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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ANDREADES, Andreas Michael.
De la monnaie et de la puissance d’achat des métaux précieux dans l’Empire Byzantin . . . Extrait...
Liège, Imprimerie H. Vaillant-Carmanne, 1924.
An offprint, with its own title-page and pagination, of this important study. This is a presentation copy, inscribed in ink ‘To Robert Byron. A. A.’ at the head of the front wrapper. Andreades was the first professor of public finance at the University of Athens and the author of a monumental work...
£45
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BELLONI, Girolami, Marchese.
Del Commercio dissertazione.
Rome, Niccolo and Marco Pagliarini, 1757.
Second edition to be authorized by Belloni, (first, 1750) – the first edition to include the author’s considerations on ‘imaginary money’ (pp. 135-154) – of a work notable for its argument in favour of restrictions on the export of money by the Vatican banker Girolamo Belloni (1688–1760)....
£300
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[FRANKLAND, William.]
A large collection of manuscript correspondence relating to the death of William Frankland.
[Manchester, Slaidburn, and Blackburn, June 1886–May 1888].
An interesting archive relating to the death of William Frankland, a Lancashire railway worker killed in a shunting accident, consisting largely of manuscript correspondence from his father’s landlords – two solicitors evidently working pro bono – fighting to obtain an insurance payout from the...
£650
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FROST, Thomas Gold.
A treatise on guaranty insurance: including therein as subsidiary branches the law of fidelity, commercial,...
Boston, Little, Brown, and Company, 1902.
Only edition of the first treatise on the theory and practice of guaranty insurance law and its branches.
£125
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[HAMBURG.]
A sammelband of material relating to the Great Fire of Hamburg.
[Germany, 1842.]
A fine and unusual volume of materials relating to the Great Fire of Hamburg of May 1842, comprising a long article by Joseph Mendelssohn published over five issues of Der Komet, special issues of several periodicals devoted to the disaster, a rare poem by Margarethe Hedwig Hülle, and maps of...
£850
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HURRY, Thomas.
Tables of interest, from one pound to five hundred millions, for one day; by which the interest for any sum of money...
[Yarmouth], Printed for the author, and sold by Messrs. Robinson, London; and Downes and March, Yarmouth, 1786.
One of two editions published in 1786, the other one undated, ESTC does not give any precedence. Tables for calculating interest at a quarter, half, three-quarters, three, four, and five percent; intended as a quick reference for bankers and merchants. Hurry precedes his tables with four pages of example...
£150
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LAEMMEL, Rudolf.
Untersuchungen über die Ermittlung von Wahrscheinlichkeiten.
Zurich, Jean Frey, 1904.
The doctoral dissertation of Rudolf Laemmel, produced under the auspices of Burkhardt of Zurich, and the first attempt at founding probability theory on set theory and measure theory (the axiomatization of probability). The work discusses the rules of total and compound probability as axioms. The rule...
£250
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[LONDON ASSURANCE CORPORATION.]
By-laws, orders, and rules, for the good government of the corporation of the London assurance....
London, [n.p.], 1722.
First edition of the by-laws of the London Assurance Corporation, which, along with The Royal Exchange Assurance Corporation, was constituted and granted sole rights, excepting private individuals, to the granting of assurance and bottomry by ‘The Bubble Act’ of 1720. The right to self-govern, reflected...
£550
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[MABBUT, George].
Sir Isaac Newton’s tables for renewing and purchasing the leases of cathedral-churches and colleges, according...
London, printed for Thomas Astley, 1742
Sixth edition, first published in 1686, this issue was sometimes also published with a separate title page and imprint reading, ‘The money’d man’s pocket-book’, London, 1742’ immediately preceding the title-page of the second part. A series of tables calculating the amounts owed on leases based...
£125
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[PRATT, Samuel].
The regulating Silver Coin [sic], made practicable and easie, to the Government and Subject. Humbly submitted...
London, Bonwick, 1696.
First and only edition. William Lowndes had the Treasury pay for this argument for the recoinage of the currency of 1696, and it was supportive of his policy of devaluation. Pratt calls for regulation of the mint and an end to clipping, hoarding and the exportation of coins. He develops the idea of a...
£575
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[SERRÉ, Jean-Baptiste-Adrien-Joseph.]
Livre utile aux négocians de l’Europe, contenant les réductions des argents dont ils...
Paris, chez Valade; Brussels, chez Emmanuel Flon, 1774.
£100
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[SOUTH AND CENTRAL AMERICAN COINAGE.]
The King’s Assay Master’s Report, with Tables, shewing the Weights and Fineness of the...
[London, 1834].
Three tables of coinage weights and fineness for Mexico, Central America, Bolivia, Peru, Chile, Rio Plata and Columbia, drawn up by Robert and Henry Bingley of the Assay Office ‘to enable Government to form a correct estimate of the value of South American Dollars, as a supply for the military chests...
£250