[Venice, printer of Pomponius Mela, 1477].

Second edition, very rare. This is the variant issue without date or place of printing, and is one of only five books known to have produced by the anonymous printer who has been named after the present edition. Mela’s description of the world, also known under the title Chorographia, was written...

£35000

Very rare first edition. With a long authorial presentation inscription on the initial blank to a fellow Merchant Adventurer:

£33000

Paris, [variously:] Jean Cusson, Nicolas le Clerc, Jean Barbou, P.G. le Mercier, Boudet, Marc Bordelet, H.L. Guerin, L.F. Delatour, Rualt,...

A very rare complete first edition set of the enormously significant Lettres édifiantes et curieuses, ‘the most valuable 18th-century source on Jesuit activities in frontier regions throughout the world’ (Hill Collection of Pacific Voyages) and a monument to Jesuit missionary and scientific zeal....

£16000

Naples, ‘apud Horatium Salvianum’, 1573.

Third and best edition of the earliest detailed history of the Jesuit missions in the East, especially Japan. Included for the first time in this edition are five pages of Japanese characters in printed facsimile, ‘Specimen quoddam litterarum vocumque Japonicarum; desumptum e regis Bungi diplomate’...

£12000

Cologne, Wilhelm Lützenkirchen, 1600.

First edition in Latin, rare, the maps all finely coloured by a contemporary hand. First published the previous year as Enchiridion cosmographicum, daß ist ein Handtbuechlin der gantzen Welt gelegenheit, with five maps only. The number of maps in the Latin edition seems to vary, but our copy...

£10000

Brescia, Bernardinus de Misintis, 30 May 1497.

First edition of Mantuanus’s work containing -on recto of m3- a lengthy reference to America, one of the very few 15th century instances: a ‘mention of discoveries of islands in the Atlantic, noting their size and the fact that they are inhabited. Because none of the ancient geographers knew of them,...

£10000

‘Notre Camp Impérial à Burgo’, 22 November 1808.

This brevet conferred the title of baron upon Colonel Marc Nicolas Louis Pécheux (1769-1831) of the 95e regiment d’infanterie de ligne. It was signed by Napoleon, later countersigned by Cambacérès (Arch-Chancellor of the Empire), and docketed on the verso with details of the transmission of the...

£9000

Paris, [Jean Bessin] for the author, 1644.

First edition. A rare practical mercantile arithmetic handbook for financiers and tax farmers. The work, beginning with the mathematical ‘alphabet’ of 10 numbers, covers basic arithmetic, as well as more complicated quadratic roots, rules, discounts, change and exchange, all illustrated with numerous...

£7500

London: Samuel Bentley for Richard Bentley, 1836.

First edition. The English naval officer and Arctic explorer Sir George Back (1795-1878) was a veteran of Sir John Franklin’s first two Arctic expeditions, and this experience led to his appointment to command an expedition to search for Sir John Ross, whose party searching for the Northwest Passage...

£7500

London, printed for Philemon Stephens in Paul’s Church-Yard, 1654.

First edition in English. The translator’s preface to the reader is unsigned, but the translation is usually attributed to Edward Chilmead (see Oxford DNB). He explains that he could not discover in which language the Discourse was originally written in, but that the recent [1653] Latin edition published...

£7500

[?London: ?the author], 1885.

First edition. Following a period in the army, Estridge (1837-1902) was appointed Collector of Customs at Mahé in the Seychelles (probably in 1880), and held the position until 1885, when he returned to England. In 1886 he took up the position of Receiver and Accountant-General, British Bechuanaland...

£6000

Paris, Gervais Clouzier, 1679.

First edition, separately published, of the third part of Tavernier’s celebrated collection of voyages. The first two parts, Les six voyages, had appeared in 1676 and were also reissued in 1679.

£6000

London, Printed for T. Collins and I. Ford … and S. Hickman … 1671.

First and only edition of this account of a special embassy to the court of Sultan Mehmed IV, undertaken in 1664-5 by Walter Leslie, the Scottish-born Ambassador Extraordinary of the Holy Roman Empire. In his party was Henry Howard, later sixth Duke of Norfolk, along with the author John Burbury, who...

£5750

London and Liverpool: George Philip & Son, 1891.

First English edition, standard issue. Hans Meyer (1858-1929), son of bookseller-turned-publisher Herrmann Julius Meyer and grandson of Joseph Meyer, the founder of the publishing house Bibliographisches Institut, built his reputation as one of the most famous explorers and mountaineers of his...

£5750

Paris, Deterville and Treuttel & Wurtz, ‘an VIII de la République’ [1799–1800].

Presentation copy with the author’s inscription of the rare first edition of Say’s utopia, written in response to a competition organized by the Académie des Sciences Morales et Politiques on the question: ‘Quelles sont les institutions capables de fonder la morale chez un peuple?’. Say treats...

£5000

Paris: Mathurin Henault, 1628.

First edition in French of Mendes Pinto’s celebrated travel account; rare. The original Portuguese edition was published in 1614, although the first draft of the book had been completed by 1569. The present ‘atmospheric and faithful French translation’ (Lach, Asia in the Making of Europe,...

£4750

Paris, de l’imprimerie de Franç. Amb. Didot l’Ainé chez Alexandre Jombert, 1783.

First edition. ‘Ouvrage estimé’ (Brunet). A splendidly illustrated military treatise and excellent example of French colour printing written by a French infantry officer and mathematician who distinguished himself in the Seven Years’ War.

£3750

i). The consequences of his majesty’s journey to Hanover, at this critical juncture. Considered in a letter from a Member of Parliament in town to a noble Duke in the country: to which is added, the Duke of A---l’s speech upon the state of the nation: with the reply to it, by Lord ******. London,...

£3500

Frankfurt, Anton Humm for the author, 1641.

First Latin edition of this monumental work on architecture and fortifications, a book produced by father and son. The imprint makes clear that the son, Johann Wilhelm, not only was responsible for the magnificent plates but also edited and published the work ‘edita sumptus et typos suppeditante Joanne...

£3500

Çaragoça, Angelo Tavanno, 1603.

Rare early edition of the prototype of the picaresque novel, Guzman de Alfarache. The novel prepared the way for the acceptance of Cervantes’ Don Quixote by the literary public of Europe; and, like Don Quixote, it quickly inspired a sequel. The original part I first appeared in 1599; Lujan de Sayavedra’s...

£3500