired and innovative choices, such as the new works by Tintorretto, Bassano and Paolo Veronese. (The restoration programme lasted many years, and some famous works, such as Tintorretto's Paradise, were produced long after Bardi's preliminary report.) \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n In the present work, Bardi describes the circumstances of the fire, and the reorganisation of the two rooms worst affected, the Sala dello Scrutinio and the Great Council Chamber. His detailed description of the new pictures, recording celebrated Venetian victories, essentially provides a potted version of the key events of Venetian history, as conceived by the rulers of the late sixteenth century. In addition to the historical paintings, Bardi also describes the portraits of the Doges, a permanent record of whose likeness was a consequence of office. The art historical interest of the account is increased by the fact that Bardi explains the physical layout of the rooms, with details of where each painting was hung in relation to its fellows, allowing us to reconstruct the precise appearance and disposition of the galleries at this period.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"BARDI, Girolamo","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816116920655,"sku":"L641","price":1950.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/Screenshot2026-06-27at6.12.33PM.png?v=1782580779"},{"product_id":"nolpe-pieter","title":"NOLPE, Pieter","description":"\u003cp\u003eMagnificent fête book attributed to Samuel Coster commemorating the 1642 entry into Amsterdam of Henrietta Maria, superbly illustrated with a series of allegorical engravings celebrating her visit, and a wonderful large engraved view of Amsterdam (quite commonly missing). Henrietta Maria 1609-1669, (Queen Consort of Charles I) arrived in Holland after a stormy crossing in March 1642. Ostensibly her journey was to convey her daughter Princess Mary to her future husband William II Prince of Orange, but she also used the occasion to try to obtain military and financial assistance for the King. She received a less than enthusiastic welcome, since she was both Catholic and a queen, and the Protestant republic was reluctant to help. The Prince of Orange was apprehensive about assisting her for fear of jeopardizing his own position with the States hoping to maintain good relations with both sides. Despite this, the City of Amsterdam agreed to receive the royal guests. For the occasion of her arrival ‘tableau vivants’ of Arion and the Dolphin and Perseus and Andromeda were planned in the Damrak (then still a canal), but were never actually performed. These scenes or fêtes, represented in allegorical engravings by Nolpe, had strong political overtones. “In Dutch literature, the subject of Andromeda stands for the threatened country – the Netherlands – and Perseus for the noble hero who liberates it from tyranny. … in 1642 a tableau vivant (in the waters of the Rokin) was planned for the joyous entry of Henrietta Maria in Amsterdam, with Perseus symbolizing Frederick Henry.” Jan Suijter. Again the figure of Arion rescued by the dolphin in the next plate symbolized the Netherlands saved by William of Orange. The other four scenes represented: ‘The marriage of Peleus and Thetis’ (a prefiguration of the Marriage of William II and Mary Stuart); ‘The Treaty of Adolf van Nassau’; ‘The Marriage of Reinout II of Egmond and Eleonora Plantagenet’ and ‘The Marriage of James II of Scotland and Maria van Egmond’. All were subjects chosen to allude to the importance of the Orange family in the well-being of the Dutch Republic, and to stress the connection between the Stuarts and the House of Orange. The series is very finely engraved by Nolpe after oil sketches by the celebrated artist Peter Potter, one of which survives, in the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam. The other engravings show the stages or triumphal arches designed for the fêtes. The last engraving is a very finely engraved large sea view of Amsterdam showing the salut given by the fleet in welcome of Henrietta Maria. This view is particularly rare. A large copy, with all the plates retaining their full margins, of a rare work, especially complete.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eSarah Sophia Banks was an English collector of antiquities and sister to the celebrated naturalist Joseph Banks. Her important collection of theatrical ephemera containing playbills, broadsides, notices and press-cuttings dealing with private theatrical performances, dating from 1750 to 1808, was presented to the British Museum Library on her death in 1818.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"NOLPE, Pieter","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816117150031,"sku":"L1021","price":8500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_0009_fb4ec4ce-3317-4c79-8dd9-3171adba59d0.jpg?v=1781795305"}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/collections\/Screenshot_2026-06-13_at_5.05.27_PM.png?v=1781366743","url":"https:\/\/sokol-books-ltd.myshopify.com\/collections\/early-books.oembed","provider":"Sokol Books Ltd","version":"1.0","type":"link"}