Continental

Contact Alex Day, Andrea Mazzocchi, Jonathan Harrison, Charlotte Miller or Sally Deegan

Our Continental department specialises in incunabula, Greek and Latin classics, early vernacular imprints, and notable texts from the Renaissance, the Reformation, and the early modern era, with a specific section devoted to medieval manuscripts, fragments, and illuminations.

We regularly issue lists and catalogues, offering a wide variety of literary, historical, and philosophical books printed in Italy, France, Spain, Germany, Switzerland, the Low Countries, Eastern Europe, and Russia.  Woodcuts, early engravings, notable bindings, notable marginalia, rare manuscript or printed survivals, and books with a remarkable provenance are among our keenest interests and feature regularly in our stock.

 
  1. LACTANTIUS.

    Opera.

    [Venice,] Vindelinus de Spira, 1472.

    Magnificent incunable edition of the works of Lactantius, a fine product of the first Venetian press, established in 1469 by Johannes de Spira and continued by his brother Vindelinus from 1470 until 1473. This was the fifth impression of the works of Lactantius, the hugely successful North African...

    £25000

  2. EUCLID.

    Στοιχειων βιβλ. ιε εκ των θεωνος συνουσιων. Εις του αυτου του πρωτον,...

    Basel, Johannes Herwagen, September 1533.

    Editio princeps of Euclid, the ‘oldest mathematical textbook still in common use today’ (PMM), a work which ‘has exercised an influence upon the human mind greater than that of any other work except the Bible’ (DSB).

    £18000

  3. CAESAR, Gaius Julius.

    C. Julii Caesaris quae extant. Accuratissime cum libris editis & MSS optimis collata, recognita & correcta....

    London, Jacob Tonson, 1712.

    First edition of the celebrated Tonson’s Caesar edited by Samuel Clarke (1675–1729), ‘the most sumptuous classical work which this country has produced’ (Dibdin).

    £9500

  4. MACROBIUS, Ambrosius Theodosius.

    Somnium Scipionis ex Ciceronis libro De republica excerptum; Macrobii … primi diei Saturnaliorum...

    Venice, Filippo Pinzi, 29 October 1500.

    Sixth and last incunable edition of Macrobius, illustrated with a world map, with extensive early annotations.

    £9500

  5. THEOCRITUS et al.

    Theocriti aliorumque poetarum Idyllia. Eiusdem Epigrammata …

    [Geneva], Henri Estienne, 1579.

    An outstanding volume uniting the Estienne Greek bucolic poets (Theocritus, Bion, and Moschus) and the Estienne Greek Psalms in an Henri Estienne presentation binding.

    £9000

  6. POCOCKE, Richard. 

    A Description of the East, and some other Countries.  London: W. Bowyer for the Author, [‘and sold by J. and...

    [Nourse, and J. Rivington’ (I)], 1743–1745. 

    First edition, demy folio issue. A successful churchman Pococke (1704-1765) is now best remembered as a traveller and mountaineer. His earliest journeys were undertaken between 1733 and 1736 through continental Europe. His ‘next and most ambitious journey, from 1737 to 1740, was to the Near...

    £8000

  7. LUCIAN of Samosata.

    Opera graece et latine ad editionem Tiberii Hemsterhusii et Ioannis Frederici Reitzii accurate expressa cum...

    Zweibrücken, Typographia Societatis, 1789–1793.

    Renouard’s copy of the Bipontine Lucian, the finest instantiation of the Hemsterhuys-Reitz edition, ‘the most accurate and complete edition of Lucian that has ever been published’ (Dibdin), made more accurate and extensive through reference to Parisian manuscripts which had never been published...

    £8000

  8. EUSTRATIUS of Nicaea, et al.

    Ευστρατιου και αλλων τινων επισημων υπομνηματα εις...

    [(Colophon:) Venice, heirs of Aldus Manutius and Andrea Torresano, July 1536.]

    Editio princeps of the Greek commentaries on Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics by Eustratius of Nicaea, Michael of Ephesus, the Peripatetic philosopher Aspasius, and other anonymous scholiasts, published by the Aldine press, annotated by a contemporary scholar.

    £5500

  9. MARLIANI, Bartolomeo.

    Urbis Romae topographia.

    Rome, Valerio & Luigi Dorico, September 1544.

    First illustrated edition (third overall), considerably expanded, providing a comprehensive visual record of ancient structures and sculptures in Rome as known in the sixteenth century.

    £5500

  10. EUCLID; Jean MAGNIEN and Stephanus GRACILIS, editors.

    Euclidis elementorum libri XV Graece et Latine, quibus, cum...

    Paris, Guillaume Cavellat, 1557.

    First edition of Euclid’s Elements as edited by Jean Magnien and Stephanus Gracilis, with woodcut diagrams throughout, this copy extensively annotated by a contemporary student.

    £5500

  11. FULBECKE, William.

    An Historicall Collection of the continuall Factions, Tumults, and Massacres of the Romans and Italians during...

    London, Printed for William Ponsonby. 1601.

    First edition of Fulbecke’s Historicall Collection, a ‘narrative history of the last years of the Roman republic’ (ODNB), one of very few such works by a Renaissance English writer, featuring much material on the rebellion of the nobleman Catiline, undoubtedly included as a reference...

    £5250

  12. PLATO; [Marsilio FICINO].

    Platonis opera.

    [(Colophon:) Venice, Filippo Pinzi, 22 April 1517.]

    Third edition of Marsilio Ficino’s important and influential Latin translations of and commentaries on Plato’s works, with numerous early annotations.

    £5000

  13. CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA (Titus Flavius CLEMENS); Gentian HERVET, translator.

    Omnia opera.

    Paris, Sebastien Nivelle, 1572.

    A thoroughly annotated copy of this early edition of the complete works of Clement of Alexandria, in the Latin translation of the theologian and humanist Gentian Hervet (or Hervetus, 1499–1584).

    £4750

  14. [POPE, Alexander.]

    The Dunciad. An heroic Poem. In three Books. The second Edition.

    ‘Dublin, Printed; London, Re-printed for A. Dodd. 1728.’

    Second edition, rare, and of considerable interest, largely a reimpression of the first edition but with gathering B, most of C, and D4v reset.

    £4500

  15. PHILOPONUS, Joannes.

    Υπομνημα εις τα περι ψυχης βιβλια του Αριστοτελους … Comentaria...

    [(Colophon:) Venice, Bartolomeo Zanetti and Giovanni Francesco Trincavelli, November 1535.]

    Editio princeps of the ancient commentator John Philoponus’ commentary to Aristotle’s On the intellect, edited by the Venetian Vettore Trincavelli (1496–1568), responsible for the publication of several Greek editiones principes. The authorship of Book 3 of the commentaries...

    £4000

  16. LIVY, Titus. 

    T. Livii Patauini […] ex XIIII Decadibus Historiae Romanae ab Urbe condita, Decades, prima, tertia, quarta,...

    Paris, [Michel Vascosan for] Oudin Petit, 1543 [– Michel Vascosan for himself and Oudin Petit, 1542]. 

    A much-praised edition of Livy’s History, reprinting Vascosan’s 1535 edition and including the philological corpus on Livy by the most established humanists of the time: Rhenanus, Gelenius, Grynaeus, Glareanus, Badius Ascensius, Valla, and Sabellico. 

    £3800

  17. CICERO, Marcus Tullius.

    Marcus Tullius Ciceroes three Bookes of Duties to Marcus his Sonne, tourned out of Latine into English,...

    [London, Richard Tottel,] 1583.

    Sixth edition of Grimald’s Cicero, first published 1556. De Officiis was perhaps the most pervasive piece of classical writing in early modern Europe – the second or third book to be printed in Europe, standard reading in England from at least the sixteenth century, recommended in Eliot’s...

    £3200

  18. APPIAN of Alexandria.

    Civili. Appiano Alessandrino delle guerre civili de Romani tradotto da M. Alessandro Braccio secretario...

    Venice, [Pietro Nicolini da Sabbio for Federico Torresano, April] 1538.

    A much-annotated copy of these late Aldine Press productions, the two complementary works on the history of Rome’s wars by Appianus in the Italian translation of Alessandro Braccio (or Braccesi), which had first appeared in 1519 – the first vernacular versions.

    £3000

  19. DOMINICUS DE FLANDRIA.

    Dominici de Flandria ordinis predicator[um] artium et theologie doctoris in divi Thome de Aq[ui]no co[m]mentaria...

    Venice, Giorgio Arrivabene for the heirs of Ottaviano Scoto, 25 January 1514.

    Scarce early editions of two Aristotelian commentaries. The first, by the Dominican philosopher Dominic of Flanders (c. 1425–1479), analyses two works by Thomas Aquinas: his commentary on Aristotle’s Posterior Analytics (on the nature of scientific axioms), and his De fallaciis...

    £3000

  20. PLUTARCH.

    ...

    Venice, Nicolao di Aristotile detto Zoppino, March 1525.

    An attractive illustrated edition of twenty-seven of Plutarch’s lives, extensively annotated by a Papal tax-collector, in a striking contemporary binding.

    £2750