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Human Sciences

Contact Jonathan Harrison, Alfred Pasternack or Barbara Scalvini

Human Sciences at Quaritch embraces a wide range of books and manuscripts documenting the history of ideas from the earliest times up to about 1960. Our strengths are in the history of economic thought and in philosophy, but we also deal in law; finance and banking (including speculation, actuarial science and insurance); politics and political theory; sociology; psychology; agriculture; education; logic; and the theory of language.

Some notable items which have recently passed through our hands include the only known copy of the Communist Manifesto inscribed by Karl Marx, Rudolf Carnap’s annotated copy of Wittgenstein’s Tractatus (Logisch-philosophische Abhandlung), Joseph Penso de la Vega’s Confusion de Confusiones (1688, the first book to describe the practice of a stock-exchange) and a copy of Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations (4th edition, 1786), inscribed in Smith's own hand to Bonnie Prince Charlie's private secretary.

As well as dealing in individual books and manuscripts, we also offer collections. In recent years we have sold author collections of Friedrich Nietzsche, Bertrand Russell, Thorstein Veblen, Emile Durkheim and Jeremy Bentham. Among subject collections we have offered are the Herwood Library of accounting literature (including Pacioli's Summa de Arithmetica, 1494, the first printed exposition of double-entry book-keeping); the philosophy of language; texts pertaining to the theory and study of language in the West, and the history of probability - the calculus of probabilities, statistics and their applications.

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  1. CAPRA, Alessandro.

    Geometria famigliare, et instruttione pratica d’Alessandro Capra architetto cremonese. Per gl’edificii nuovi,...

    Cremona, Gio[vanni] Pietro Zanni, 1671.

    An exceedingly rare extract from the first edition of the treatise of practical geometry by the architect and inventor Alessandro Capra (c. 1605–c. 1685), seemingly prepared and sold as a manual for surveyors and early estate agents.

    £575

  2. CARAVADOSSI, Enrico.

    La moderna filosofia convinta d’inganno nelle sue promesse di felicità libertà ed uguaglianza ragionamenti...

    Turin, Giammichele Brioio, 1793.

    First and seemingly only edition of this attack on the false promises of the philosophes, by the Torinese Dominican friar Enrico Caravadossi.

    £395

  3. CARD, Henry.

    Literary Recreations …

    London, Printed by W. Wilson … for Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme … 1809.

    First edition of a scarce collection of miscellaneous essays on such topics as ‘the Condition and Character of Women in different Countries and Ages’ (pp. 51–118), the ‘Rapid Growth of Methodism’ (pp. 131–187), and ‘Bastards’ (pp. 199–227).

    £650

  4. [CARDUCCI, Giosuè, Olindo GUERRINI, et al., editors.] 

    ...

    Bologna, 19 April [– 29 June] 1874. 

    Very rare complete run of this short-lived satirical magazine against the pro-government newspaper Il Monitore, produced by a group of young liberals from Bologna including the poets Giosuè Carducci and Olindo Guerrini. 

    £1000

  5. CARNAP, Rudolf.

    1959 & 1962.

    The first photograph shows Carnap and his wife outside their house and is signed and, in another hand, dated 1959 as having been taken in Santa Monica. The second photograph is of Carnap and is dated 1960, signed and inscribed “Der lieben Erna, in alter Freundschaft”. This refers to Erna Lowenberg...

    £1500

  6. [CARTOUCHE.]

    The Life and Actions of Lewis Dominique Cartouche: who was broke alive upon the Wheel at Paris, Nov. 28. 1721. N.S....

    London, Printed for J. Roberts … 1722.

    First edition in English, published in the same year as the French original, of this life of the French highwayman Louis Dominique Bourguignon, alias ‘Cartouche’, broken on the wheel in 1721.

    £1750

  7. CASAUBON, Meric.

    A Treatise concerning Enthusiasme, as it is an effect of nature but is mistaken by many for either divine inspiration,...

    London, R.D. for Thomas Johnson, 1655 [i.e. 1654].

    First edition of the first separate treatise on ‘enthusiasm’, a pioneering work of psychiatry avant la lettre and one of the most ground-breaking publications in a very public controversy. Of all Casaubon’s books, this has been shown as the most directly linked to the publication of John...

    £1750

  8. CASTELLESI, Adriano. 

    Hadriani cardinalis de vera philosophia libri IIII ex quatuor ecclesiae doctoribus conscripti, varia eruditione...

    Cologne, Melchior von Neuss, 1540. 

    A fine sammelband of theological works, with interesting provenance.  The De vera philosophia (first published Bologna, 1507) is the most important work of the Italian cardinal and English agent in Rome, Adriano Castellesi (c.1461–1521).  ‘The dedication to Henry VII suggests that...

    £1750

  9. [CAVALLERI, Paolo Agostino.]

    Lettera dall’Adriatico del signor Antonio Bianchi sopra l’opera de’diritti dell’uomo del sig....

    Rome, Giovanni Zempel, 1792 (colophon 1793).

    First edition, uncommon, of this counter-revolutionary polemic written in response to Spedalieri’s I diritti dell’uomo of the previous year and attributed to the Barnabite Paolo Agostino Cavalleri (1742-1803). Spedalieri had attempted a Catholic response to the revolutionary ideas of the rights of...

    £375

  10. [CERI, Giovacchino Domenico.]

    Prodromo all’estirpazione del pirronismo dalla ragion civile d’Italia.

    [Florence?] 1769.

    Only edition, uncommon, of this analysis of the political and legal organisation of Italy, and proposals for its improvement, by the Prato lawyer and historian Giovacchino Domenico Ceri (1734–1798).

    £375

  11. CHALMERS, David.

    Histoire abbregee de tous les roys de France, Angleterre et Escosse, mise en ordre par forme d’Harmonie: contenant...

    Paris, Jean Fevrier, 1579.

    First edition of Chalmer’s historical work focusing on Scotland’s relations with France and England, written at a time of marriage negotiations between England and France, seeking to dispel the idea that England had any overlordship over Scotland.

    £950

  12. [CHAPBOOK.]

    Narrow Escape from the Punishment of Death, or, The Case of John Taylor and John Burton, who were left for Execution...

    Collins … and Evans and Sons … [c. 1820–1826].

    An uncommon early chapbook from the press of Augustus Applegath (1788–1871), interpreting the real-life stay of execution for two sheep-stealers as an act of divine providence.

    £225

  13. [CHARITY.]

    Reglement du 11 Juin 1752, concernant la nourriture et le travail des pauvres de l’Hôpital de N. D. de la Charité,...

    Dijon, Antoine Defay, [1752].

    Very rare work detailing the regulations governing the 450-or-so poor residents of the Hôpital de Notre Dame de la Charité in Dijon, eastern France, in the mid-eighteenth century.

    £850

  14. CHARLES, King of Sweden and Norway, or OSCAR I (attrib. authors), and Friedrich Ernst FELLER (translator).

    Ueber die Banken. (Von einem schwedischen Fürsten). Deutsch von F....

    Leipzig, Goetz, 1843.

    First edition thus, scarce, of a treatise on banks, banking and money in Sweden in the crucial years from 1800 to 1842, probably a translation of Om banker; skrift meddelad i Conseljen den 15 augusti 1842, attributed to Karl XIV Johan by Linnström, Svenskt boklexikon. Humpert’s...

    £125

  15. CHERUBINI, Luigi.

    Autograph note signed ‘L. Cherubini’ regarding the cellist Auguste Franchomme.

    [Paris,] 19 December 1825.

    A short note in which the composer and director of the Conservatoire de Paris Luigi Cherubini records that ‘Mr. Franchomme’ has been admitted into the class of ‘Mr. Seuriot’ and that he will begin there on 22 December 1825.

    £350

  16. CHESTERFIELD, Philip Dormer Stanhope, fourth Earl of.

    Letters written … to his Son, Philip Stanhope, Esq; late Envoy Extraordinary...

    London: Printed for Dodsley … 1777.

    Eighth edition, a very pretty set.

    £250

  17. 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

  18. CHEVRET, Jean.

    Épitre a l’humanité et a la patrie en particulier, sur le bon ordre & l’idée de la véritable liberté. Suivie...

    [Paris?], au temple de la vérité, 1789.

    A good copy of this rare essay on the workings of society and the conditions required for human flourishing, by the controversialist and librarian Jean Chevret (1747-1820). After a brief letter addressed to humanity in general and France (even, perhaps, Chevret’s own home town of Meulan) in particular,...

    £275

  19. 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

  20. CHURCHILL, Winston S.

    A History of the English-Speaking Peoples, Volume I: The Birth of Britain [– Volume II: The New World;...

    London, Cassel & Company Ltd, [1956; – 1956; – 1957; – 1958].

    First editions, with dust-jackets, of Churchill’s History of the English-Speaking Peoples, his last major historical work.

    £200