here - Bernard Quaritch Ltd

New Acquisitions
August · MMXVI
1. [ANON]. Scarron aparu à Madame de Maintenon, et les reproches qu’il lui fait, sur ses
amours avec Louis le Grand. Cologne, Jean Le Blanc, 1694.
12mo, pp. 136, [2], with an engraved frontispiece; title printed in red and black; short tear to
one leaf just touching a couple of words, title a little toned; a very good copy in modern
morocco, spine lettered in gilt, edges speckled red.
£400
Bernard Quaritch
First and only edition of this engaging satire. Paul Scarron was the first husband of Françoise
d’Aubigné, Marquise de Maintenon, who went on to marry illicitly Louis XIV after Scarron’s
death. The present work visualises Scarron’s appearance from beyond the grave to his widow
to rail against her torrid liaison (later, her morganatic marriage) with the king of France. The
frontispiece shows a seated Françoise finely dressed, rosary in hand, perusing a book, whilst
in the background is Scarron, pale and weeping in robes of ghostly white.
BM STC Fr. 399; Brunet, V, 186.
THE PORT ROYAL LOGIC
2. [ARNAULD, Antoine; Pierre NICOLE.] La logique ou l’art de
penser, contenant, outre les regles communes, plusieurs observations
nouvelles propres à former le iugement. Paris, Jean Guignart, Charles
Savreaux, Jean de Launay, 1662.
12mo, pp. 473, [7, table of contents, errata, privilege]; light toning,
light dampstaining to upper outer corners at beginning, small burn
hole to pp. 429-434 repaired and lost words supplied in manuscript;
otherwise a very good copy in contemporary calf, spine gilt in
compartments, sprinkled edges; joints and extremities a little worn;
inscription ‘Emile Calais 1852’ on rear endpaper.
£3000
Scarce first edition of the work known as the Port Royal Logic. The
authors were leaders of the Port Royal movement, and the book
displays the distinctive tone of earnest piety for which the movement
became famous. La Logique was the most famous logic text of the
seventeenth century and set the form of manuals of logic for the next
two hundred years. In particular, its division of the subject into the
theory of conception, of judgment, of reasoning and of method
established a psychologistic approach which dominated the field until
the time of Frege. A handbook on method rather than a study of
formal logic in the strict sense, La Logique was strongly and
consciously Cartesian: a development from Descartes’ Regulae rather
than Aristotle’s Prior Analytics.
It nevertheless made important
technical advances, most notably its distinction between the
comprehension and extension of a term (a development of the
medieval distinction between significatio and suppositio and a forerunner
of Hamilton’s distinction between intension and extension); its quasimathematical treatment of the rules of distribution, conversion and
syllogistic; and its formulation of the deduction theorem.
BM STC French 1601-1700 p. 333; Risse I p.153.
THOMISM, SIBYLS, AND VIRGIL REPACKAGED
3. BARBIERI, Filippo; Faltonia PROBA. Quattuor
hic compressa opuscula.
Discordantie sanctorum
doctorum Hieronymi Augustini. Sibyllarum de Christo
vaticinia cum appropriatis singularum figuris. Varia
Judeorum [et] gentilium de Christo testimonia. Centones
Probe Falconie de utriusq[ue] testamenti hystoriis ex
carminibus Virgilii selecti. Venice, Bernardinus Benalius, [c.
1520].
Two parts, small 4to, ff. [28]; gothic and roman letter,
large and small historiated woodcut initials, some white
on black, with a series of 12 full-page woodcuts of the
Sibyls with borders, contemporary correction slip pasted
to B3r correcting ‘Sibilla delphica’ to ‘Sibilla libica’, the
Centones with its own title-page and signatures; neat paper
repair to two small holes in lower outer blank corner of
first leaf, discreet repairs to lower inner corners of leaves
C2-4 and D4, neat repair to tear from fore-edge to centre
of D2 (touching woodcut), small repair to fore-edge of
E2, neat repairs to small cut running through lower
margins of quires a-c (touching but not obscuring some
letters), small tear to upper margin of D4, a few small
marks to E1r, very small worm hole in upper margins of
a2-4; otherwise an excellent copy in modern red
morocco, gilt-lettered spine, gilt dentelles, gilt edges;
early ownership inscriptions of Giulio di Marco and
Nicolai Perrone to first leaf.
£7500
The handsome first Venetian edition of this intriguing
miscellany, probably intended for scholastic use and first
printed in Rome in the early 1480s, with charming
woodcut initials and illustrations. Previously considered
an incunable, ISTC now dates this edition to around
1520.
The collection opens with one of the most
important works of the eminent Dominican
theologian, philosopher and historian Filippo
Barbieri (c. 1426-87). A native of Syracuse, Barbieri
became inquisitor general in Sicily, Sardinia and
Malta and travelled widely in Italy, Spain and further
afield, winning the admiration of Matthias Corvinus
among many others. The Discordantiae is, like his
other theological works, a strong defence of the
Thomist school and of the knowledge and truth to
be found in Aquinas’s thought.
The Sibyllarum that follows deals with prophecies of
the coming of Christ and is illustrated with a striking
set of twelve full-page woodcuts of the Persian,
Libyan, Delphic, Cimmerian, Samian, Cumaean,
Hellespontine, Phrygian, European, Tiburtine,
Agrippan, and Erythraean Sibyls, surrounded by
four-piece borders.
The compendium ends with the most famous work
of Faltonia Proba, the fourth-century Roman
poetess.
Composed after her conversion to
Christianity, the Cento Vergilianus de laudibus Christi is
a cento of verses from Virgil pieced together to
relate stories from the Old and New Testaments,
particularly the life of Christ: a testament to Virgil’s
influence within the Christian tradition.
BMC (It) p. 348; Essling 2316; Goff B121; ISTC
ib00121000; Sander 775. Rare: ISTC records only
one copy in the UK, at the British Library, and four
in the US.
SHAKESPEARE, TWAIN AND DICKENS FOR RUSSIAN CHILDREN
4. CALVERT, Lilian, editor. English Books for Russian Readers with a Guide to
Pronunciation and Vocabulary // Angliiskiia knizhki dlia russkikh chitatelei … Seriia I,
No. l-4; Seriia II, No. 1-2; Seriia III, No., 1-2 and 4 … [Printed: Vyborg, Tip. Estra
Finliand.] Petrograd, N. P. Karbasnikov, 1916-17.
Nine parts, 8vo, each with text in English followed by an English-Russian vocabulary;
some wear and toning but generally in very good condition, stapled as issued in the
original printed wrappers of yellow, green, grey or orange stiff paper.
£1250
An attractive group of very rare simple English readers for Russian students,
assembled by a teacher at the Peskovskaya Gymnasium in St Petersburg, renamed
Petrograd in 1914. Each volume contains a vocabulary list at the end. The books in
series I and II also include a general pronunciation guide to English at the font of each
work. Three series were produced, of increasing difficulty, running to 15 titles in total
– we offer here four fairy-tales and five pieces of short fiction. They were printed in
Vyborg in Finland, then part of Russia but which became independent after the 1917
Russian Revolution, presumably curtailing further publications by Calvert; Vyborg did
not return to Russian control until after WWII.
I.1 Beauty and the Beast, pp. 20. 3rd edition, revised.
I.2 Jack the Giant-Killer, pp. 24. 2nd edition, revised.
I.3 Cinderella, pp. 24. 2nd edition, revised.
I.4 Sleeping Beauty, pp. 24. 2nd edition, revised.
II.1 Andrew Lang, The History of Whittington, pp. 32. 2nd edition, revised.
II.2 Florence Montgomery, The Little Brother-in-Charge, pp. 36. 2nd edition,
revised.
III.1 Mark Twain, A Dog’s Tale, pp. 42.
III.2 Shakespeare/Lamb, The Tempest, pp. 40. 2nd edition, revised.
III.4 Charles Dickens, The Story of Richard Doubledick, pp. 50.
Not in COPAC. OCLC lists all except Jack the Giant-Killer, but with no locations. We
have previously handled a single copy of The Tempest, now at the Folger, and there is a
copy of Twain’s A Dog’s Tale at the Russian State Library.
FIRST TRANSLATION OF EPICURUS INTO ENGLISH
5. EPICURUS. CHARLETON, Walter, translator. Epicurus’s Morals, collected partly out of his
own Greek Text, in Diogenes Laertius, and partly out of the Rhapsodies of Marcus Antoninus,
Plutarch, Cicero, & Seneca. And faithfully Englished. London, Printed for H. Herringman … 1670.
8vo, pp. [38], 201, [1], wanting the frontispiece; title-page slightly soiled and with a small hole (no loss),
else a good copy in eighteenth-century red morocco, gilt; from the library of Bent Juel-Jensen;
bookplate of Robert S. Pirie.
£300
Second edition (first 1656) of the first English
translation of Epicurus, an author condemned in
this period for his pernicious pagan morality. The
translator, and author of the long prefatory
‘Apologie’, was the royal physician Walter
Charleton, whose friends included Thomas
Hobbes.
There are some opinions that Charleton is not
prepared to defend: ‘That the Souls of Men are
mortall ... That Selfe-homicide is an Act of Heroick
Fortitude in case of intollerable ... Calamity. These,
I confesse, are Positions to be wholly condemned and
abominated’. But ‘we may hence collect what [the
pagans’] true meaning was, when they said ... the Soul is a
particle of Divine breath ... Secondly, we may hence learn
the sense of Empedocles ... that this present life is a
banishment of the soul ... Thirdly, we may hence know how
to understand the true sense of Plato’s opinion, that all
learning is only Reminiscence’.
In the Restoration Charleton became the president
of the Royal College of Physicians and Fellow of
the Royal Society.
He is probably best
remembered for his attractive book on Stonehenge
(Chorea gigantum, 1663).
Wing E 3156.
6. [EVERS, Samuel.] A Journal, kept on a Journey from Bassora to Bagdad; over the little
Desert, to Aleppe, Cyprus, Rhodes, Zante, Corfu; and Otranto, in Italy, in the Year 1779. By a
Gentleman, late an Officer in Service of the Honourable East India Company: containing an
Account of the Progress of Caravans over the Desert of Arabia; Mode and Expences of
Quarantine; Description of the Soil, Manners and Customs of the various Countries on this
extensive Route, &c. &c. Horsham [in Sussex]: Printed by Arthur Lee; and sold by J. F. and C.
Rivington … 1784.
8vo, pp. [viii], xi, [i], 155, [1], with a subscribers’ list; some small offset inkstains to title-page,
else a very good copy in nineteenth-century half calf and marbled boards; small booklabel with
the crest of the Hall family, ownership inscription ‘G. Hall’.
£12,000
First and only edition, very scarce. Evers’s Journal, published anonymously for a list of 134
mostly local subscribers, is an account of his return journey from India via the overland route
in 1779, in the company of three other English travellers and a Frenchman. The party
travelled first up the Tigris, then cross-country on mules and asses to Baghdad, and thence by
caravan to Aleppo and the Mediterranean. Writing from a diary kept at the time, Evers
provides ‘observations of customs, town life, encounters with local governors and Sheikhs,
constant wranglings over money and the progress of the current armed conflict between the
Turks, with their Arab army, and the Persians in the region of Basra’ (Ghani).
The first book printed in Horsham, in Sussex, A Journal is still sometimes erroneously
attributed to Charles Eversfield, who is in fact named among the 134 local subscribers.
Authorship can now be definitely attributed to Samuel Evers, who, upon his return to England
in 1780 fell into severe debt and was forced to take up a position as solicitor’s clerk to Thomas
Charles Medwin in Horsham. After his suicide in 1787 (the result, apparently, of thwarted
love), a local obituary notice named him as the author of the Journal (see a series of articles by
Brian Slyfield in The Horsham Society Newsletter).
ESTC shows copies at the BL (four), NLS, Royal Irish Academy, V&A; Harvard, Huntington,
Library Company of Philadelphia (imperfect), and Sasketchewan. Despite its scarcity, two
copies have appeared recently at auction, the Brooke-Hitching copy in September 2014, and
the Mohamed and Margaret Makiya copy in April 2016, both £12,500.
Ghani p. 125; Wilson p. 112. Not in Atabey or Blackmer.
[item 6]
REVOLUTIONARY CLERIC
7. FAUCHET, Claude. De la religion nationale. Paris, chez Bailly, Desenne, Lottin,
Cussac, le portier de la communauté de S.-Roch, 1789.
8vo, pp. [iv], 300; engraved vignette on title and head-piece on p. 1, tail-pieces; a few
very small marks, light creasing to lower outer corners of pp. 207-224, otherwise an
excellent, crisp and clean copy in contemporary tree calf, gilt spine with red letteringpieces (gilt initial P at foot of spine), striking blue endpapers; some loss of leather at
outer edge of lower board, a few small worm holes to joints, edges and corners a little
worn, but a very attractive volume.
£550
First edition of one of the most important works of the Revolutionary clergyman
Abbé Fauchet (1744-93), published on the eve of the French Revolution, demanding
greater ecclesiastical discipline and reform in the relationship between Church and
State. Fauchet served as Louis XVI’s preacher, only to be dismissed for the
philosophic and critical tone of his sermons. He later became one of the leaders of the
attack on the Bastille and one of the most popular libertarian speakers in
Revolutionary Paris. His opposition to the Terror eventually led him to the guillotine,
accused of having encouraged Charlotte Corday to assassinate Marat.
In his De la religion nationale Fauchet recommended the selection of bishops by lay
electors, denounced the holding of multiple benefices, called for reforms in seminary
teaching, argued for a celibate priesthood and for the abolition of birthright and
nobility, and defended absolute liberty of the press and book trade.
COPAC records only four copies (British Library, Oxford, Cambridge, and Leeds).
8. [FOKKE, Jan.] Histoire van den Amsterdamschen schouwburg.
Amsterdam, G. Warnars and P. den Hengst, 1772.
4to, pp. [viii], 80, [12], with engraved frontispiece and 4 double-page plates,
title-page with large vignette and engraved memorial leaf with large vignette,
plates after Simon Fokke and Meer the younger; a very good copy with wide
margins, the double-page plates occasionally with a little light soiling in the
margins; contemporary half calf and speckled boards, richly gilt spine with
red label.
£300
First edition of the history of the Amsterdam theatre together with an eyewitness account of its destruction by fire. The Amsterdam Schouwburg,
inaugurated in 1638, was the first permanent theatre in Amsterdam. Initially
the theatre saw 90 productions per year, during the 18th century it became
more and more a place for opera. In May 1772, during a performance of
Monsigny’s Déserteur, a fire swept through the building, destroying it
completely and killing eighteen people. Fokke’s dramatic illustrations capture
the outbreak of fire on the stage behind the scenes, the burning of the whole
building illuminating the night sky with curious onlookers thronging the
streets and bridges, and an internal view of the gutted theatre.
Simon Fokke (1712-84), brother of the author Jan Fokke, was an actor as well
as a stage designer. He had designed the set for the opera Demostenes at the
Shouwburg.
‘SCALA GRIMALDELLI’: HARRISON D. HORBLIT’S COPY
9. [GEOMETRY.] FELICIANO, Francesco. Libro di
arithmetica et geometria speculativa et praticale. Venice, Francesco
Bindoni and Maffeo Pasini, 1536.
4to, ff. [80]; woodcut frame with foliage and grotesques and a
woodcut image of the ‘Scala grimaldelli’ (ladder and key) to the
title-page, many typographical and woodcut diagrams in the outer
margins; a few minor repairs and the odd mark, but a very good
copy in later stiff vellum; several contemporary manuscript
annotations in the margins; from the library of Harrison David
Horblit, his exlibris on the front pastedown.
£2200
Second edition (first 1527), Horblit’s copy. This wonderfully
printed handbook contains much commercial arithmetic, a feature
which guaranteed its success as a practical tool for merchants,
surveyors, engineers and many other occupations for over two
centuries; but it also afforded the most approachable exposition of
roots, the rule of false position, some algebra, and practical
geometry. Teachers of mathematics drew a great deal from
Feliciano’s ‘Scala’. ‘Feliciano’s second work was highly esteemed as
a textbook for schools . . . . More complete than the Treviso book,
more modern than Borghi, more condensed than Paciuolo, few
books had greater influence on the subsequent teaching of
elementary mathematics’ (Smith p.148).
The suggestive ‘subtitle’ of Scala grimaldelli which inspires the little
emblematic vignette is thus explained by the author: ‘on account of
its soaring upwards and of its clarifying obscure things my little
book is called scala grimaldelli, because the ladder (scala) takes us
high up, and the key (grimaldello) opens up locked-away secrets’.
16 CNCE 18698; Smith, Rara arithmetica p.148; cf. Riccardi ii, 21.
Scarce outside Italy.
A NEW GEOMETRY TEXTBOOK FOR A NEW
EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM
10. [GEOMETRY.] [SOAVE, Francesco.] Elementi di
geometria teorico-pratica ad uso delle scuole normali della
Lombardia austriaca. Milan, Giuseppe Galeazzi, Giovanni
Battista Bianchi and Cesare Orena, 1790.
8vo, pp. [viii], 100; [17] engraved plates bound at rear; a
beautiful, clean copy bound in contemporary mottled half
calf over marbled boards, flat spine decorated in gilt, red
lettering piece.
£450
An extremely rare survival of a Euclidean geometry textbook
used in the ‘scuole normali’, primary schools for all 6-12 year
olds in every main town of Lombardy under Austrian rule; it
includes three main chapters, on lines, planes and solids, with
the theories accompanied by the relevant theorems, practical
applications and engraved diagrams.
The textbook is the result of the educational reforms carried
out by Maria Theresa in 1774, which introduced compulsory
schooling for children in all the Habsburg dominions, funded
by the State and offered to everyone, regardless of social
origin or wealth.
Somascan Father Francesco Soave (1743–1806) was given
responsibility for modernising the educational system in
Lombardy according to Maria Theresa’s reforms. This
included providing suitable new textbooks, of which this is an
example in remarkably fine condition.
OCLC records only one copy outside Italy, in the Sistema
Bibliotecario Ticinese (Switzerland); no copies on COPAC.
CORPUS CHRISTI AT AIX-EN-PROVENCE
11. [GRÉGOIRE, Gaspard.] Explication des cérémonies de la Fête-Dieu
d’Aix en Provence, ornée de figures du Lieutenant de Prince d’Amour; du Roi et
Bâtonniers de la Bazoche; de l’Abbé de la Ville; et des Jeux des Diables, des
Razcassetos, des Apôtres, de la Reine de Saba, des Tirassons, des Chevaux-frux,
etc. etc. etc. Et des airs notés, consacrés à cette fête. Aix-en-Provence, Esprit
David, 1777.
8vo, pp. [ii], 220, with a portrait frontispiece and 13 folding plates (including one
of music); a very good, large, unwashed copy in 19th-century maroon morocco,
gilt inner dentelles, gilt edges, by H. Duru; rubbed, rebacked preserving original
spine.
£300
First edition of this detailed account of the popular religious celebrations held at
Aix-en-Provence to mark the feast of Corpus Christi. The festivities,
remarkable for their mixture of the sacred and profane, were established (or at
least largely given their form) by René of Anjou around 1462. Each year they
were preceded, on Pentecost Monday and on Trinity Sunday, by the election of
various figures who were to play a crucial role in the organisation of the
revelries: a ‘Lieutenant de Prince’ from amongst the townspeople or law
students, a ‘Lieutenant de l’Abbé de la Ville’ from amongst the artisans, and a
‘Roi de Bazoche’. On Corpus Christi itself a series of set pieces or ‘jeux’ were
staged: ‘les Jeux des Diables’, in which Herod is tormented by demons with long
sticks; ‘les Jeux des Razcassetos’, representing four lepers, one of whom wears
an old wig which is brushed and combed by the other three; ‘les Jeux des
Tirassons’, dramatising the Massacre of the Innocents; ‘les Jeux des ChevauxFrux’, a sort of tourney with underskirt-horses, and so on.
Gaspard Grégoire (1715–1795) was a prominent silk merchant of Aix whose
son Gaspard junior perfected the art of creating a picture woven in velvet. The
Grégoires no doubt played a leading role in the Corpus Christi festivities and
probably supplied cloth for the costumes. The distinctive plates in this volume
were engraved by Gaspard fils after drawings by his brother Paul.
Barbier II 378; Cohen-De Ricci 367; Lipperheide Sl 20; Ruggieri 614; WatanabeO’Kelly 2224.
A CLAIRVAUX COURSE OF LAW
12. HUGUES DE CLAIRVAUX.
[Clairvaux, 1779].
‘Tractatus de justitiae precepto’.
Manuscript on paper, small quarto, pp. [ii], 444 (a few errors in numbering),
[10, blank]; neatly written in brown ink in a single cursive hand throughout,
up to 29 lines per page; small loss to lower outer corner of first leaf and a
few marks from old adhesive (not touching text), some words trimmed at
fore-edge margins (sense recoverable), small holes to pp. 93-96, 316-317,
and 444 touching a few letters, a few ink marks; very well preserved in 18thcentury mottled calf, spine gilt in compartments with lettering-piece,
marbled endpapers, red edges; some small abrasions to covers, a little wear
to extremities.
£650
An attractive, apparently unpublished, legal manuscript, composed,
according to a note on the first page, by ‘Hugues p[re]tre De Clairvaux’, its
completion dated in the colophon to 30 July 1779, arranged as a series of
questions, propositions, objections, and solutions. After initial discussion
around the nature and kinds of law and justice, the text turns to the subject
of theft (‘furtum’), including consideration of the gravity of robbery as a
crime and the question of compensation. The author then examines issues
of defamation and slander, and causing harm or death to oneself or others,
before a detailed consideration of questions of restitution and recompense,
including in instances of violation and adultery. By way of authorities, the
writer refers to the Bible, to the Church Fathers (including Augustine and
Cyprian), to Justinian, and to canon law. Hugues would appear to have
been a member of the great Cistercian Abbey of Clairvaux, founded in 1115
by St Bernard, and one wonders what became of him and his legal learning
post-French Revolution, after the Abbey’s closure in 1790.
13. [HYMNS.] Expositio himnorum cu[m] notabili co[m]me[n]to q[uo]d semp[er] implicat
hystorias cu[m] optimis allegatio[n]ib[us] sacre scripture illo[rum] sancto[rum] vel sancta[rum]
de q[ui]b[us] tales hymni deca[n]tant[ur]: ex q[ui]b[us] p[ossu]nt facile de eisdem sanctis colligi
sermo[n]es p[er]optimi: subiu[n]ctis quoru[n]da[m] vocabulor[um] expositio[n]ib[us].
[Colophon:] Basel, Michael Furter, 1504.
8vo, ff. 70, [1] (without the final blank leaf), gothic letter, with a large woodcut of the Christ
Child surrounded by the four symbols of the Evangelists bearing scrolls on title, full-page
woodcut of the Crucifixion on verso of title; some minor foxing and dampstaining, a few
wormholes, short repaired tear in final leaf affecting a few letters, names of Evangelists added
in manuscript to empty scrolls of title woodcut; stab-sewn, disbound.
£650
Scarce edition of this popular hymn commentary (also known as the Aurea expositio) ascribed
to one ‘Hilarius’ and probably dating from the twelfth century.
The Expositio hymnorum was ‘the standard hymnal for German-speaking countries in the later
years of the fifteenth century and the first decade of the sixteenth . . . . Subsequent editors
influenced by recognisably humanist concerns still use “Hilarius” as the basis of their editions.
There was obviously a good sale for hymn-books and for our allegorising commentary, but
whether primarily among clerics or among lay-people for devotional use, it is impossible to
say. One clue about their public is provided by the title-page of some of the German editions
of the Expositio hymnorum which advertise its usefulness to preachers wishing to use the
appropriate hymns as a source for sermons for saints’ days, and indeed parts of the
commentary are couched in a style of address already suitable for a homily’ (Ann Moss, ‘Latin
liturgical hymns and their early printing history, 1470–1520’, in Humanistica Lovaniensia, vol. 36,
1987, pp. 112–137 at pp. 117–118).
The present edition is sometimes encountered bound after Textus sequentiarum cum expositione
lucida ac facili and was probably issued with it, as it was in Heinrich Quentell’s 1494 edition.
Adams L1123; VD16 H 6510 and T 653 (as second part of Textus sequentiarum, although both
are independent works). COPAC records copies at the British Library and Cambridge only.
OCLC records three copies in the US (Boston College, Brigham Young and Illinois).
THE FIRST PUBLICATION OF A SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY ACCOUNT OF
TRAVELS THROUGHOUT ASIA
14. LACOMBE, Jean de, sieur de Quercy. A Compendium of the East, being an Account
of Voyages to the Grand Indies . . . Now Published for the First Time [from the Bordeaux
Manuscript of 1681] in an English Translation by Stephanie & Denis Clark. Edited, with an
Introduction and Notes, by Ashley Gibson. London, The Golden Cockerel Press, 1937.
Folio in 8s (315 x 192mm), pp. 209, [1 (colophon)]; one double-page collotype facsimile of the
original manuscript and 5 double-page plates, one wood-engraved illustration in the text;
original black-cloth backed, batik-cloth boards, spine lettered in gilt and with press device in
gilt at the foot of the spine, top edges trimmed, others uncut, map endpapers after a
contemporary atlas; corners very lightly rubbed and bumped, otherwise a very good copy.
£600
First edition, no. 167 of 300 copies. A Compendium of the East is based upon the manuscript
titled Compendiare du Levant, which was written in 1681 and relates de Lacombe’s travels
between 1668 and 1676, which took him through the Dutch East Indies and the Middle and
Far East to Java, Sumatra, Malaysia, Thailand, China, Japan, India and Sri Lanka, and Persia
and Arabia. The manuscript subsequently passed (probably in the early nineteenth century)
into the collection of baron Charles Athanase Walckenaer (1771-1852), the distinguished
French bibliophile and scholar, and in 1937 it was acquired in Paris by an acquaintance of
Ashley Gibson, who in turn acquired it a few days later.
Following the completion of a translation into English by Stephanie and Denis Clark, and
further research into the manuscript, the text, and the author, the narrative was published for
the first time in this edition, under the title A Compendium of the East. Described by Pertolote as
‘entrancing in the contrast of de Lacombe’s arrogant gasconnades with the naïve
manifestation of his primitive explorer’s superstitious terror of the unknown’, the work is of
interest for the range of countries and cultures described by the author, and the text is
prefaced by a lengthy introduction by Gibson, and supplemented by a glossary of placenames, an extensive, annotated bibliography, and a comprehensive index. The work is
illustrated with map endpapers, a facsimile of two pages of the original manuscript, and five
double-page plates reproducing contemporary views of the cities described, which were taken
from Wouter Schouten's Ost-Indische Reyse (Amsterdam, 1676).
Pertelote 130.
CLASSICAL PHILOLOGIST AT WORK
15.
[LENORMANT, Charles.
PLATO.]
Commentaire sur le Cratyle de Platon. [France, 1854].
Manuscript on paper, 4to, pp. 451 + 50 (composed of a
few quires stitched together and tipped in), written in
Greek and French in brown ink, the first portion
arranged in two columns with Plato’s text on one side
and glossae in Greek on the other; numerous instances of
corrections and interlinear or marginal additions; in
excellent condition, bound in French dark green
morocco, sides panelled in blind, panelled spine lettered
in gilt; one or two surface scratches.
£1550
The preparatory manuscript of the French classicist and
archaeologist
Charles
Lenormant’s
important
commentary on Plato’s Cratylus, an innovative
monograph which sought to unveil the Platonic dialogue
as the fullest expression of Socrates’ and Plato’s criticism
of the Greek system of religious beliefs.
Lenormant’s commentary was read by the author at the
Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres during 1854;
several years later, in 1861, it was posthumously
published in Athens (copies of the publication are very
rare institutionally, according to OCLC only currently
held by two Italian libraries and the British Library), the
author having died there whilst on an archaeological
expedition in 1859. The published version, however,
does not include the voluminous amount of glossae and
notes that surround the Greek text in our manuscript, or
the scholarly references which accompany the
commentary.
‘SCALA DI PARADISO’, BY LUCREZIA BORGIA’S CONFESSOR
16. MELI, Antonio. Libro de vita contemplativa, lectione, meditatione, oratione, contemplatione, scala dil paradiso intitulato,
cum adaptatione mistica dellhistorie divine, [et] expositione de suoi misterii, [et] excellentissimi sacramenti, compilato per il
reverendo patre frate Antonio da Crema, eremitano di S. Augustino. Brescia, Giovanni Antonio Bresciano, 28 June 1527.
4to, ff. [xxii], 434, [12]; woodcut engraving of stairway and border to title-page, full-page engraving of St Augustine to title verso,
many other engravings (repeating), initials and borders throughout the text; small tear to inner upper margin of title leaf touching
the border, small piece cut from lower blank margin (with old paper repair), two tiny wormholes to upper margins of first four
leaves, a little dampstaining to inner margins at the beginning and to the outer margin of 103, small wormhole from f. 237 to the
end (touching some letters), a few small marks and paper flaws, else a very good copy in modern calf, parts of old spine laid
down; 19th-century monogram bookplate (VLG) to front pastedown and matching small blue stamps to recto and verso of first
leaf, with another circular black stamp to the lower margin of the verso.
£4500
Rare first edition, richly illustrated with over a hundred woodcuts, of Meli’s most famous work, a spiritual guide describing the
ascent of the ‘scala di paradiso’ from earth to heaven through four fundamental steps illustrated in the title woodcut. A native of
Crema, Meli (c. 1462-1528) was an Augustinian theologian who rose to become vicar general of his congregation and confessor
to Lucrezia Borgia, Duchess of Ferrara. The Libro was composed expressly for use by Lucrezia and her maids-in-waiting, and
she directed that it be written in Italian to reach a wider audience. It appears to have circulated in manuscript during her
lifetime, only being published eight years after her death.
The first part of the Libro deals with the happiness and dignity of the first man, his subsequent fall, and how God made a ladder
to enable him to reach heaven. In the second part, Meli discusses the four steps of this ladder, comprising reading, meditation,
prayer, and contemplation, and the third and final part explains the obstacles encountered in ascending the ladder. Meli makes
the rewards of success clear: those who reach the final step rise above themselves to embrace the divine and discover knowledge
and truth. Meli’s Libro was inspired by the ‘Scala claustralium’ (ladder for monks) of Guigues Le Chartreux, and, in addition to
the Bible, the author frequently cites the works of St Augustine as the source of his doctrine. He was evidently also familiar with
the works of St Bernard, Hugh of St Victor, and Jean Gerson.
Some of the charming woodcuts are derived from those found in the Malermi Bible of 1490 and in the Deche di Tito Livio of
1493.
BL STC Italian, p. 432; Brunet III, 1587; EDIT 16 46866; Sander 4489; USTC 841964. COPAC records a single copy, at the
British Library. OCLC locates copies at the University of Toronto and UCLA only.
‘MILL’S MASTERPIECE’, WITH NOTABLE AMERICAN
PROVENANCE
17. MILL, James. Elements of political economy . . . Third edition, revised
and corrected. London, Baldwin, Cradock, and Joy, 1826.
8vo, pp. viii, 304; closed tear in blank upper margins of pp. 277-278; a very
good, uncut copy; original blue boards, new tan paper spine with printed label;
edges of boards chipped in places; some marginal pencil markings, inscriptions
of ‘M. Carey’ on front free endpaper and ‘M. Carey Lea Sep 1844’ at head of
title (see below).
£850
Third and final edition of what Palgrave terms ‘Mill’s masterpiece’, first
published in 1821, once in the possession of the American publisher and
economist Mathew Carey (1760-1839) and of his grandson Mathew Carey Lea
(1823-1897), the noted chemist.
Mill’s motivation for writing the Elements was ‘to compose a schoolbook of
Political Economy; to detach the essential principles of the science from all
extraneous topics, to state the propositions clearly and in their logical order,
and to subjoin its demonstration to each’. According to John Stuart Mill, the
work sums up the instructions given to him by his father in the course of their
daily walks. The Elements is particularly valuable as a summary of contemporary
received theories. It was translated into French in 1823 and a second, revised
edition came out in 1824. ‘Several of the alterations in the third edition were
founded on criticisms made by J. S. Mill and his friends’ (Palgrave).
Provenance: Mathew Carey was born in Dublin, worked for Benjamin Franklin
and Lafayette in Paris, and moved to Philadelphia in 1784. He became ‘the
leading book publisher in America in the formative years of that industry’ and
‘must be reckoned as one of the founders of the nationalist school of American
economic thought’ (American National Biography). His grandson Mathew Carey
Lea was a noted chemist: ‘During the last quarter of the nineteenth century
[his] studies were universally regarded as the most important contributions to
the relatively new physicochemical field’ (ibid.).
Einaudi 3894; Goldsmiths’ 24799; Kress C.1729.
18.
PEREZ DE HITA, Ginés (Isaac Jansz. BIJL,
translator). Historie van Granada, van de borgherlijcke
oorlogen, ende andere, die in het Granadijnsche coninckrijcke
geschiet sijn, van de Mooren tegens de Christenen, tot dat de
stadt ghewonnen wert van den koninck Don Fernando de
vijfde. Met een discours van de incomste der Mooren in
Spaengien (ende hare geschiedenissen) met haren uytgang.
Amsterdam, Jan Evertsz. Cloppenburch, 1615.
8vo, pp. 504, woodcut grotesque on title; some light browning,
but a very good copy in contemporary vellum with remains of
ties; slightly soiled, short split in spine; from the library at
Coker Court, with bookplate.
£1800
First edition in Dutch of the first part of Perez de Hita’s major
historical novel Historia de los bandos de los Zegríes y Abencerrajes,
better known as the Guerras civiles de Granada (first part
published Saragossa, 1595; a second part published in 1619).
The first part of Pérez de Hita’s novel is ‘a remarkable work of
fiction on a basis of history but interspersed with frontier and
Moorish ballads already circulating out of context and ending
with the fall of Granada in 1492. It inspired dozens of
imitations, including Washington Irving’s Chronicle of the conquest
of Granada (1829), and many by French writers’ (Ward p. 457).
It is followed here by a history, in Dutch verse, of the invasion
of Spain by the Moors (pp. 449–504).
Not in Palau or Simoni. Not in the British Library. OCLC
records just four copies (Göttingen, Herzog August Bibliothek,
Leiden and Utrecht).
19. SILVESTRE DE SACY, Antoine Isaac. Al Tuhfa Al-Sinniya fi
‘ilm al-arabiyya. Grammaire arabe de l’usage des élèves de l’école
spéciale des langues orientales vivantes; avec figures. Paris, Imprimerie
Impériale, 1810.
2 vols., large 8vo (228 x 154 mm.) pp. [1], xxvi, 434, [2]
(advertisements); x, 473, [1], with 8 folding plates illustrating varieties
of Arabic script, some with added colour by hand, and 10 folding
letterpress tables; a little light foxing but a very handsome and large
copy bound in contemporary pale polished calf by Bozerian jeune
signed at foot of spine, covers with gilt borders, flat spine richly gilt in
a seme of stars, two black gilt lettered labels, gilt edges; upper joint of
vol. I cracked and upper cover becoming loose; printed label of the
bookseller and publisher Benjamin Duprat pasted on inside front cover
of vol. I.
£500
First edition, a milestone in Arabic scholarship.
Sacy (1785-1838) was the ‘founder of modern Orientalism’ (Robert
Irwin) and the first president of the French Société Asiatique. In 1795
Paris saw the establishment of the first school devoted to the teaching
of oriental languages, founded for both political and commercial
reasons. From its outset, Sacy was designated chair of Arabic, and was
required to devise a comprehensive descriptitve grammer in French to
facilitate his work there and Grammaire arabe was the fruit of fifteen
years of research. His sources include early European writers such as
Sionita, Martellotto and Metoscita as well as the Arabic Ajurumia which
appeared with the Latin translations of Obizini and Erpenius.
Throughout his career Sacy remained a prolific writer and is perhaps
best known for his literary anthology Chrestomathie arabe.
Schnurrer 154.
20. [SOUTH SEA COMPANY.] Five documents relating to the South Sea Company –
transferrals of stock and/or instructions for the payment of dividends. April 1720 – July 1737.
Comprising:
SEYMOUR, Algernon, Earl of Hertford. Secretarial warrant to John Grigsby, accountant
general, empowering John Mulcaster to accept in Seymour’s stead £400 of South Sea stock
transferred to him by James Round, attorney to John Kirrell. Signed at the foot ‘Hartford’, 7 April
1720. Creased where folded.
KING, John, third Baron Kingston?. Secretarial warrant to Charles Lockyer, accountant,
instructing him to ‘pay my Dividend’ on £95 12 19d of stock due ‘at Xmas last’ to Henry Hoare.
Signed at the foot ‘J. Kingston’. Note on verso ‘Pay by Humphreys / Henry Hoare’. 14 Nov 1721.
Laid down.
KING, John, third Baron Kingston?.
Secretarial warrant to Charles Lockyer, accountant,
instructing him to ‘pay . . . my Dividend’ on £3420 1s 9d of stock due ‘at Midsomer last’ to Henry
Hoare. Signed at the foot ‘Kingston’. 20 July 1722. Laid down.
SEYMOUR, Charles, Duke of Somerset. Secretarial warrant to Charles Lockyer, accountant,
instructing him to ‘Pay to [the MP?] Thomas Elder Six P. Cent Principal Money’ on his stock of
£2710 9s 2d, ‘being all the Stock standing in my name, in the Books of the South Sea Company, on
the 24th day of June last’. Signed at the foot ‘Somerset’. 10 March 1730/1.
HERVEY, John, Lord Hervey. Secretarial warrant to John Gyles, Clerk of the transfers,
instructing him to pay all the dividends due now and henceforth ‘upon all the South Sea Stock that I
now have or shall have’ to Christopher Arnold [his banker]. Signed at the foot ‘Hervey’. 19 July
1737? Laid down.
Together £500
The South Sea Company had been launched in 1711 ‘partly as a Tory rival to the Whiggish bank and
East India Company, but mainly with the aim of transforming the unfunded [government] debt into
its stock’ (Oxford DNB). In 1720, after a further round of debt-conversion, the company began to
talk-up its stock with rumours of extravagant returns. The stock price rose from £128 in January to
£1000 by early August, which triggered rapid selling and therefore rapid losses, the price falling again
to £150 by the end of September. Many investors, including Isaac Newton, lost heavily, but some,
such as Lord Hervey above, made a fortune by the timely sale of stock. Evidently he retained some
stock, or repurchased after the crash.
FIRST EDITION OF AN ILLUSTRATED JOURNAL
KEPT BY THE LAST SURVIVING MEMBER OF THE
CHALLENGER EXPEDITION
21. [SQUIRREL BINDER, attributed to, for CHARLES I.]
BARTLETT, J., photographer. Carte de visite photograph of a
fine binding. Chipping Norton, late nineteenth century.
Albumen print, 3⅛ x 2¼ inches (7.8 x 5.6 cm) on a carte de visite,
4⅛x 2½ inches (10.6 x 6.3 cm), with photographer’s printed credit
on verso ‘J. Bartlett, photographer. Oddington, Chipping Norton’;
very fine condition.
£300
A well-preserved carte de visite photograph of a fine binding linked to
either Charles I or II, attributed to the Squirrel Binder. The
Oxfordshire address of the photographer’s studio suggests that this
could have been a prize volume belonging to a local bibliophile.
The field of tooled thistles and fleurs-de-lis around the arms of a
Stuart monarch and the initials ‘CR’ would suggest that this book
was bound for Charles I, although this in itself cannot be taken as
definitive evidence of royal ownership. The corner-pieces can be
identified as those used for several other bindings, as can the smaller
thistle and fleur-de-lis tools and the border roll, although the royal
arms with supporters and initials vary from these. These bindings
are attributed to the Squirrel Binder, active in London until c. 1640
and known to have bound for Charles I.
The photographer J. Bartlett appears to have been active in
Oddington at least during the early 1880s, otherwise there is little
information on this studio. The name does not appear in the
Oxfordshire History Centre’s detailed List of Oxfordshire photographers.
A L. W. Bartlett (a relative?) was meanwhile active as both
photographer and taxidermist at two addresses in nearby Banbury
between 1881 and 1911.
22. SWIRE, Herbert. The Voyage of the Challenger. A
Personal Narrative of the Historic Circumnavigation of the
Globe in the Years 1872-1876 by Navigating SubLieutenant Herbert Swire, R.N.
Illustrated with
Reproductions from Paintings and Drawings in his
Journals. Foreword by Major Roger Swire . . . Introduction
by G. Herbert Fowler. London, Golden Cockerel Press, 1938.
Two volumes, folio in 8s (314 x 193mm), pp. I: 192; II:
168, [2 (colophon, verso blank)], [2, blank]; colour-printed
frontispieces and 8 colour-printed plates after Herbert
Swire, all retaining tissue guards, line-engraved illustrations,
diagrams and plans in the text, after Swire, some full-page;
occasional, very light spotting; original white buckrambacked blue cloth boards, spines lettered in gilt and
decorated with designs after Lettice Sandford, map of the
world showing the Challenger’s route on vol. I front
endpapers, top edges trimmed, others uncut, blue cloth
slipcase; extremities very lightly rubbed, slipcase slightly
rubbed, nonetheless a very good set with unusually fresh,
unmarked spines, in the original slipcase.
£950
First edition, no. 288 of 300 sets. Undertaken at the
instigation of Charles Wyville Thomson and his close
collaborator William Benjamin Carpenter, the Challenger
expedition was intended to be a full-scale scientific survey
of the world’s oceans. The Admiralty provided a 226-foot
long steam-assisted screw corvette under the command of
Captain George Strong Nares, and the Challenger sailed
from Portsmouth on 21 December 1872 and returned to
Spithead on 24 May 1876: in the course of the expedition
‘she had spent 713 days at sea and had covered 68,890
nautical miles through all the major oceans except the
Indian. A total of 362 official “stations” had been
occupied, more or less equally spaced along her track,
obtaining soundings and samples of the bottom sediment,
and taking serial measurements of the temperature and
collecting water samples between the surface and the
bottom. But above all the expedition collected biological
specimens; mid-water nets were used to about 3000m
deep, and bottom dredges and trawls were fished
successfully twenty-five times at depths greater than about
4.5 km, the deepest from 5.7 km on the edge of the Japan
trench in the western Pacific. In recognition of the
expedition’s achievements, acknowledged as marking the
beginning of the modern science of oceanography,
Thomson was knighted and received a royal medal on the
ship’s return’ (ODNB, s.n. Thomson).
This journal was written by Navigating Sub-Lieutenant
Herbert Swire (?1851-1934) for his mother and sisters,
and ‘he kept the Journals chiefly as a handy way of telling
them of his travels and used to send them home as
opportunity offered’ (I, p. [7]). In 1930 – nearly sixty
years after they were written – Swire edited his Challenger
journals and painted the watercolour of the ship which is
reproduced as the frontispiece to volume I. With Swire’s
death in 1934 the last surviving member of the expedition
passed, and his family decided to publish his account,
which is prefaced by an introduction by the zoologist,
oceanographer, and sometime Assistant Professor of
Zoology at University College, London, G. Herbert
Fowler (who notes that Swire possessed ‘a shrewd power
of observation and description, and of sympathetic
understanding of primitive people, rather remarkable in
one so young’) and a foreword by the author’s son Roger
Swire, who outlines the history of the journals. The
journal concludes with a ‘Postscript to the Challenger
Journal’ written by the author in 1930 (II, pp. 167-[168]),
which records incidents unremarked in the original text.
Interestingly, as his son notes, Herbert Swire omitted one
particularly interesting and flattering episode from his
journal, which is recounted by R. M. Corfield in his The
Silent Landscape: the Scientific Voyage of HMS Challenger
(London, 2004): ‘On March 23, 1875, 13 days after leaving
Nares Harbour, soundings indicated a depth of 4,475
fathoms or about 27,000 feet. This staggering abyss, now
known to be almost 7 miles deep, was by far the deepest
part of the seafloor that Challenger encountered. To honor
both the occasion and the popular young sub-lieutenant,
the Scientifics [as the scientific staff of the expedition
were known] named it Swire Deep (although sadly, after
they had returned to Britain, the name was later changed
to Challenger Deep)’ (p. 204).
The volume is remarkable for the high standards of its
production, and the Golden Cockerel Press were
understandably proud of it, commenting in Pertolote that,
‘in our “sea series”, this was the most formidable
undertaking on which we had embarked . . . . The owners
of [Herbert Swire’s] journal stipulated that Lt. Swire’s
illustrations must be reproduced as an integral part of the
whole: to this we agreed though it meant departing from
our tradition by reproducing amateur illustrations in penand-ink and in colour. The only satisfactory way of
reproducing the coloured sketches was to have them
specially painted by hand . . . . While we are unlikely to
repeat such an experiment in illustration, we have had the
satisfaction of knowing that we fulfilled our function by
publishing this book in a style impossible for a
commercial firm . . . . We consider Lettice Sandford’s
design for the spine the most attractive thing of its kind
we have produced’.
Hill 1664; NMM I 183; Pertelote 134; Spence 1179.
ANTI-SLAVERY CAMPAIGNER
23. WOOLMAN, John. Serious considerations on various
subjects of importance. By John Woolman, of Mount Holly, in the
Jerseys, North America, deceased; with some of his dying
expressions. London, Mary Hinde, 1773.
12mo, pp. [vi], 137, [1, publisher’s advertisement], each part with
its own title-page included in pagination; a very good copy in
contemporary plain calf; small chip to head of spine and two small
holes at foot, corners slightly bumped, a few marks; printed slip,
completed in manuscript, giving rules of the library of the Society
of Friends at Wigton loosely inserted.
£650
First edition (quire B beginning on p. 7) of this collection of works
by John Woolman (1720-1772), the Quaker minister and antislavery campaigner, comprising his ‘Considerations on the true
harmony of mankind, and how it is to be maintained’, ‘An epistle
to the quarterly and monthly meetings of Friends’, ‘Remarks on
sundry subjects’, and ‘Some expressions . . . in his last illness’. A
Dublin reprint was issued in the same year. Woolman’s crusade
against slavery began when he was asked, and refused, to write a
bill of sale for a black slave, and his campaign took him thousands
of miles through America and England, where he died at York.
His impassioned speech at Philadelphia in 1758 prompted Quakers
to begin freeing their slaves – the first large body to do so in
America. Woolman also championed the cause of Native
Americans.
This copy contains a printed slip laying out the six rules of the
library of the Society of Friends at Wigton in Cumbria, which was
also open to Quaker members in Bolton and Kirkbride.
ESTC T13151; Sabin 105207.
Quaritch Publications
Recent Catalogues and Lists
Recent Lists:
Recent Catalogues:
2016/17 The Armchair Traveller: Women Travellers
2016/16 Death
2016/15 Continental Books
2016/14 Bristol Bookfair: Highlights
2016/13 60 Books on Economics
1434 Medieval and Renaissance MSS
1433 English Books and Manuscripts
1432 Continental Books
1431 Travel & Exploration, Natural History