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.
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[CHARLES II.]
RIVET, Jean. ‘Le favory du Ciel ou Meditation sur le pseaume cent un par Jean Rivet laisné Sainctongeois’.
[Caussade en Quercy, 1664.]
A fascinating manuscript meditation on Psalm 101, a text traditionally used as an exposition on princely authority in Protestant theology, with a long dedication ‘A Tres Puissant et Serenissime Roy Charle deuxiesme Roy de la grande Bretagne’.
£1850
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[CHARTONNET, Antoine-François.]
Considerations sur les devoirs des personnes qui sont engagées par leur état à servir les...
Paris, chez Edme Couterot, 1695.
Rare first edition of this religious manual of instruction aimed at those caring for the sick in hospitals, exhorting carers to look after the bodily and spiritual needs of their charges ‘with charity, gentleness, compassion, patience, diligence, zeal, respect and humility’.
£275
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CHEVALIER, André-Joseph, professor; A.J. BERENTS, compiler.
‘Tractatus De Fide, Spe et Charitate Dictatus ab...
[Douai, 9 March–4 August] 1787.
A manuscript treatise concerning the three theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity as expounded in Thomas Aquinas’s Summa theologiae, compiled by a student at the University of Douai from lectures by André-Joseph Chevalier.
£375
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[CHINA.]
Précis des nouvelles reçues des missions de Chine et des royaumes voisins, en 1819.
[Paris, Adrien Le Clere, 1819?].
An extremely rare summary of the state of French Christian missions in Su-Tchuen (China), Tong-King (Vietnam), Cochinchine (Vietnam), Siam (Thailand), and Pondichery (India) in 1819.
£180
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[CHINA.]
Business report written to a Mr Luo by two Chinese Christian employees.
[China], 咸豐壬子年 [1852].
An interesting mid-nineteenth-century report written by two employees (Andrew Zhu 朱安德肋 and Anna Pan 潘亞納) to their manager Mr Luo 羅當家大人.
£850
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[CHOISY, François Timoléon, Abbé de.]
Journal ou suite de voyage de Siam. En forme des lettres familieres fait en M.DC.LXXXV...
Amsterdam, Pierre Mortier, 1687.
Amsterdam edition, issued the same year as the first Paris edition, recounting a voyage to Siam by the prolific French writer, former cross-dresser, and Jesuit priest, the Abbé de Choisy.
£300
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CHRYSOSTOM, John.
[Opera: Homeliae.] Que in secundo Ioannis Chrisostomi volumine continentur: Super Mattheum homelie 89 …...
Venice, Stagnino & de Gregoriis, 1503.
First edition of Chrysostom’s Opera omnia, the second volume (of two), annotated throughout by two critical readers.
£2800
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CHRYSOSTOM, John.
[Opera] Que in secondo volumine continentur super Mattheum homiliae … super Joannem homiliae … de laudibus...
[Venice, Bernardino Stagnino and Gregorio de’ Gregori, February 1503.]
The second volume of the first collected edition of John Chrysostom’s sermons on the New Testament and the monastic life, a wide-margined copy with extensive annotations.
£2500
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[CHURCH OF ENGLAND.]
The New Weeks Preparation for a worthy Receiving of the Lord’s Supper, as recommended and appointed by the...
London, printed from the edition of the late Edwd. Wickstead, for T. Wilson and R. Spence, York, [c. 1780–1800?].
An attractive copy of two later editions of these collections of prayers, hymns, meditations, and self-examinations, with a focus on Holy Communion.
£250
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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
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[COMMON PRAYER.]
The Book of Common Prayer, and Administration of the Sacraments, and other Rites and Ceremonies of the Church,...
London, Millar Ritchie for J. Good and E. Harding, 1794.
A splendid copy of the Good and Harding Book of Common Prayer, in a striking masonic binding by John Lovejoy.
£1850
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[COMMON PRAYER.]
The Book of Common Prayer, and Administration of the Sacraments, and other Rites and Ceremonies of the Church,...
London & Glasgow, Collins’ Clear-Type Press, [c. 1910].
A George V Common Prayer and hymnal, uniformly bound and unusually housed in a ‘handbag’ slipcase for the convenience of the fashion-conscious churchgoer.
£275
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CORTÈS, Gioacchino.
Dissertazione anti-Bolgeniana sopra la carità difesa dal suo autore l’abate Gioacchino Cortes contro...
Rome, Salomoni, 1793.
First edition of this response to and attempted refutation of Bolgeni’s Della carità o amor di Dio by the Spanish Jesuit Joachim Cortès. Della carità was the best-known work of the Jesuit theologian and controversialist Gianvincenzo Bolgeni, in which he had argued, against...
£450
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COSTER, François.
Piarum et Christ. institutionum libri tres, in usum sodalitatis B. Mariae Virginis primum conscripti, nunc...
Douai, Jean Bogard, 1582.
Very rare Douai edition of this devotional work by the Belgian Jesuit François Coster (1532–1619), first published at Cologne in 1578, illustrated with woodcuts of the Crucifixion and Our Lady of Sorrows.
£675
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CYPRIAN, Saint; Desiderius ERASMUS, editor.
Opera [– Alter tomus operum].
Lyons, Sébastien Gryphe, 1550.
A richly annotated copy of the works of the third-century martyr and bishop of Carthage, St Cyprian, with later Portuguese provenance.
£1800
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DARRÉ, G.G.
‘Conferences diaconales données par Mr l’abbé Darré, Vicaire Général au GrandSéminaire d’Auch. Année...
Auch, 1864.
An attractively written manuscript of Abbé Darré’s practical manual for the use of young priests entering pastoral ministry, the text remaining unprinted, according to OCLC, until 1872.
£200
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DELL’UVA, Benedetto.
Le vergini prudenti.
Florence, Bartolomeo Sermartelli, 1582.
First editions of three religious poems in ottava rima by the Capuan monk Benedetto dell’Uva, representative of Counter-Reformation poetry in southern Italy.
£650
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DE LUCA, Giovanni Battista.
Il Cardinale della S.R. Chiesa pratico di Gio. Battista de Luca nell’ozio Tusculano della Primavera...
Rome, nella stamperia della Reverenda Camera Apostolica, 1680.
Scarce first edition of this thorough work on the cardinalate by the Italian jurist and cardinal De Luca (1614–1683). De Luca studied and practiced law at Naples before moving to Rome in 1645, where he established his reputation as one of Italy’s pre-eminent jurists and worked closely with...
£300
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[DEVOTION.]
Meditation et preire du jeusne, seigneur ouvre me levres, & ma bouche announcer ta loüange. Ps. 51.v.17.
Se vend à Charenton, par Pierre Auvray, demeurant à Paris … [1670s?]
First edition, extremely rare, of a prayer in preparation for a fast, published for sale in Charenton, the first Protestant centre in the Paris region.
£850
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[DOMINICAN NUNS.]
Regola e costituzioni delle suore di S. Domenico riviste e ristampate d’ordine del rmo p. vicario generale...
Rome, Bernardo Morini, 1853.
Very rare first edition thus of the regulations governing Dominican nuns, published by order of Alexandre Vincent Jandel (1810–1872), who served as Master of the Order of Preachers from 1850 until his death.
£250