{"title":"History","description":"\u003cp\u003eHistorical events, genealogy, heraldry, and ancestry.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"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":"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":"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":"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":"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":"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":"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":"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"},{"product_id":"puget-de-la-serre-jean","title":"PUGET DE LA SERRE, Jean","description":"\u003cp\u003eRare first edition of La Serre's description of the famous visit of Marie de Medici to the Dutch Republic in 1638, beautifully illustrated with portraits by W. Hollar and with exceptionally fine etched views of the entr ée of the French Queen Mother into various Dutch cities, bound with the extremely rare continuation of her voyage to England, also superbly illustrated with portraits and views. Landwehr and Fairfax Murray ascribe all the engravings to Hollar, but Pennington, Parthey and Hind only the frontispieces, the view of the States General and portraits. Hollar lived at the time at London with the Earl of Arundel, enjoyed the patronage of Charles I and was one of the foremost engravers and illustrators of his day. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n Marie de Medici, mother of Louis XIII, exiled in 1630, escaped to Brussels in 1631 (after the failure of her attempted coup against her son), where she lived for seven years, supported by a Spanish pension. She continued intriguing against Richelieu and was forced to flee to Holland, greatly to the indignation of Philip of Spain, who at once stopped her allowance. Her visit to Amsterdam was considered a diplomatic triumph by the Dutch, as it lent official recognition to the newly formed Republic; accordingly she was given an elaborate ceremonial royal entry. Spectacular displays, by Claes Cornelisz Moeyaert, and water pageants took place in the city s harbour. There was a procession led by mounted trumpeters; a large temporary structure erected on an artificial island in the Amstel River was built especially for the festival. The structure was designed to display a series of dramatic tableaux in tribute to her once she set foot on the floating island. She was accompanied by the present author, Puget de La Serre, from Toulouse, librarian of Gaston d'Orl éans and prolific author of novels and histories. His description of Marie s voyage is magnificently illustrated with splendid views of the towns visited and the pageants and ceremonies, including a magnificent double page view of her procession approaching Hertogenbosch where she was met by Prince of Orange. There are further fine etchings showing her disembarking at Gorcum, Dordrecht and at Rotterdam. The whole procession is shown again nearing The Hague, and at Amsterdam a boat-show on the canals is depicted. At Leiden the 'Entr ée  is shown on a quay alongside a canal, and the last plate, shows the Queen Mother's dramatic stormy channel-crossing to England. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n Following her travels through the Netherlands, she sought refuge in England which was granted by Charles I. Marie had a grand reception and St. James's Palace was given her as a residence, where she kept a court of her own. However she was mobbed and insulted by the people, even in the palace and forced to leave in 1641. The work is illustrated with superb views of her arrival in Harwich, her entr ée in Colchester, the country houses she stayed at through East Anglia, and her entrance to London. The magnificent double page engraving representing Marie's public entrance into London is particularly interesting; it is one of only two street views extant of the City previous to the great fire. The scene shows the royal cortege in the middle of Cheapside, by the Cheapside Cross, one of the crosses erected by Edward I, to mark the nine resting places of the body of his beloved queen, Eleanor of Castile, on its way from Lincoln to Westminster Abbey. It was destroyed by order of parliament in May 1643. It also depicts the Cheapside Standard, rebuilt in the reign of Henry VI. Stow describes it exactly as represented in this engraving. There are numerous trade signs seen in the illustration; every house had a sign, as shop windows were too small to afford any idea of the trade carried on within. This is followed with scenes of her arrival at St. James Palace, the receptions there, and a view of the Thames, the Tower of London and the firework display that celebrated her arrival. The fine engraved frontispiece and three portraits are among Hollar's finest productions. A superb copy, extremely rare with both parts, of a most interesting and important work. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n Henry de la Tremouille 1599-1674, was a celebrated French general, cousin of Cond é and grandson of the prince of Orange, William the Silent, also the grandfather to William III of England. De la Tremouille s last active service was in Italy - where he received the wound that enforced his retirement. A. Walsh, was from a Jacobite ship owning family, resident in St. Malo after 1685, which provided and manned the vessel which took Prince Charles Edward to Scotland in 1745. The family bought the Chateau de Serrant in 1749 and became Comtes de Serrant in 1755. The ch√¢teau passed back to the Tremouille family in 1830 when Valentine Walsh de Serrant married Charles, Duc de La Tremouille.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"PUGET DE LA SERRE, Jean","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816117346639,"sku":"L1023","price":13500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_0014_ecc9c73f-d3bf-4c49-92f4-58a5aba70354.jpg?v=1781795305"},{"product_id":"francquart-jacques","title":"FRANCQUART, Jacques","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst edition of this superb suite of beautiful and very finely engraved plates commemorating, in extraordinary detail, the funeral of Albert VII, engraved after the designs of Jaques Francquart by Cornelis Galle, with a description of the occasion by Puteanus; one of the most eminent works of the golden age of Flemish copperplate engraving. Jacques Francquart (1582\/3 1651) was a Flemish painter, court architect, and an outstanding copper plate engraver, born at Antwerp. He traveled to study in Italy and was apprenticed to Rubens on his return. In 1613 he obtained the position of court painter to the Archduke Albert. He designed the Temple des Augustins which stood on Place de Broukere in Brussels. The Archduke Albert s highly cosmopolitan court became a flourishing centre of the arts, a showcase for other courts throughout Europe. The archduke, with his support of artists such as Rubens, did much to contribute towards the creation and spread of the style later known as 'Flemish Baroque'. The Twelve Year Truce (1609-1621), in the civil war in the Netherlands, brought the necessary peace for a political, economic and in particular cultural revival. Albert surrounded himself with artists, such as Peter Paul Rubens, Jan Brueghel, Wenzel Coebergher, Jacques Franckaert, the composer Peter Philips and the South-Netherlandish humanist Justus Lipsius. Francquart designed the funeral chariot and its engraving in this work is nearly a meter long. The plates depicts of more than 700 members of the funeral cortege. It is also innovative in that he created a table of  hatching  to represent heraldic colours, which is the earliest hatching system in heraldry. The work is particularly interesting in giving a detailed snapshot of the composition of the court of Albert at his death.  When Albert set out for the Netherlands in 1595, his court was almost entirely Spanish. The two mayordomos, all the gentlemen of the bedchamber and every chaplain but one were from the peninsula. .. The transformation was almost complete by the time of his death. None of the mayordomos who marched in the funeral procession was Spanish. One was a Burgundian; the other five were titled noblemen from the Netherlands. There was only one Spaniard among the eight gentlemen of the bedchamber who bore the coffin with Albert s remains. .. On all these levels, the local nobility had taken over.  Luc Duerloo.  Dynasty and Piety: Archduke Albert (1598-1621)  A very good copy of this monumental work.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"FRANCQUART, Jacques","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816117477711,"sku":"L1619","price":4750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_0032.jpg?v=1781795304"},{"product_id":"liebault-jean","title":"LIEBAULT, Jean","description":"First French edition (translated from the Latin De sanitate, faecunditatae et morbis mulierum of the same year) of this gynaecological handbook by Jean Li ébault (c.1535-1596), doctor and agronomist. It was one of the very first vernacular works, designed for the laywoman, about the female physical condition. Li ébault was born in Dijon but moved to Paris to study medicine, where he became a successful doctor, highly esteemed by both colleagues and patients. He married Nicole Estienne, daughter of the great Parisian printer Charles Estienne (1504-1564), who had himself studied medicine under Jacob Sylvius alongside the young Vesalius. Li ébault completed and translated his father-in-law's Praedium rusticum into French as La maison rustique (1564); a translation of Gesner's Quatres livres des secrets de m édecine followed in 1573. Trois livres de la sant é was the first of two works on feminine health and beauty he published in 1582: De l'ornement \u0026amp; beautez des Femmes is advertised in the present work. Madame Li ébault, a noted femme des lettres, was herself the author of Misères de la femme mari ée, mises en forme de stances, and the manuscript Apologie pour les femmes, contre ceux qui en m édisent. She predeceased her husband by some years; the contemporary diarist Pierre de L'Estoile records that Li ébault died suddenly, after sitting down to rest on a stone in the rue Gervais-Laurent.\r \r Li ébault's introduction to the present work laments the infinite number of maladies which accompany any person through his or her life, 'mais plus griefues en affliction tormentent le corps de la femme comme celuy de l'homme'. Woman, he takes care to emphasise, 'n'est animant mutile ny imparfaict, mais foible \u0026amp; maladif'. His work describes and suggests causes and remedies - often more than one - for a range of gynaecological complaints, in chronological order from childhood to motherhood; Li ébault does not advise on the maladies of women beyond child-bearing age. Young girls, he notes, may be subject to nervous illnesses, nausea, headache and neuralgia. He deals with menstruation, venereal disease and various renal and gastro-intestinal problems, before proceeding to the subject of conception and childbirth, which occupies the greatest portion of the book. Obesity, male and female, is listed among the causes of infertility; common birth defects are described, along with less common ones such as hermaphroditism. Alongside a discussion of family resemblance in young children (with a gentle reminder that even animals and plants have an urge to reproduce in their own image), Li ébault also addresses the question of when a child receives its soul. Of particular interest is the chapter devoted to the performance of caesarean section, which, given the high mortality rate, is advised only as a last resort: the first modern caesarean section which the mother is known to have survived had been performed as recently as 1500. Li ébault concludes with advice on the treatment of the newborn and the new mother. The work contains a detailed table of contents and index, and a brief list of errata.","brand":"LIEBAULT, Jean","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816117576015,"sku":"L603","price":3750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L603-5.jpg?v=1781795303"},{"product_id":"reserved","title":"RESERVED","description":"\u003cp\u003eRare edition, the eighth published in ten years of the first major work on China and the first European book in which Chinese characters occur. All early editions in the original Spanish are now rare. It includes the celebrated 'Itinerario del nuevo Mundo', details of Tordesillas  voyage from Manila to China, the first Franciscan mission to China in 1579 and the account of the Canary Islands, Santo Domingo, the Philippines, Japan, Malacca and Coromandel, along with Loyola s account of the discovery of New Mexico by Antonio d Espejo which was never published separately. An English translation by Robert Parke was published in 1588. It was the first major survey of China and ran to some 33 editions between 1585 and 1613. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n  This work, the first great book about China to be published in Europe, was a compilation of material Mendoca had obtained from a few Spanish missionaries, both Augustinians and Franciscans, living in the Philippines who had visited the southern coast of China for brief intervals. Mendoca s principle source was the learned Martin de Rada. This wonderful book contains a four-page sketch of the history of China, from Emperor Yao to the Wan-li Emperor of the Ming dynasty. Mendoca probably got much of his information from the papers of de Rada, including Chinese books he had bought during a short visit to Fu-chien province, that he had had translated by Chinese people living in the Philippines.... Though brief, this summary gives a historical dimension to this first book about China to be presented to the European reader, a work that was printed in forty-six editions in seven languages in the first fifteen years after it came out.  Thomas H. C. Lee  China and Europe: Images and Influences in Sixteenth to Eighteenth Centuries\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"RESERVED","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816118657359,"sku":"L1581","price":3950.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L1581-4.jpg?v=1781795301"},{"product_id":"nostredame-jean","title":"NOSTREDAME, Jean","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst edition in Italian. The original French version was published in the same year; it was translated into Italian for this edition by Giovanni Giudici, with many additions and corrections. The second Italian edition was not published until 1722. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n Nostredame or Notredame, was the younger brother of the celebrated astrologer Nostradamus, and a 'procureur' to the Parlement of Aix. He was very early drawn to poetry and wrote a large number of songs. He was also a great connoisseur of Provencal poetry and amassed a large collection of books on the subject, from which the present text was compiled. Nostredame gives a short biography (typically a few pages long) of 76 early Provencal poets, with selected examples of their work. The Troubadours had most influence in Italy, and Nostredame mentions a number of them referred to by Dante in the Divine Comedy - Bertran de Born, Arnaut Daniel, Folquet de Marseille and Sordello. The work starts with the 12th-century poets Jaufre Rudel and Marcabru, and goes on to the golden age of the Troubadours, with such figures as Bernart de Ventadorn and Raimbaut d'Orange; making the work a 'who's who of Troubadours' - for whose often ephemeral careers this is both the earliest and the pre-eminent source.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"NOSTREDAME, Jean","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816118755663,"sku":"L605","price":1750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/Nostreadame-L605-2.jpg?v=1781795300"},{"product_id":"campanus-johannes-antonius","title":"CAMPANUS, Johannes Antonius","description":"\u003cp\u003eSecond edition of the collected works of Johannes Antonius Campanus (Giovanni Antonio Campano; c. 1429-1477). Campanus, churchman, humanist and orator, led a varied career which took him to appointments in Naples and Perugia (as a teacher of rhetoric), before his election as Bishop of Crotone in 1463. From 1472-74 he was Papal Governor of Todi. A prominent figure of the day, Campanus was the subject of a Latin epitaph by Poliziano. The present edition reproduces the introduction by Michael Fernus from the first, Roman edition of 1495.  The essays in the present volume demonstrate Campanus' rhetorical and theological expertise to the full, and are comprehensively indexed. They include orations on the Holy Spirit and St. Stephan; we are not told the occasions on which these were delivered - if, indeed, they were anything more than exercises in composition. Other instructive essays include 'De dignitate martrimonii' and 'Contra Turchos ad principes germanos'; biographies of Thomas Aquinas, Pope Pius and Archbishop John of Benevento also appear. The present volume is, however, dominated by a lengthier biographic work, Campanus' six book life of the famous condottiere Andrea Braccio Fortebracci, conte di Montone (1368-1424), who was fatally wounded by his fellow soldier of fortune Francesco Sforza near L'Aquila, northeast of Rome. The work concludes with eight book of Latin epigrams, on religious and secular subjects.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"CAMPANUS, Johannes Antonius","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816119017807,"sku":"L649","price":3950.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_00161.jpg?v=1781795300"},{"product_id":"la-roche-flavin-bernard-de","title":"LA ROCHE-FLAVIN, Bernard de","description":"\u003cp\u003eA lovely copy of the first edition of this important and revealing work on the procedures and duties of the Magistrates and officers of the Parlements of France, beautifully printed by Simon Millanges, Montaigne s printer, a work which lead to the authors immediate ruin, as he wrote directly and openly of the failings, shortcomings, and corruptions of his colleagues who immediately sued him for libel. La Roche Flavin, studied at Rodez, at one of the first colleges founded in France by the Jesuits, then at Toulouse, where he became a lawyer at the Parlement, then Magistrate in the Parlement of Paris and President of the  Chambre de Requets  at Toulouse. His long and honorable career of over over fifty years as a Magistrate came to and abrupt end with the publication of this work. Its deliberate and systematic revelation of  the hidden workings of the judicial system is a precious resource for the historian. In around 550 chapters he details with all the knowledge required for the Magistrate of the ancient and modern parlements of France. The fruit of a life times labour, it is not simply a users manuel for the Magistrate, full of the details of the period, it contains all of La Roche Flavin s 50 years experience at a time when the Magistrature was rapidly changing. Written from 1614-17 but containing material gathered from the 1580 s, it includes the debates which shook the parlements since the civil wars.  The question of the paulette (and judicial corruption more generally) made parlement magistrates sensitive to questions of Propriety during the first half of the seventeenth century. Toulouse magistrate Bernard de la Roche Flavin s treatise about parlement procedure,  Thirteen books of the Parlements of France , first published in 1617, was an important contribution to this debate about the professional role of magistrates and their social status. As a magistrate who had served at the Paris Parlement and more recently at the Parlement of Toulouse, La Roche Flavin urges his colleagues to prove their critics wrong. Much to the dismay of his colleagues, La Roche Flavin airs the dirty laundry of the Judiciary in an effort to reform current practice, acknowledging the faults of his colleagues in the hopes of holding them to higher standards in an age when venality threatens to undermine the authority of the Profession. La Roche Flavin, for whom the magistrates integrity is the very cornerstone of the French judicial system urges that court procedure be regularized and that magistrates maintain their public dignity at all times.  Sara Beam.  Laughing matters: farce and the making of absolutism in France . A very good copy of this important work in excellent contemporary morocco.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"LA ROCHE-FLAVIN, Bernard de","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816119116111,"sku":"L1554","price":3750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_00242.jpg?v=1781795300"},{"product_id":"reserved-1","title":"RESERVED","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst complete edition, one of four variant issues, of this important history of the Kingdom of Naples by the Poet and lawyer Angelo di Costanzo, written at the suggestion of his friend the poet Sannazzaro. Costanzo lived in the refined literary circles of Naples, and fell in love with the beautiful poetess Vittoria Colonna, to whom he dedicated much poetry. His great work,  Le Istorie del regno di Napoli,  was the fruit of forty years labour. It is one of the best histories of Naples, distinguished by its clearness, simplicity and elegance. His history, in twenty books, details the period from 1250 (the year of the death of Frederick II) to 1486 (the year of the war of Ferdinand I of Naples with the Duchy of Milan). The first eight books were printed in Naples in 1572, and the complete work at Aquila in 1581-2. It is especially renowned for its record of the period of the reign of Joanna I of Naples.  As Costanzo was born little more than a century after the death of Joanna, he might, without any great stretch of probability, have acquired much of his information from the grand-children, if not the children, of those who took part in the events of her reign; and in his introduction he tells us himself, that he wrote his history in part from a journal, kept by the Grandfather of the Duke of Montelone, of the public transactions of the Kingdom of Naples in the time of Joanna, and continued by his successors till the death of Alphonso the first. A similar work had supplied his account of those from the death of Frederic the second of Swabia, to that of Charles the second of the Angevine line. Costanzo commenced his history of Naples, at the suggestion of the celebrated Sannazzaro, and other eminent scholars, who were disgusted by the falsities and absurdities of the fabulous history of Collenuccio.... From Sannazzaro, Costanzo received many ancient documents, and much useful information. .. His style is remarkable for a forcible brevity and simplicity, which seems to convey the undisguised dictates of truth; and his character for fidelity and accuracy has never been questioned. .. His history is rather the recital of exploits and fortunes of individuals, than the chronicle of the vicissitudes of a monarchy; and a chivalrous interest is therefore attached to his personages, resembling that excited by the chronicles of Froissart, or the Florentine Annals of the Villani.   Historical Life of Joanna of Sicily, Queen of Naples.  \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n Count Giuseppe Francesco Ignazio Attems (1686-1721), was Baron of Heiligenkreuz, Imperial Chamberlain at the Austrian Court, and owned considerable estates in northern Italy.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"RESERVED","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816119181647,"sku":"L1320","price":3450.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/IMG_4920-copy.jpg?v=1781795299"},{"product_id":"de-billon-francois","title":"DE BILLON, François","description":"\u003cp\u003eFIRST EDITION of the “most enthusiastic and passionate panegyric [on the rights and merits of women] to have been written between 1450 and 1550” (Albistur \u0026amp; Armogathe, Histoire du feminisme du Moyen-Age à nos jours), Billon’s strenuous early defence of the equality of the ‘second sex’. Another edition was apparently published with the same date and different title but without giving the printer’s name – either a shared or pirated issue. Little is known about his life, but Billon was born in Paris, the nephew of Artus Billon, Bishop of Senlis. He was an author ‘in the Italian style’, and accompanied Cardinal Bellay to Rome as his secretary in the mid-1550s, where he wrote the present treatise, dedicated to Catherine de Medici. Billon died around 1566, and was one of the principal theorists of feminism in the 16thC, and the work forms part of the literary canon of the ‘Women’s Quarrel’ (‘La Querelle des Femmes’), which was a Europe-wide literary battle that raged for over 300 years between various authors attacking, and defending women (hence the martial imagery), reflecting the sometimes serious and sometimes jocular nature of scholarly argument from 1500-1800; these texts were often reliant on theological sources. The work appeared again in 1564, with a slightly different title.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eBuilt up as an ‘impregnable fort’ of separate ‘bastions’ (chapters), the work is a robust defence of the role of women, peppered with allegorical references, but arguing strenuously for improvements in female education, encouraging women to abandon home and convent for traditionally male-dominated professions, including politics and the military. Billon also advocates the dissolution of arranged marriages and the ending of a woman’s legal subjugation to her husband. He notes that in Europe, where he says women are held in the greatest subjugation, men are also more subjugated; and argues for the qualities (such as honesty, magnanimity, piety and devotion) and achievements (arguing, i.a., that women make better singers -the ‘angelic sweetness’ of the female voice) of women throughout the ages, even disputing with the Bible. The book also includes the first appearance of the word ‘atheism’ (in the context of a people’s lack of belief) and contains probably the first bio-bibliography of female writers and inventors.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"DE BILLON, François","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816119279951,"sku":"L646","price":9500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_00492.jpg?v=1781795298"},{"product_id":"garisendi-antenore-or-vizani-pompeo","title":"GARISENDI, Antenore or VIZANI Pompeo","description":"\u003cp\u003eRare first edition of this fascinating description of a chivalric 'tournament' held in Bologna for the carnival of 1578, containing descriptions of the various scenes enacted for the occasion, including the names of the participants and details of the poems and songs recited. It is a blow by blow account with speeches, poems and songs reported verbatim. The local participants are identified by the stylised names of chivalric romance, 'gli Cavalieri Ardenti, Fideli, placito' and the rest by place of origin eg \"Cavaliero di Scotia, Cavalieri Portoghesi\". The 'knight of Scotland' speech is of particular interest as he may be identified with the semi-mythical James Crichton better known as \"The Admirable Crichton\" who arrived in Italy at around this time having served in the French army. In his speech the 'Scottish Knight' makes many references to Merlin and to the 'Great Queen of Scotland' and his adventures and travels in France. The show was staged in the Piazza delle Scuole (now the Piazza Galvani) on a gigantic platform, which was built up above the heads of the surrounding onlookers. This was the second and last tournament organized by the Accademia della Viola, initially founded in 1561 as the Academy dei Desti, by Ettore Ghisileri, Legnani Vincent and others, with the intention of reviving the ancient traditions of the knightly orders of Europe. The present account was compiled by Pompeo Vizani (1540-1607), also a member of the Academy of Viola, who signed the work under the pseudonym Antenor Garisendi. Vizani, a descendant of an important aristocratic Bolognese family, also helped organize the spectacle. At the end of the volume he recalls, not without some pride, that. \"questi signori Cavalieri per motivo proprio, et senza altra occasione, che del Carnovale, fanno quello, che a' pena fanno altre Citta' a' contemplazione, et con l'aiuto de' loro Principi, et con grandissime occasioni\". A most interesting insight, and first hand account, of popular chivalric entertainment in late Renaissance Italy. This first edition is rare with few copies in libraries outside Italy; we have been able to locate only three copies in the US.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"GARISENDI, Antenore or VIZANI Pompeo","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816119509327,"sku":"L941","price":3450.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_00133.jpg?v=1781795298"},{"product_id":"justinus-with-gellius-aulus","title":"JUSTINUS [with] GELLIUS, Aulus","description":"\u003cp\u003eA very clean and wide-margined copy of two Venetian incunables in a strictly contemporary and very attractive Renaissance binding. The second work notably features a fine instance of the kind of large Greek type used in the 1480s, illustrated by Proctor, who praised it for 'the regularity and size which make it the best type of its class' (p.127). \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n Justinus was a second century Roman historian. This, his most notable work, he describes as a collection of the most interesting and important passages from Pompeius Trogus' 'Historiae philippicae et totius mundi origina et terrae situs', written in the time of Augustus and now lost. This was a general history of those parts of the world that had come under the auspices of Alexander the Great, and takes as its main theme the Macedonian Empire founded by his father Philip. The last event it records (in Justinius' version) is in 20 B.C. Through his frequent digressions, Justinus here produces not an epitome but rather a useful and sometimes elegant anthology based on the work. It was very popular in the Middle Ages, when the author was frequently confused with Justin Martyr. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n The Noctes Atticae consists of a miscellaneous anthology on various topics, including philosophy, law, literature, grammar, and history. Gellius (c. 125 - c. 180) wrote the book for the education of his children during his winter nights in Attica, and the work proved very popular into and throughout the Middle Ages. It grew out of a commonplace book that Gellius kept, in which he recorded items of unusual interest that he heard in conversation or read about. The book deliberately has no specific structure, and of the twenty books only 19 have come down to us - the 8th is known only through its index. In it, Gellius quotes extensively from Greek and Latin authors, many of whose works have not survived - the book is therefore a valuable resource in preserving fragments of writings otherwise entirely lost. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n The binding, although elements of its decoration are common to several printing centres in Italy at this time, bears a strong resemblance to a number of bindings known to have been produced at Venice (and in particular to de Marinis' no. 1532 in vol II of his 'Legatura Artistica in Italia'). In its decoration it shows elements of the assimilation of Eastern design in Italian bookbinding, especially by the Byzantine\/Ottoman nature of the central knotwork tools. It must previously have been very grand, and shows evidence of elegant and arabesque furniture at the corners and at the centre of the covers. The furniture would most likely have been bronze or silver; the remaining studs holding the stubs of the ties are in bronze. The binding is still an elegant example of Renaissance bookbinding craftsmanship and examples in this condition and are invariably rare.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"JUSTINUS [with] GELLIUS, Aulus","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816120459599,"sku":"L446","price":14500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L446-8.jpg?v=1781795294"},{"product_id":"le-petit-francois","title":"LE PETIT, François","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst edition of this highly important and beautifully illustrated history of the Dutch Republic, printed privately for the author. The commendatory verses include one in Dutch by Nicholas Doublet. Although the author covers the whole of the country's history up to 1600, about two thirds of the text is devoted to the C16th., making it one of the most detailed sources for the struggle for Dutch independence. Le Petit lists some 160 authors whose works he employed in his compilation, but much of its value lies in his use of mss. and original documents, and thus in his account of events otherwise unrecorded in printed histories. Le Petit's own history reflects the unsettled nature of the times he wrote on: although born in 1546 at B éthune into a noble Belgian family, he later abjured Catholicism and fled to Holland where he served William Ist, Prince of Orange. By 1598 he was living in Aix-la-Chapelle where he wrote his \"Grande Chronicle\" and dedicated it to the Estates-General of the United Provinces. An account of the reputed Swiss engravers, Christoph von Sichem Sr. and Jr., is given in Nagler II pp. 309-11. The portraits are generally finely engraved and are often expressive and vital, especially the superb full page portrait of the author after the title. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n About 16 pages in vol. I describe the geography of the New World, the supposed origins of its native inhabitants, the voyages of discovery, the conquest of the Indians, the climate, agriculture and resources of the Americas, their colonization, government and the missions, and the shameful treatment of the Indians by the Spaniards. Further pages deal with the expeditions of the Dutch to the East Indies and their commerce and colonization there. In vol. II Drake's exploits against the Spaniards in the New World are recorded. \"Cette chronique,  écrite en mauvais français, est fort curieuse pour les nombreux faits qu'elle relate, et que l'auteur a puis és aux sources originales . Il dit dans son  épitre d édicatoire qu'il a d écrit les choses après les avoir vues sur les lieux, et promet d'√™tre beaucoup plus exact que Guichardin qu'il contredit souvent\" (Nouv. Biog. G én.). \"En revanche la valeur historique du 2e vol., qui embrasse la p ériode de 1556-1600, est incontestable; il contient, √† cot é d'extraits de plusieurs auteurs ant érieurs, beaucoup de d étails et de particularit és qu'on chercherait vainement ailleurs.\" Biblioteca Belgica. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n A very good, totally unsophisticated copy, from the exceptional library of Nicholas Joseph Foucault (b. 1643, d. 1721), marquis de Magny, statesman and passionate archaeologist, whose library of was \"parmi les plus pr écieuse concernant l'histoire de France\" (Guigard II p. 221), and then, along with many of Foucault's books, to the equally extraordinary library of the Earls of Macclesfield.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"LE PETIT, François","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816120525135,"sku":"L861","price":2250.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_0100.jpg?v=1781795293"},{"product_id":"eutropius","title":"EUTROPIUS","description":"\u003cp\u003eThe impressive contemp. calf binding of this copy strongly resembles Oldham HM23  only one example is known  and is almost certainly English, though  many of the panels used in England no doubt came from the Netherlands  (Oldham p. 20). The text itself consists of a brief summary - the Epitome - of the Gallic Wars, taken from Suetonius  iconic work. Eutropius was a late Roman historian and secretary (magister memoriae) at Constantinople. Written in a straightforward narrative style, with none of the syntactical twists and turns of Suetonius  original Latin, the text rattles through the most important campaigns waged by Julius Caesar during the Gallic and Civil Wars, moving on to his Dictatorship and death at the hands of the Senate in only a few pages. This is followed by notes on the Commentary on Caesar s Gallic and Civil Wars, by Henricus Glareanus: these consist of short summaries of each book and explanations of any obscure place names or peoples (e.g. the tribe known as the Sedusi who, Glareanus tells us,  non sunt Seduni see Germani , referencing Pliny 4.17. Glareanus also explains, with a diagram, Caesar s battle formation, and the various numbers of his troops. The work ends with four alphabetical indexes: the first refers back to Glareanus  annotations on the commentary, the second gives the French equivalents of Roman place names and tribes mentioned in Caesar s text; the third, longer notes on these places and tribes, and the fourth is an index of Caesar s text itself. This beautifully bound edition must have been a very handy condensed textbook for any student of Caesar who had neither the time nor the inclination for the original work.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"EUTROPIUS","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816122032463,"sku":"L1853","price":3750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/Screenshot2026-06-27at6.47.34PM.png?v=1782582521"},{"product_id":"catullus-tibullus-propertius","title":"CATULLUS, TIBULLUS, PROPERTIUS","description":"\u003cp\u003eSecond, improved Colines edition, derived from the Aldine by Aldus the elder and Jer. Avancio. Each beginning with biographical extracts from the Florentine Petro Crinito's guide to the Latin poets, the work is divided into three sections, respectively comprising Catullus, Tibullus and Propertius. The first comprises the complete works of Catullus, (c.84-54 BC), 117 poems ranging in scope from the famous two-lined 'odi et amo' to the vigorous obscenities of poem 16, when Catullus wrathfully proclaims: \"Pedicabo ego vos et irrumabo, Aureli pathice et cinaede Furi\". The second presents four books which are attributed to Tibullus (c. 54-19 BC), (probably only the first two are genuine), including elegies to his first love Delia, his patron Messala, the god Priapus, and to his last love, the courtesan 'Nemesis'. Book three is attributable by internal evidence to the otherwise obscure Lygdamus, while book 4, thought to have been completed only in the 16th C, begins with a discourse on Messala's achievements, followed by poems telling of the love of his sister Sulpicia and Cerinthus. The section concludes with a passage about the death of Tibullus, drawn from Ovid. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n Section three presents the four books of Propertius (c.50-14BC); the first is a passionate love elegy to 'Cynthia', a unique work that documents the affair as it progresses, and which gained Propertius immediate fame as an innovative poet. Further poems to Cynthia with more general musings on love follow, while the third book - marking the end of the affair - diversifies into avarice, death and new friends. Book four explains the origin of various Roman rites and landmarks, and discusses the great seabattle of Actium.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"CATULLUS, TIBULLUS, PROPERTIUS","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816122458447,"sku":"L854","price":2750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L854.jpg?v=1781795287"},{"product_id":"reserved-2","title":"CIEZA DE LEÓN, Pedro [with] LOPEZ DI GOMARA, Francesco","description":"\u003cp\u003ei) Pedro Cieza de León (1518-1584) served in the Indies under Pizarro and lived for 17 years in Peru. His ‘Istorie’ is based on this long stay and his travels from place to place in the “Great Kingdom”. Divided into 122 chapters it begins with the discovery of the Indies and the foundation of Panama, then describes historical events and geographical characteristics of the various provinces which Cieza visited, and offers a fascinating account of the habits of the indigenous peoples. “One of the more important sources for the early history of Peru. The author describes Peru’s resources, vegetation and Indian tribes from personal experience, and also comments on Spanish administration of the region” JFB C256 on the second ed. Cieza never published a sequel to this ‘Prima Parte’ (though according to Sabin p.73 it exists in ms.). Nonetheless, these two related essays by the Spanish-American historian Francisco Lopez de Gomara are habitually treated as the second and third parts, the first being a history of the Western Indies, the second of Mexico.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eii) Important early essay by Spanish-American historian Lopez de Gomara on the history of the New West Indies, “covering the discovery, early exploration and first settlement of the New World by the Spaniards,” (Sabin on 1564 ed). Beginning with a discussion of the nature and location of the ‘Antipodes’ – meaning those places on the opposite side of the world – the text moves on to discuss the life and times of Christopher Columbus and a wealth of information on the religions, customs, geographies and appearance, of i.a. Honduras, Cuba, Venezuela, Peru and Nicaragua. The text discusses the division of territories between the Spanish and the Portuguese, the lives and achievements of the principal conquistadors, conflicts and allegiances with the natives including the Incas and reports mass deaths amongst the local population due to the introduction of alien germs such as smallpox. Although Francisco López de Gómara (c. 1511-1566) never actually visited the New World, through his close acquaintance with Cortés and leading conquistadors he had unparalleled access to first-hand testimony and documentary sources making this work “indispensable to the student of Spanish affairs after the conquest” (Sabin) and a prime resource for 16th century Latin-American history.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eiii) Continuation of Gomara’s history of the West Indies, dealing primarily with the conquest of Mexico and focused on the personality of Hernán Cortés, leader of the Spanish expedition. Cortes’ audacious adventures against Montezuma’s Mexican empire from 1518 onwards aroused great interest in his native Spain, and won rich and extensive colonies for Charles V. The work contains a considerable amount of biographical, anthropological and topographical information, in addition to a detailed and lively account of Cortes’ voyage and campaigns against the Aztecs, culminating in Spanish dominance over the former Aztec Empire. It concludes with a Nahuatl vocabulary and some general information on Aztec social customs, religious practices and cosmographical theories.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"CIEZA DE LEÓN, Pedro [with] LOPEZ DI GOMARA, Francesco","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816122589519,"sku":"L794","price":9850.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/CIeza-de-Leon-L794-1.jpg?v=1781795286"},{"product_id":"johnston-john","title":"JOHNSTON, John","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst edition of this rare work by Johnston (?1570-1611) Scottish poet, who styled himself  Aberdonensis  and whose family hailed from Crimond near Aberdeen - where Johnston studied at Kings College, before spending eight years at various continental universities. He became a friend of Justus Lipsius and doubtless of the other scholars whose epigrams preface the present work - among them Joseph Scaliger, Jan Dousa and Daniel Heinsius. He was also closely attached to Andrew Melville, who probably helped him to obtain the professorship of divinity at St. Andrews c1593, when he was  Maister of the new college . The present work is a series of epigrammatic addresses to the Scottish Kings from Fergus I to James VI (to whom it is dedicated) highlighting their characteristics, exhibiting their virtues and referring to the principal events of their reigns. The verses are more interesting for their historical perspective than their poetry. The anonymous portraits - of Robert II, Robert III, James II, James III, James IV, James V, Mary, James VI and Anne are very finely executed and in excellent strong impression. Neither their source nor maker has been identified. In mid C19 hand on inserted fly  A very rare book. The Roxburghe copy sold for ¬£13.13. In addition to the 10 portraits this copy has a plate of the arms of James VI ... which has not been mentioned by Lowndes, + 1 leaf of preliminary matters (beginning with the verses of J.C. Scaliger) seldom found. At a sale in 1854 or 5 (I think at W. Duncan Gardiner s) a copy was sold for ¬£10 to Lord Breadalbane .\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"JOHNSTON, John","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816122655055,"sku":"L119","price":1950.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_0001_2fe970be-4bc6-4ee3-841b-5567342b9cf6.jpg?v=1781795285"},{"product_id":"commines-philippe-de-1","title":"COMMINES, Philippe de","description":"\u003cp\u003eSecond edition of the first Italian translation of Commines' history, first published in 1544. It is the work of Nicholas Raince, about whom we have discovered nothing, and dedicated to Giovio. It does not appear to have been subsequently reprinted and examples of both editions are scarce. The classical restraint of the severely geometric binding contrasts happily with the richness of the morocco in texture and colour. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n A most attractive volume.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"COMMINES, Philippe de","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816122949967,"sku":"SN2102","price":1650.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/Commines-SN2102-1.jpg?v=1781795284"},{"product_id":"caesar-caius-julius","title":"CAESAR, Caius Julius","description":"\u003cp\u003eAn early edition of Ortica's translation, first recorded in 1517, which dominated the Italian market in the first half of the C16. In this edition the translation is still apparently unfinished, after Book VI Ortica includes a letter apologising for omitting his version of Book VII, which was imperfect and interrupted. The history of Caesar's military campaigns in Gaul, Spain, Africa, Egypt and the Civil Wars, with their terse style and lively narrative, have, in their Latin original, been a perennial favorite with schoolmasters. In the vernacular the book could be used as a crib, and at the beginning the translator provides a vocabulary of Latin and Italian place names, explaining that it is so short because he has not had more time, with all the work of translating, transcribing and having the edition printed; he promises that his versions of the Lives of Plutarch and Helius Spatianus, which he is in the process of writing, will have longer lists. The travails of the C16 literary hack! \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n The three half-page illustrations of siege engines, the \"vinea\", the \"ariete\" and the \"testudine\", and the one of the bridge half-constructed in the middle of the Rhine, which all follow the vocabulary, are very jolly. \u003cbr\u003e\n The binding is curious. It is C16 Italian morocco but over bds of the thickness we would normally associate only with pigskin. Did the binder or his client have a change of heart half way? Is it a provincial production of the far north Italian where German style bindings were more common? Were there once many bindings like this but very few survivors?\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"CAESAR, Caius Julius","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816124064079,"sku":"SN2392","price":2250.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/Caesar-2392-1-copy.jpg?v=1781795282"},{"product_id":"sens","title":"[SENS]","description":"Rare first edition of the reformed  Coutumes  of the ancient town of Sens and its region, edited by Christophe de Thou, Christophe Harlay and Barthelemy Faye by order of the King; the third book printed in Sens and the first by this printer. It is particularly rare  The Repertoire bibliographique des livres imprimes en France au Seizieme Siecle  locates two complete copies only, one printed on vellum at the British library and the other at the Bibliotheque Municipal of Sens. (another is now at Berkeley). The work is of great interest for the modernizing and systematizing of the medieval feudal  Coustumes  of Sens. It is divided into three parts; the first the final revision of the  Coutumes  created by the three magistrates. The second is the  Proces Verbal  a detailed, authenticated account of the proceedings in the exercise of the revision of the Coutumes, including a list of all the  Prelats, Abbes, Chapitres, Colleges \u0026amp;Persones Ecclesiastiques, Ducs, Comtes, Barons, Chastelains \u0026amp; Seigneurs Iusticers, Les Officiers du Roy, Advocats, Procureurs, Bourgeois  whom the work would concern, providing a form of census. The third is a printing of the ancient unrevised Coustumes. It is most interesting not only in revealing the changes it makes to the quasi feudal  Coustumes , but for providing a detailed account of why and how those changes were made. Christophe de Thou (1508 1582) was an eminent French advocate, and the First President of the Parliament of Paris in 1554. He served as chancellor to the Duke of Anjou and was an advisor successively to Henry II, Charles IX, and Henry III. His son, Jacques Auguste de Thou was the noted French historian and book collector. An entirely original copy of this rare and attractively printed work.","brand":"[SENS]","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816125079887,"sku":"L1573","price":3250.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/Coustumes-L1573-2.jpg?v=1781795281"},{"product_id":"burgos-pedro-alfonso-de","title":"BURGOS, Pedro Alfonso de","description":"\u003cp\u003eA good copy of the first edition of this rare commentary on the life of the Virgin Mary. The author, Friar Pedro Alonso de Burgos (1500-1572), is considered the most outstanding hermit writer of Montserrat (Spain). He was born in one of the islands of Zeeland (Netherlands), but his parents were originally from the diocese of Burgos. After completing his studies of theology at the University of Louvain, de Burgos spent some time at the service of emperor Charles V, until the Duke of Bejar   one of the courtiers of the emperor   brought him to Spain to be the tutor of his children. Later, after visiting the Montserrat monastery in Catalonia, he decided to stay and became a monk. Described by his contemporaries as penitent and assiduous, devoted in prayer and in all spiritual exercises, he abandoned the monastery in order to lead an eremitic life in one of the mountain hermitages. Here, he was often visited by important personalities, including King Philip II, Emperor Maximilian II of Austria and his wife, as well as the Marquis of Cortes, Juan de Benavides, to whom this work is dedicated. He exercised his spiritual influence outside of the hermitage through his writings, which consist in a series of ascetic treatises on the topics of solitary life, theological virtues, devotion to God and to the Virgin Mary. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n During the Council of Trent (1545 1563), the veneration of Mary was strongly reaffirmed in opposition to protestant reformers, who, although honouring the Virgin, were questioning the validity of her cult. As a consequence, Marian devotion blossomed in the XVI century, and this short biography is a fascinating witness of this renewal and strength. It contains forty-eight chapters dealing with her life, attributes and divine qualities, followed by a four-leaf section at the end featuring a series of additional short texts regarding her. In particular, there is a letter from Dionysus Areopagitae to the apostle Paul, two letters exchanged by St. Ignatius and Mary, one from St. Ignatius to the apostle John, and a poem in praise of the Virgin by Petrus Comestor. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n Only a small number of books were printed in Barcelona in the 16th century, and Claudio Bornat (fl. Barcelona 1556-75) produced only a few of these. An editor, printer, bookseller and writer of French origin, Bornat obtained great recognition from his editions in Latin, Spanish and Catalan.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"BURGOS, Pedro Alfonso de","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816125145423,"sku":"SN2591","price":2950.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/IMG_2837.jpg?v=1781795281"},{"product_id":"martinus-strepus","title":"MARTINUS Strepus","description":"\u003cp\u003eMagnificent copy of this grand French chronicle and history of the popes in a stunning early 17th-century binding probably from the workshop of Florimond Badier, one volume rubricated in a contemporary hand. The chronicle in its present form was assembled from that of Martin Polonus (d. 1278), which ends in 1277 with the burial of John XXI. It was continued up to Urban V (1362) by Echard Verneron (Canon of Liege), and then in the second volume from the texts of 'plusiers croniqueurs', who include: Jean de Troyes, Gaguin, Jean de Montreuil and Jean Castel. Volume I remains an important source for the history of the Avignonese papacy. The second volume comprises a history of France in the period from 1399 to 1503, including the collapse (c. 1500) of the Parisian bridge where Verard's shop was located, forcing him to move to the address on colophon of vol II and giving a date ante qua non for the production of the work. The second volume is also an important historical document, for the later periods of the Hundred Years War, from the high point of the English conquest up to their expulsion from the whole of France except Calais. Martinus was Martin Strebski, born in Troppau, a Dominican friar, papal chaplain and penitentiary under Clement IV and succeeding popes, and finally archbishop of Gnesen. His 'Chronica Pontiicum et Imperatorum' is a history of the world, and was \"the favourite handbook of the later Middle Ages\" (Catholic Encyclopaedia). It enjoyed a broad readership and tremendous popularity. His chronicle includes the (mythical) story of the female Pope, 'Pope Joan', and it is here that name is first used. Martinus tells the story that after Leo IV (847-55) the Englishman John of Mainz occupied the papal chair. He was, it is alleged, a woman. Taken as a girl to Athens in male clothes by her lover, she made such progress in learning that she was without equal. She came to Rome, where she taught science, and attracted the attention of learned men. She enjoyed the greatest respect on account of her conduct and erudition, and was finally chosen Pope, but having become pregnant by one of her attendants ('mais Durant sa papalite elle fust engrossie de son familier'), she gave birth to a child during a procession, dying almost immediately. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n The principal family of Avacourt or Avaugour were of the old Breton nobility, related to the Ducal house. The second descended from François de Bretagne, natural son of Duke Francis II. It has not been possible to indentify who commissioned these splendid bindings. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n Florimond Badier, who is thought to have come to Paris from Gascony, was apprenticed to Jean Thomas, gilder in 1630 and completed his studies in 1636. In 1645 he married the daughter of the binder Jean Gillede and was made free of the Guild of St Jean. Badier like Le Gascon (it has been suggested the two were the same) was a master of the pointill é or dotted style which increased the brilliance of the gilding, favoured by the leading French binders in the first half of the C17 and incorporated into the most splendid bindings of the time. Three very fine and intricate pointill é bindings signed by Badier are known and represent the pinnacle of delicacy and precision.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"MARTINUS Strepus","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816125538639,"sku":"L523","price":32500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_7557.jpg?v=1781795278"},{"product_id":"plutarch","title":"PLUTARCH","description":"\u003cp\u003eA very handsome copy of this most influential translation of Plutarch’s Morals by the great French translator Jacques Amyot, from the exceptional library of the English diarist John Evelyn. The Moralia of the 1st-century Greek scholar Plutarch of Chaeronea is an eclectic collection of 78 essays and transcribed speeches, that give tremendous insight into Roman and Greek life, but often are also timeless observations in their own right. They include such disparate subjects as ‘On the Fortune or the Virtue of Alexander the Great” an important adjunct to his Life of the great general “On the Worship of Isis and Osiris”, and ‘On the Malice of Herodotus’ along with more philosophical treatises, such as ‘On the Decline of the Oracles’, ‘On the Delays of the Divine Vengeance’, ‘On Peace of Mind’ and lighter fare, such as ‘Odysseus and Gryllus’, a humorous dialog between Homer’s Odysseus and one of Circe’s enchanted pigs. The work also includes ten books on the customs of the table, with much on food and wine.\u003cbr\u003e\nJacques Amyot (1513-1594), was tutor to the sons of Henry II (the future Charles IX and Henri III), later a professor at the University of Bourges, ‘Grand Aumonier de France’ and then Bishop of Auxerre,which he turned into an important centre for humanism. He translated the works of Plutarch on the recommendation of Francis I. These translations had considerable impact, not only for their rediscovery of antiquity and of Plutarch, but on the French language itself. Montaigne wrote of these works “Nous autres, ignorants, étions perdus si ce livre ne nous eût relevés du bourbier… C’est notre bréviaire”. He was not just a able translator but his goal was different to the writers of the Pleiade in that he was concerned with reaching a wide, non scholarly audience, and not with hellenistic turns of phrase. He brought French translation into a new era. The works were very successful, appearing in at least five editions within ten years of the first printing, and had huge influence, particularly on Montaigne. Montaigne started working on his ‘Essais’ at roughly the same time as the first edition of Amyot’s translation appeared. Montaigne most often cited his sources, though not always; the first four lines of his Essai “Coutumes de l’île de Cea” open with four sentences copied exactly from Amyot’s translation. Of all the authors of antiquity the one that most palpably influenced Montaigne was Plutarch and in this translation by Amyot. This edition also had a direct influence on the final monumental edition of Montaigne’s Essais edited by Madame de Gournay, copying its format and layout.\u003cbr\u003e\nFrom the library of the famous diarist John Evelyn, 1620-1706 (his sale, Christie’s, 16 March 1978, lot 1197). Evelyn was a scholar, connoisseur, bibliophile and horticulturalist, as well as a writer and thinker of sometimes startlingly current relevance. By his death his library is known to have comprised 3,859 books and 822 pamphlets, the major part of which was dispersed at Christie’s in eight sales in 1977 and 1978. Evelyn (1620-1706) was a central figure of English intellectual life for some half a century and his diaries are one of the greatest resources for the period. His breadth of scholarly interests was reflected in his fine and extensive library.\u003cbr\u003e\nThe acquisition note at the head of pastedown maybe that of John Evelyn’s father, Richard the gunpowder magnate of Wotton Surrey.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"PLUTARCH","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816126095695,"sku":"L1856","price":3250.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_0105.jpg?v=1781795278"},{"product_id":"standish-arthur","title":"STANDISH, Arthur","description":"\u003cp\u003eVery rare second edition of this important work, a rare variant published with a folding imprimatur leaf, not found in the British Library.  Arthur Standish reflected the general concern at the increasing shortage of timber in The Commons Complaint which contained two special grievances, as noted in the subtitles:  the first, general destruction and waste of woods in this Kingdom with a remedy for the same: also how to plant wood according to the nature of every soile  The second concerned  the extreme dearth of victuals  and was to be remedied by planting fruit trees, breeding more poultry, and destroying vermin.  Peter McDonald, J. P. Lassoie.  The Literature of Forestry and Agroforestry.  \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n  Church s contemporary was Arthur Standish, about whom we know next to nothing. He may have been involved in some way in the Crown surveys, given that in 1611 he wrote that he had been traversing the country investigating the themes on which he would publish for the previous four years. In a series of texts (or more correctly, one gradually expanded text), Standish provided a schema for enhancing the national wood yields such that  the whole Kingdom hereby may be preserved from the ruine that is greatly feared.  His Work differed from Church s in that it provided rather less detail on arboriculture, but a rather grander scheme for increasing output that would benefit the entire economy, freeing up land and resources for alternative uses, and through which the careful setting of pollards and hedgerows could eliminate the need for coppice-woods altogether. Standish claimed some Royal encouragement and won a laudatory preface from poet and engraver Henry Peacham; but his plans, like so many projects of the time, soon lapsed into obscurity. What however marks out Church and Standish is their intent: they did not speak of  improvement  but  profit , but the core of their argument was directed towards the increase of output through better practice. Increased revenue was thus incidental to countering the scarcity of an essential resource. Standish was one of the first to differentiate himself from a slow drip of handbooks for very specific crafts, such as beekeeping, tree-grafting or seed-setting, by projecting a grander project of national renewal.  Richard W. Hoyl  Custom, Improvement and the Landscape in Early Modern Britain . \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute (1713   1792), styled Lord Mount Stuart before 1723, was a Scottish nobleman who served as Prime Minister of Great Britain (1762 1763) under George III, and was arguably the last important  favourite  in British politics. a very rare and important work with appropriate provenance.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"STANDISH, Arthur","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816126259535,"sku":"L1872","price":4950.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/1872-STANDISH-Arthur-5.jpg?v=1781795277"},{"product_id":"lusignan-estienne","title":"LUSIGNAN, Estienne","description":"\u003cp\u003eSecond edition of this important and early genealogy, bound with the first edition of the second work  Les Droicts, Autoritez et perogatives que pretendent au Royaume de Hierusalem. . Estienne de Lusignan, was born at Nicosia, capital of Cyprus, and chose an ecclesiastical career under the guidance of the Armenian Bishop, Julian. After the fall of Cyprus he escaped to Italy and spent his fortune on buying his enslaved parents back from Turkey. He moved to Paris in 1577 and was nominated as Bishop of Limasso in Cyprus.  The work of Veccerius   became an important source for the G én éalogies of Estienne de Chypre de Lusignan (1537 - 1590). As his name suggests, Estienne was a descendant of the Lusignan kings of Cyprus and Bishop of Limassol. He wrote his Genealogies for Francois de Luxembourg-Piney, in which he presented the genealogies of sixty-seven noble dynasties that can all be traced back to the Merovingians. .. In this book, Melusine and the search for her true historic identity are a recurrent theme. This may be unsurprising, since it is that very figure that enabled the author s own glorious dynastic roots to be connected with those of his patron, or, as he wrote,  The house of Luxembourg, according to our opinion and that of many others, derived from the House of Lusignan . He also sees Melusine on the crest worn by  all members  of the house of Luxembourg and Lusignan as clear proof of his hypothesis.  Pit P éport é.  Constructing the Middle Ages:  The second work is the first edition of Lusignans interesting treatise as to the various claims of the main European noble houses, including the Papacy and the Patriarchy, over the Kingdom of Jerusalem. The first chapter concerns the rights over the kingdom exercised by his own family. He then discusses the rights of each of the royal families of Europe and their connection to the Kingdom, including the English royal Family through the exploits of Richard the Lionheart. Very good crisp copies of these two works.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"LUSIGNAN, Estienne","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816126325071,"sku":"L1917","price":2750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L1917-LUSIGNAN-Estienne-2.jpg?v=1781795276"},{"product_id":"gysius-johannes-and-las-casas-bartolome_","title":"GYSIUS, Johannes and LAS CASAS, Bartolome_","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst edition of the of these two important works published in the Netherlands in 1620, containing French translations of two earlier works detailing Spanish crimes and atrocities in both Europe and the New World. The first part is an abridged version of  Oorsprong en voortgang der Nederlandtscher beroerten  (Origin and progress of the disturbances in the Netherlands) by Johannes Gysius (died 1652), first published anonymously in 1616. The second part is a translation of Brev√≠sima relaci√≥n de la destrucci√≥n de las Indias (A short account of the destruction of the Indies), written by Bartolom é de las Casas (1474 1566) in 1542 and first published in 1552. These histories were published together under a new title by Jan Evertszoon Cloppenburch (1571 1648), an Amsterdam bookbinder and publisher of Bibles and patriotic and religious books and tracts associated with the Dutch Reformed Church. Gysius was a minister, whose book is a history of the Dutch revolt against Spain in 1555 98, containing accounts of such events as the sieges of Haarlem, Leiden, and other cities and the execution by the Spanish of Count Egmont in Brussels in 1568. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n  Las Casas was reprinted in 1620 and 1630. The first of these editions appeared in Amsterdam without any prefatory matter not even the author s .. relying largely on copperplates to tell a pictoral story of torture and cruelty on the title page and throughout the text. The publisher, Jan Evertz Cloppenburg, presented a typology of Spanish cruelty. He included two title pages set up in identical ways with the same pictures . The first,..was on the Low countries and the second was about the new World and preceded Las Casas s account. The first title page included writing surrounded by pictures of men, women and children being tortured. Philip of Spain presided at the top and centre above the title, his vassals  Don Jan  and the  Duke of Alva  are shown facing the title: the Spanish cruelty in the Netherlands was mirroring that in the New World. .. This symbolic correspondence was a central typology of the Old World and New. Cloppenburg was asking the readers to see the Old World through the New. .. Here the publisher says that the Spaniards brought war and tyranny to the Low countries under the same religious pretext that they used to tyrannise the Natives in the New World a hundred years before. The heretics and the Lutherans in the Netherlands had taken the place of the pagans an Idolaters of the New World. .. In some of the engravings in Cloppenburg s edition, the inhabitants of the Netherlands are naked like the Natives. The translation, which is from the dutch, sometimes elaborates beyond Las Casas s original to make the Spaniards seem even crueler. The engravings of the Flemmish artist Theodore de Bry, which had been in the Frankfurt Latin edition of Las Casas in 1598, constituted part of this edition, where they reinforced visually the worst atrocities in the text.  Jonathan Hart  Literature, Theory, History.  \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n A good copy of this important reinterpretation both these works.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"GYSIUS, Johannes and LAS CASAS, Bartolome_","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816127144271,"sku":"L1795","price":4850.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/l1795-le-miroir-10.jpg?v=1781795273"},{"product_id":"acosta-jose-de","title":"ACOSTA, Jos é de","description":"\u003cp\u003eThird edition of these pioneering treatises on the geography, anthropology and evangelisation of South America, previously published in Salamanca in 1588\/1589 and 1595. Jos é de Acosta (1540-1600) was among the first Jesuit missionaries to embark for the Spanish New World. He spent much of his life in Peru. The main settlement of the order was at that time in the village of Juli, on Lake Titicaca. Here, a college was set up to study the languages of the natives, while the newly-funded Jesuit printing press issued the first printed book of the Americas in 1577. Later, Acosta moved to Lima and taught theology at the university. In the Third Council of Lima (1582-1583) reorganising the American church, Acosta took a very active part and became its official historian. Following an adventurous journey through Mexico, in 1587 he head back to Spain, where he was appointed head of the Jesuit college in Valladolid and later Salamanca. A prolific writer, he is mostly famous for his very successful Historia natural y moral de las Indias. This knowledgeable, realistic and detailed description of the New World was sought after and soon translated into Italian, French, German, Dutch and English. The Natura novi orbis opening this edition represents the early draft of the Historia. In it, Acosta provided the first account of altitude sickness, which affected him while crossing the Andes. He also divided the Amerindians into three categories, acknowledging the Incas and Aztecs as fairly advanced societies in the civilisation process. The second part comprises a very innovative essay on evangelisation. Acosta struggles to demonstrated to his contemporaries that Amerindians were part of the original God s plan for mankind and thus were not inferior creatures undeserved of being Christianised and saved. In grounding his argument, the idea that the first inhabitants of America migrated from the biblical world (specifically from Asia), played a crucial role. Indeed, he was the first writer to postulate the existence of a land bridge at the northern or southern extremities of the two continents, long before the discovery of the Bering Strait. In his missionary zeal, Acosta was much concerned with the preparation and morality of priests, who he encouraged to study the aboriginal languages as an essential part of their duties.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"ACOSTA, Jos é de","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816127439183,"sku":"L1787","price":2750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L1787-Acosta-666-e1436265905365.jpg?v=1781795273"},{"product_id":"brossin-jacques","title":"BROSSIN, Jacques","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst edition of this extremely rare piece of trial evidence, beautifully bound in very fine limp vellum with the arms of Louis XIII, probably made for presentation to the king by the author. The work details the descendants of Andr é de Laval who go back as far as Louis de D ébonaire, the son of Charlemagne. This work was made as evidence gathered in reply to the defamation, by Jean Barbotin, made against Jaques Brossin, that he was not of noble decent. Brossin in reply to these accusations made this impressive genealogy, consulting the Royal historian Duchene, which assembles evidence of his lineage through the descent of his Grandfather, the knight Andre de Laval. Andre de Laval s first son was revealed to be one of the ascendants of the royal family and other major figures of the Aristocracy; related to Henry IV, to Louis XIII, Marie De Bourbon, and Duc of Guise and Mary Stuart. The second son of Andre de Laval, Guy, was the ascendant in the seventh degree to the Cardinal de Richelieu and to Jacques Brossin, the author of this work. Brossin then produces further documentary evidence, which he transcribes in its entirety including; the letter from Catherine de Medicis recommending his father for marriage with one of the descendants of Andre de Laval; the letter of Henry II asking his grandfather to raise arms on his behalf; letters from Kings and Queens recommending the Brossin family, and the Brossin family genealogy. The work terminates with the genealogy of the family of Andre de Laval as far back as Charlemagne.   Jean Barbotin and his accomplices, who had accused Brossin of not being of noble descent, undoubtedly did not realise that he would thus be accusing the Royal family, by proxy, of the same thing, and that the charge of defamation would then be transformed to that of lèse Majest é. Jean Barbotin, on the strength of the evidence gathered in this work, was found guilty of this crime and executed along with his two accomplices. It would have been unusual for such a personal family document to be printed or to be so finely bound, however, Brossin, as a result of the court case for lèse Majest é, probably had a small quantity privately printed of which he had this copy finely bound with the arms of Louis XIII, who may have required a copy as it was a matter that concerned him personally. The quality of the materials used and the gilding of this binding are particularly fine.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"BROSSIN, Jacques","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816128192847,"sku":"L2057","price":7500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_0455.jpg?v=1781795269"},{"product_id":"dorsten-theodor","title":"DORSTEN, Theodor","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst and only edition of this beautifully illustrated herbal. One of the two printing variants, here the title has woodcut plants instead of printer's device. All the numerous illustrations were consistently coloured, probably for the publisher. Theodor Dorsten (1492-1552) was a physician and botanist, as well as professor of medicine at the University of Marburg. In recognition of his contribution to botanic studies, Charles Plumier and Carl Linneus named Dorstenia a family of the Moraceae (mulberry or fig family). As Dorsten explains in the preface, he was commissioned by the renowned publisher of scientific books Christian Egenolff to expand and translate into Latin the Kreutterbuch von allem Erdtwaechs by Eucharius Rösslin, published in 1533. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n Dorsten s herbal was expanded in its turn in 1557 by Egenolff s son-in-law, Adam Lonicer. The Botanicon provides a remarkable account of sixteenth-century botanic and pharmacopeial knowledge. It describes alphabetically hundreds of herbs, along with tubers, spices, fruits, nuts, a couple of mushrooms and some liquids very broadly speaking derived from plants, such as vinegar, resin, honey, but also asphalt, cheese and water. Entries comprise a detailed illustration, the different names in Greek, Latin and German, references from ancient and contemporary authorities, description of physical qualities and healing properties and often recipes for medicaments. Those who followed some of the misleading prescriptions must have suffered greatly. Bitumen is said to cure cancer when mixed with vinegar and stop women s periods when combined with beaver s secretion; inhaling its smoke is supposed to prevent mucus (probably), while one gets rid of tooth pain by chewing it (perhaps). Luckily, it was hard to find asphalt at the time. It was mainly collected on the shores of the Dead Sea and thus was known as bitumen Iudaicum. The various uses suggested by Dorsten for cannabis (f. 60r) are equally noteworthy and maybe more appropriate. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n This copy belonged to the famous Italian humanist Benedetto Varchi (1503-1565), as indicated by his faint autograph on the title. Varchi possessed vast and multifaceted knowledge. Member of several Italian circles and in particular the Florentine Academy, he was mainly interested in philosophy and literature. Yet, he did not disregard science. Among the 85 books identified as annotated by him, there are important treatises on maths, astronomy, veterinary and human medicine (see A. Siekiera,  Benedetto Varchi , in Autografi dei letterati italiani: il Cinquecento, I, Rome 2009, pp. 337-357, at pp. 343-348). This copy was later acquired by a close friend of Varchi, Lelio Bonsi (1532-post 1569). The two exchanged some sonnets and Bonsi was included among the interlocutors of Varchi s linguistic dialogue Ercolano. A member of the Florentine Academy and of the Order of St Stephen, Bonsi was also a legatee of Varchi s will.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"DORSTEN, Theodor","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816128487759,"sku":"K19","price":39500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/DSC_8139.jpg?v=1781795269"},{"product_id":"egnatius-giovanni-battista","title":"EGNATIUS, Giovanni Battista","description":"\u003cp\u003eSecond edition of this curious collection of exemplary episodes, issued in Paris some months after the princeps of Venice the same year. Giovanni Battista Cipelli (1478-1553), better known by his humanist nickname Egnatius, was a prominent scholar in Renaissance Venice and a trusted collaborator of Aldus Manutius. Very knowledgeable in Latin and Greek, he taught in the School of St Marcus and was appointed official orator of the Venetian Republic. On account of his philological, editorial and teaching skills, he was held in high esteem by Pietro Bembo, Marco Musuro, Marco Antonio Sabellico and even Wilibald Pirckheimer and Erasmus. His most successful work was De Caesaribus, a learned overview of the lives of the Roman, Byzantine, Frankish and German emperors, up to Maximilian I of Augsburg. An extract of the second book circulated independently as an essay on the origins of the Turks. Following the model of Valerius Maximus, Egnatius assembled a vast number of edifying stories from the lives of Venetians and other illustrious personalities of the past and present. It is divided into nine books and each of the numerous chapters is devoted to a topic (either virtue or vice). Book 8 includes a note on the invention of printing (f. 300rv) and a praise of Columbus (f. 301v). Muslims and Ottomans are also frequently mentioned, with several examples drawn especially from the life of Saladin (ff. 172r, 237rv, 242v, 265v, 326r). ). The work was published posthumously by Marco Molin, the son of Egnatius s heir and friend. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n This is a copy of the first of the eighteen books published in Paris by Bernardo Torresano on behalf of the Aldine Press over the 1550s and 1560s. Bernardo was the grandson of Andrea Torresano, father-in-law and business partner of Aldus Manutius. The Aldine enterprise tried several times to set up a branch or at least have a trusted dealer in Paris, but the attempts were all quite short-lasting and little fruitful.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"EGNATIUS, Giovanni Battista","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816128553295,"sku":"L2015","price":2750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L2015-Egnatius-1.jpg?v=1781795268"},{"product_id":"lurbe-gabriel-de","title":"LURBE, Gabriel de","description":"\u003cp\u003eVery rare, excellent second edition in French, finely printed by Simon Millanges (Montaigne s printer), of this important description of the history of the statutes of the town of Bordeaux by the historian Gabriel de Lurbe, a native of Bordeaux who published several works on the subject. The first edition was published in Latin in 1589 and then translated and expanded by the author and published in 1594. The work offers a fascinating insight into the every day life of the town as the statutes concern the regulation of its every aspect from the duties of the police and the Judiciary to fishmongers selling fresh fish or fishmongers selling salted fish (as a port town the trade in salt fish for the fleet was important). Naturally many of these statutes concern wine and give a very vivid description of the business with eleven chapters devoted to every aspect of the wine trade from the manufacture of barrels to the prohibition of the purchase of wines from areas outside Bordeaux, such as Armagnac. There is a specific regulation concerning the (very lucrative) trade with the English in wine which prohibits anyone taking an Englishman to buy wine from anyone other than the  bourgeois  of the town, and forbids English merchants from seeking to buy wine directly  sur les champs  unless with express permission from the relevant authorities. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n There are specific statutes concerning the labelling of wine, wine to be drunk in taverns, wines that are forbidden to be brought into the town, at what times wine from specific regions inland (such as the Gaillac) can be brought in town, the use of barrels, regulation of wine merchants, the growing of vines etc. These statutes are especially interesting as they clearly show the protection given to local merchants in their quasi monopoly on the wine trade and demonstrate the particular importance of this trade with the English market. Many also concern food such as butchers, the regulation of the trade in flour, fishmongers etc. Amusingly, the first line of the statute regulating  des tondeurs  or hair cutters states that it is strictly forbidden to cut the hair or wash the sheets of an Englishman if his ship was berthed within twenty leagues of the town. There are also particularly interesting statutes concerning the book trade and paper and parchment makers. A rare work, that gives fascinating insight into a town that was intimately linked, through its trade in wine, with the English.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"LURBE, Gabriel de","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816129601871,"sku":"L2053","price":1950.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L2053-Lurbe-1-e1439396196472.jpg?v=1781795267"},{"product_id":"reserved-3","title":"RESERVED","description":"\u003cp\u003eSumptuous copy of an early edition of a famous contemporary account of Italian political history in the first half of the sixteenth century, first published in Florence in 1550. A physician, historian and high-ranking Catholic prelate, Paolo Giovio (1483-1552) was a highly respected Renaissance scholar, linked to the Medici and later the Farnese family. In his famous villa in Como, he gathered a vast amount of ancient and contemporary statues and portraits, forming his beloved Museum. His works range from ichthyology, science and occultism, to philosophy, history, biography, iconography and ethnography, including a description of the British Isles and a very famous collection of imprese. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n The Historiae was his lifework, meant to leave an indelible trace of his scholarship. Giovio focuses on the Italian wars, sprung from the invasion by King Charles VIII in 1494, up to the late 1540s. A sharp mind, he foresaw the disastrous outcome of the conflict between France and the Holy Roman Empire for the control of Italy on the cultural and political life of the peninsula. The work is dedicated to Giovio s close friend, Andrea Alciato, and each volume closes with verses by Benedetto Varchi. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n This two volume set retains a very interesting contemporary binding. Gauffering of such a remarkable quality   certainly the work of a very skilled artisan in Geneva anticipating the style of Goldast Meister, such as the King s Binder (see I. Schunke, Der GenferBucheinband, 1937)   is usually combined with lavish tooled-blind and painted calf over pasteboards rather than gilt limp vellum on books as large as these ones. It is likely that the copies, gauffered in Geneva in 1561, were completed by another local binder, following afterthoughts of the patron. Even so, the bicolour silk ties were matched with the gauffering, formerly painted red.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"RESERVED","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816132452687,"sku":"L2115","price":7750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L2115-Giovio-2.jpg?v=1781795256"},{"product_id":"wishart-george","title":"WISHART, George","description":"\u003cp\u003eA fine, large paper copy of this most interesting contemporary biography of the feats of the great Scottish General, James Montrose, in a stunning contemporary morocco binding attributable or very close to the great French binder Le Gascon, from the exceptional library of Bolongaro-Crevenna.  Dr. George Wishart was born in 1599  In 1626 he moved to St. Andrews as second charge, and it has been conjectured that is was there that he first met the Earl of Montrose, who matriculated at the University of St. Andrews in 1627  When the Presbyterians obtained the ascendancy, Dr. Wishart fled to England with Archbishop Spottiswood. On 19th October 1639, he was appointed to a lectureship of All Saints Church, Newcastle, and in 1640 he was presented at St. Nicholas Church, Newcastle. When Leslie and the Scots army took Newcastle on 19th October 1644, Wishart was taken prisoner, and, on the charge of corresponding with royalists, was imprisoned in the Thieves  Hole, Edinburgh. After 7 months in prison, Wishart was liberated when the Marquis of Montrose arrived in Edinburgh after his victory at Kilsyth on 15th August 1645. Wishart joined the royal army at Bothwell, and was appointed private chaplain to the Marquis of Montrose. In this capacity he accompanied the Marquis in his campaign both at home and abroad, and his narrative of Montrose s campaign is that of an eye-witness and biographer. It was first published in Amsterdam   1647. When the Scottish Parliament tried Montrose in abstentia in 1649, Wishart s book was brought as evidence against him. A bounty was pledged by Parliament and the Church of Scotland for his capture, and he was sentenced in abstentia to be hanged with Wishart s book around his neck. The sentence was carried out in the following year after Montrose was captured and brought to Edinburgh.  The Wishart Society. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n  Les reliures de Le Gascon sont de veritables objets d art.  Edouard Rouveyre.  Connaissances n écessaires √† un bibliophile.  This binding is very similar in style and the tools are nearly identical to a binding attributed to Le Gascon in a Sotheby s sale at Paris, 2011, sale PF1113, lot 51, the 1595 edition of the works of Montaigne. It shares the same oval centre surrounded by near identical scrolled tools and pointill é work.  The style of Le Gascon, so-called, was in vogue between the years 1640, and 1665  Herbert P. Horne  An Essay in the History of Gold-Tooled Bindings . \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n The binding is also very similar in design and tools to another binding attributed to Le Gascon in the Tenschert Catalogue  Biblia Sacra  2004, no. 59, a Greek New Testament. Many of the best binders of the period imitated the work of Le Gascon, who was then at the height of fashion, and if this binding is not by Le Gascon or his atelier, it is by someone who was imitating him as closely as possible. The gilding and use of pointill é tools is particularly fine, the morocco is of the highest quality. As this is a large paper copy in a very rich binding, it was almost certainly made for presentation, though there is no indication of to whom. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n A wonderful copy from the extraordinary library of Bolongaro-Crevenna, the francophile Italian merchant from Amsterdam, whose magnificent collection was sold in Paris between 1775 and 1793. This work was in his sale of History books in 1789 lot 6506; see  Catalogue des livres de la bibliothèque de M. Pierre Antoine Bologaro-Crevenna   Volume 4  Amsterdam, chez Changuion 1789.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"WISHART, George","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816133042511,"sku":"L2211","price":4250.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L2211-Wishart-1.jpg?v=1781795254"},{"product_id":"giovio-paolo","title":"GIOVIO, Paolo","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst edition of an early biographical work by a distinguished historian of the Italian Renaissance. Paolo Giovio (1483-1552) was a talented humanist, prelate and art collector; educated in Padua, he taught moral and natural philosophy at the University of Rome, acted as personal physician to pope Clement VII and was later appointed bishop of Nocera. His numerous writings enjoyed great success throughout Europe, embracing a vast range of subjects, from ancient and contemporary history to science, travel and emblems. This biography is devoted to the founder of the Sforza dynasty, Muzio Attendolo (1369-1424), whose powerful portrait appears in the book. A skilled condottiero, he served many Italian rulers, including pope Martin V, in the turbulent period marked by the wars against the expansion of the Milanese Duchy and the succession to the throne of Naples. His son Francesco (1401-1466) married Bianca Maria Visconti and managed to take over the Duchy of Milan from her family. The volume is dedicated to Cardinal Guido Ascanio Sforza, grandson of Paul III and illustrious member of the branch of the Sforza family stemming from another of Muzio Attendolo s sons, Bosio (1410-1476), who settled in southern Tuscany to rule over the small independent county of Santa Fiora. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n The coat of arms painted on f. 1r (red shield with gilt chevrons and three half moons) may well be that of a contemporary Italian family, like the Leonardi from Florence, who used silver-gilt chevrons and half moons.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"GIOVIO, Paolo","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816134287695,"sku":"L2783c","price":5250.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/Screenshot-2024-08-06-at-11.05.51.webp?v=1781795216"},{"product_id":"bale-john-bade-conrad","title":"BALE, John [BADE, Conrad]","description":"\u003cp\u003eA beautiful copy of this rare and most influential translation into French, by the celebrated protestant publisher and author Conrad Bade, in a most elegant French binding. The binding, exceptionally well worked in gilt using fine crushed red morocco, is very much in the style of Derome the younger (see British Library Shelfmark c42c9 with his ticket). However it is almost certainly the work of the highly skilled if little known Jean-Baptiste Gosselin (whose niece married Michel Derome) and who, it is claimed, executed special bindings for Louis XVI. According to Erick Aguirre, who himself supplied this information, Gosselin bound several copies of the Bale for the bookseller Guillaume-Luc Bailly in about 1785. M. Bailly's price codes are in very small letters at the foot of the final end-paper. Mr. Aguirre has also identified this copy as lot 3913 in the 1803 M éon sale (little red numbers on foot of t-p) where it was purchased by Morel de Vind é. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n Bale (1495-1563), a former Carmelite monk who converted to protestantism, later bishop of Ossory, was one of the most outspoken English Protestants of the first half of the C16. After the fall of his patron, Thomas Cromwell in 1540, he fled to Germany, where he busied himself in composing the bitter diatribes which earned him the nickname \"Bilious Bale\". On the accession of Edward VI he returned to England to share in the triumph of the reformers and publish in London the works composed in exile. Bale initially wrote this work in Latin and it was first published in Basel in 1558. It was translated into English, with additions by John Studley, as  The Pageant of Popes  in 1574. The French is the first translation into the vernacular. Conrad Bade is justly recognised as a hugely important publisher just for the publication of his friend Calvin s works but was also a satirical author in his own right. He published his most famous satirical work the  Alcoran des Cordeliers  in 1556 and followed this with another attack on the abuses of the Church with his  Satyres Chrestienes de la Cuisine Papale .  The third polemical work which Badius printed was a translation from Bishop John Bales history of the Popes, Acta Pontifcum Romanorum. Its most interesting feature to us is Bale s preface in praise of Geneva as it appeared to him in 1558. In this work, which was produced in 1561, Badius reveals himself as a poet, by his versification of the various rhymes in the original,  Like so many who tried their hand at verse in this period, he was never a great poet, yet he was at least spirited and readable which is more than could be said of most of his contemporaries.  Lewis Lupton  Conrad Badius . \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n A very fine copy of this extremely rare work from William Beckford s library. William Thomas Beckford (1760   1844) extraordinarily wealthy English novelist, art critic, travel writer and politician, now chiefly remembered as the author of the Gothic novel Vathek and builder of the remarkable Fonthill Abbey, the enormous gothic revival country house, largely destroyed. Beckford's fame rests as much upon his eccentric extravagances as a builder and collector as upon his literary efforts. The opportunity to purchase the complete library of Edward Gibbon gave Beckford the basis for his own library, which was extensive, and dispersed over two years in 1883-4.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"BALE, John [BADE, Conrad]","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816134385999,"sku":"K42","price":13500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/K42-Bale-Bade-1-e1466263738521.jpg?v=1781795215"},{"product_id":"florus-lucius-annaeus","title":"FLORUS, Lucius Annaeus","description":"\u003cp\u003eA very beautifully bound copy of this exceptionally rare edition, finely bound in a style that is very close to or imitates bindings made for the Cardinal de Granvelle or Mahieu by the Fugger or Apple binder, though French. The binding, apparently made at the very end of the C16th, seems closer to those of the mid century, though freer in style. The scrolled corner pieces with a distinctive leaf in the outer corner look like a conscious imitation of the Fugger binders distinctive tool. It is exceptionally finely worked for such a small binding, totally unsophisticated, and very well preserved. An inlay has been added to the centre of the binding in red morocco probably to cover a monogram or cypher that the new owner wished to cover. Many armorial bindings had their arms removed during the revolution so as to disguise their noble or ecclesiastic provenance which could have been dangerous or embarrassing to the owner. Unfortunately we have not been able to identify the small princely armorial stamp on the title-page. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n This edition of Florus is exceptionally rare; we have located only one copy in libraries, at San Diego State University. There is apparently no copy held in French or any other European library. Neither is it recorded in either of the Lyon bibliographies, Baudrier or Gultlingen. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n Lucius Annaeus Florus (74 AD   130 AD) was a Roman historian who lived in the time of Trajan and Hadrian. He compiled, chiefly from Livy, a brief sketch of the history of Rome from the foundation of the city to the closing of the temple of Janus by Augustus (25 BC). The work, is a panegyric of the greatness of Rome, the life of which is divided into the periods of infancy, youth and manhood. It is often wrong in geographical and chronological details. In spite of its faults, the book was much used as a handy epitome of Roman history in the Middle Ages, and survived as a textbook into the nineteenth century. In the manuscripts, the writer is variously named as Julius Florus, Lucius Anneus Florus, or simply Annaeus Florus. From certain similarities of style, he has been identified as Publius Annius Florus, poet, rhetorician and friend of Hadrian, author of a dialogue on the question of whether Virgil was an orator or poet, of which the introduction has been preserved. The Epitome of Livy is Florus' most famous work, offering a unique insight into the lost books of the famous History, only around a quarter of which survives. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n A very beautiful and most intriguing binding.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"FLORUS, Lucius Annaeus","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816135565647,"sku":"L2584","price":4950.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L2584-1.jpg?v=1781795209"},{"product_id":"casas-bartolome-de-las","title":"CASAS Bartolom é de las","description":"\u003cp\u003eSecond edition of the first Italian translation of Las Casas   Brevissima relation  a fundamental text in the history of the Spanish conquest, and in establishing the rights of indigenous Indians. Las Casas was the first great historian of the New World and famously argued the humanity of indigenous Americans and African slaves in the Valladolid debate of 1550-1551, against the counter-arguments of Juan Gin és de Sep√∫lveda. While a boy in 1493, he witnessed the return to Seville of Christopher Columbus after his first voyage, and later the same year Las Casas' father Pedro and several of his uncles embarked for the New World as members of Columbus' second expedition. With his father, Las Casas emigrated to the island of Hispaniola in 1502 under Nicol√°s de Ovando, and witnessed the brutalities committed against the Tainos. He played a significant historical role as an eyewitness to one of the most important eras in history as he made an abstract and copy of the diary Christopher Columbus kept of his voyages and incorporated much of Columbus writings, diary and log in his own history. Today, both the Columbus diary as well as the copy have disappeared but Las Casas' abstract survived. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n His work is a primary source for the early period of Spanish Colonialism. In 1550 he took part in official debates on the status of indigenous peoples and used this opportunity to prepare a series of nine essays that subsequently appeared in Seville in 1552 and 1553. He was keenly aware of the power of the printed word, so much so he ignored the need to secure royal permissions before publishing. With their wide ranging indictment of Spanish atrocities, they had an immediate impact in Europe. They were widely translated and frequently reissued, especially in anti-Spanish contexts. Las Casas became Spain s witness against itself. The critique was particularly powerful because Las Casas was not only a master of philosophy and logic, he was an acute observer who reported on the situation of the native populations in an immediate and persuasive style. The work is of immense significance, both for its immediate effect in reforming the Spanish colonial system, and as an extremely early example of European concern with the human rights of indigenous peoples. It was his descriptions of the plight of the native populations that early modern Europeans remembered.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"CASAS Bartolom é de las","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816135729487,"sku":"L2357","price":3950.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L2357.jpg?v=1781795210"},{"product_id":"zurita-jeronimo-et-al","title":"ZURITA, Jeronimo, et al.","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst edition of this compendium of chronicles of the medieval Aragonese kings and the rulers of the kingdom of Sicily, consisting of the Renaissance historian Zurita s Indices rerum ab Aragoniae regibus gestarum, issued in the second part with an account of Robert and Roger Guiscard or Viscardi, Norman Dukes of Sicily, by Gaufredo Malaterra, an eleventh-century monk resident in Sicily; the life of Roger II, King of Sicily by another monastic author, the twelfth-century Alessandro Telesino; and a genealogy of Robert Guiscard taken from the fourteenth-century historian Ptolemy of Lucca. \u003cbr\u003e\n \u003cbr\u003e\n  Zurita, sometimes considered to be the first  modern  Spanish historian, begins his account as early as the seventh century, setting the scene for the development of the historical scene over the next five hundred years: the simultaneous rise of the Visigothic kings in Spain, from whom the Aragonese were descended, and the appearance of the Saracens during the reign of the Byzantine emperor Heraclius, spreading to control all of North Africa and eventually much of Spain. However, much of his account is dedicated to Aragonese exploits outside of Spain, including the Sicilian Vespers, in which Aragon took control of Sicily from the French, and the subsequent bloody wars for control of the island. Zurita s account ends in 1410 with the death of King Martin of the House of Barcelona, who was regent of Sicily. In order to confirm the authenticity of his account, Zurita personally sought out sources in Sicily, Naples and Rome.  \u003cbr\u003e\n \u003cbr\u003e\n  The second part consists of works devoted entirely to Sicilian history, all by early medieval chroniclers, describing the Norman conquest of the island. The first, by the monk Malaterra, is possibly a first-hand account of the adventures of the Viscardi or Guiscard brothers, Norman nobles who first settled in Apulia in southern Italy, operating effectively as bandits, before their conquest of Sicily from the Saracens. Roger was invested by his brother Robert as effectively the first King of Sicily, and the account may well have been finished before his death in 1101, since it is not mentioned in the text. The second work, by the abbot Alessandro Telesino, describes the reign of Roger s son, Roger II, and his attempt to expand Norman rule into Naples, etc., and ends with an alloquium or address praising him. The final work is a genealogy of Robert Guiscard describing his later medieval descendants as kings of Sicily, extracted from the chronology of Ptolemy of Lucca. It is preceded by the printer s apology for the corrupted state of the medieval texts, and followed by a brief account of the origin of the city of Aquila in Apulia.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"ZURITA, Jeronimo, et al.","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816136548687,"sku":"L2624","price":2250.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/IMG_2440-e1504184387128.jpg?v=1781795206"},{"product_id":"polo-marco","title":"POLO, Marco","description":"One of the earliest editions, including a charming illustration of Marco Polo at the court of the Khan, of the well-known account of his travel in Asia (and particularly China), which was considered legendary by his contemporaries. Born in Venice (1254) from a family of merchants, in 1271, together with his father Niccol√≤ and the uncle Matteo, he embarked on an epic journey across Asia, arriving in Peking, where he was in the service of Kublai Khan, the Mongolian Emperor, for several years. Returning to Venice in 1298, Marco was taken as a prisoner by Genoese after the battle of Curzola. It was in prison that he dictated his adventures to Rustichello da Pisa who first put them into writing in French, probably using Marco s diary. After gaining his freedom Polo lived in Venice for the rest of his life (1324-25).\r \r About 150 manuscript editions in different languages spread within a century, such as the ancient version in Venetian, only recently discovered ( Il Milione Veneto. Ms. CM 211 della Biblioteca civica di Padova di Marco Polo , ed. by A. Barbieri \u0026amp; A. Andreose, 1999). However, the anonymous shorter Italian version, first printed in 1496 (Venice, Giovanni Battista Sessa) and reissued many times by Righettini and others, was the most widely read by the Mediterranean sailors. Better known as  Il Milione , nickname of Polo s family, this work showed similarities with the typical merchant s manuals and used simple and concise language, including both first and second hand information on geography, customs and economies of unknown peoples and territories of Asia. The text opens with a short address to the reader and a chapter on the city of Trebizond. The first part is aimed at introducing Marco Polo s family. There follow 145 chapters describing the Turkish lands, small and great Armenia, Mosul and Baghdad, the territories of Balkh and Badakhshan, the fertile Persian Empire and its desert, the Tatar Empire and the borders of India. The work especially focuses on the politics, cities and architecture of the Chinese empire. For instance, many pages are dedicated to the luxurious residences of the Great Khan and the numerous diplomatic missions undertaken by Polo on his behalf, such as the journey to the extensive province of Tibet. Some of the information in this book was incorporated in important maps of the later Middle Age, such as the Catalan World Map (1375). Above all, Marco Polo s was the most influential travelogue on the Silk Road ever written in an European language depicting the enchanted Asia as a rich continent characterised by incredible resources, creatures and prodigies, which opened up the way for the arrival of thousands of Westerners in the centuries to come. It encouraged XV century traders interested in exotic products, such as silk, porcelain, jewellery and spices, to visit Asia and start new business, It also inspired missionary efforts from Europe, primarily by Franciscan, Dominican, or Jesuit missionaries.  This influence prevailed until the seventeenth century when the maps of Martini, the visits of the Jesuits and the work of de l Isle and d'Anville superseded his accounts . . . As a story of adventure, an account of the experiences of one of the greatest travellers who ever lived, the book has remained alive  ( Printing \u0026amp; the mind of man , p. 23).","brand":"POLO, Marco","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816137630031,"sku":"K100","price":29500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/Untitled-42-copy-copy.jpg?v=1781795198"},{"product_id":"markham-gervase","title":"MARKHAM, Gervase","description":"\u003cp\u003eFourth edition  revised, corrected, and amended, together with many new additions,  of this important and innovative agricultural work by Markham, on the preparation and improvement of soils and on arable farming generally.  Soil husbandry began to be seen as the key to productive, profitable farming. Gervase Markham, one of the first agricultural writers to write in English instead of Latin, described soils as various mixtures of clay, sand, and gravel. What made good soil depended on the local climate, the character and condition of the soil, and the local plants (crops).  Simple Clays, Sands, or Gravels together; may be all good, and all fit to bring forth increase, or all   barren.  Understanding the soil was the key to understanding what would grow best, and essential to keeping a farm productive.  Thus having a true knowledge of the Nature and Condition of your ground . it may not only be purged and clensed   but also so much bettered and refined.  Prescribing steps to improve British farms, Markham recommended using the right type of plow for the ground. He advised mixing river sand and crushed burned limestone into the soil, to be followed by the best manure to be had, preferably ox, cow, or horse dung. In describing procedures for improving barren soils, Markham advocated growing wheat or rye for two years in a field, and then letting sheep graze and manure it for a year. After the sheep, several crops of barley were to be followed in the seventh year by peas or beans, and then several more years as pasture. After this cycle the ground would be much improved for growing grain. The key to sustaining soil fertility was to alternate livestock and crops on the same piece of ground. Equally important, although it received less attention, was preventing erosion of the soil itself. Markham advised plowing carefully to avoid collecting water into erosive gullies. Good soil was the key to a good farm, and keeping soil on the farm required special effort even on England s gentle rolling hills.  David R. Montgomery.  Dirt. The Erosion of Civilizations  The work also deals with the preservation of grains and pulses, including a section on the best grain to take to sea (which he concludes is rice). It also contains two chapters at the end on the husbandry of cattle for plowing. \u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n  Many books on agriculture and gardening were published during the century, but from the historical point of view the most important are those of Markham, because they appeared at an early stage in the new development, were widely read, and full of useful information and sound advice. Markham was a too prolific writer, but one can forgive his constant repetition and shameless re-issuing of unsold books under a new title for the great influence his writings had on English agriculture. His most important work was  Markhams farewell to husbandry.  It dealt fully and expertly not only with ploughing, sowing and harvesting, but with methods such as sanding, lining, marling and manuring, by which fertility of land could be increased.  Anne Wilbraham  The Englishman s Food: Five Centuries of English Diet .\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"MARKHAM, Gervase","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816139104591,"sku":"L2675","price":1750.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L2675.jpg?v=1781795189"},{"product_id":"lawson-william","title":"LAWSON, William","description":"Fourth edition, slightly enlarged from the previous, of this beautifully illustrated work on gardening, the only published work of William Lawson, all early editions of which are now rare. Little is known of Lawson s life apart from what he tells us in the preface   that he has 48 years and more experience of furnishing his northern orchard and country garden  with needfull plants and usefull herbs . The work is dedicated to Sir Henry Belosses of a well known Yorkshire family who appears to have been a neighbour of the author and shared his keen horticultural interest and tastes.\r \r Lawson claims no authority for his work other than his own observation and experience;  my meer and sole experience, without respect to any former-written Treatise , but he was obviously sensible, educated and well read.  A man of some learning, he evidently read widely on agriculture and gardening, and his two works are also scattered with references to the classics. When he died he willed  all my latine books \u0026amp; mie English books of contraversie  to his son William, which suggests that he may well have owned a relatively substantial library of books for the period.  Julie Gardham   Glasgow University Library Special collections. Within a small compass he provides sound instruction for  planting, grafting as to make any ground good, for a rich Orchard  particularly in the north.  Occasionally in the text he refers to the difficulties of this environment. He advises his fellow northerners, for instance, to  meddle not with Apricockes nor Peaches, nor scarcely with Quinces, which will not like our cold parts . This book can therefore be credited with being the first to deal with the northern garden.  Julie Gardham. This followed by similar information on  herbes of common use, their virtues, seasons, profits, ornaments, variety of knots, models for trees, and plots for the best ordering of Grounds and walks , together with the  Husbandry of Bees .  The work goes on to deal comprehensively with all aspects of orchard management, covering: the kind of soil required ( blacke, fat, mellow, cleane and well tempered ) and how to improve it; the best kind of site and how to protect it with fencing, or even better,  quickwood, and moates or ditches of water ; how to deal with  annoyances  such as animals, birds, thieves, disease and the weather (not to mention the evils of a  carelesse master ); how to plant, space and prune your trees; the different types of fruit trees and bushes and their qualities; and how to gather, store and preserve the fruits of your labours. As Lawson sums up,  skill and pains, bring fruitful gains .  Julie Gardham. The section entitled  the County Houswife s Garden  is valuable for its attention to the essential role of women in the rural household, as cooks, nurturers of fine flowers and keepers of the herbal medicine cupboard. Also Appended to this edition, is Simon Harwood s short treatise on the art of propagating plants and another, which may be by Lawson or Harwood, on how to increase the yield from a wide selection of fruits. A simple practical work written with much charm by an obvious enthusiast and still eminently readable.","brand":"LAWSON, William","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57816139137359,"sku":"L2578a","price":6500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/Screenshot-2024-08-06-at-11.31.24.webp?v=1781795188"}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/collections\/Screenshot-2024-02-28-at-13.40.35-1021x1024.webp?v=1781370989","url":"https:\/\/sokol-books-ltd.myshopify.com\/collections\/history.oembed","provider":"Sokol Books Ltd","version":"1.0","type":"link"}