Gift Ideas
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WALLER, Edmund.
Poems, &c. written by Mr. Ed. Waller … and printed by a Copy of his own Hand-Writing. All the lyrick Poems...
London, Printed by I. N. for Hu. Mosley … 1645.
Second (but first licensed) edition of Waller’s first and most important collection, published while he was in exile, and shortly preceded by an unlicensed volume, Workes (London, Thomas Walkley, 1645) (Wing W 495) – ‘an adulterate Copy, surreptitiously and illegally imprinted, to...
£850
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GAZZOLI, Giacomo Maria.
Il Luminario de’ Ciechi. Operetta diretta all’universale del Giudaismo da Giacomo M.a Gazzoli già...
Parma, [Giambattista Bodoni] ‘Dalla Reale Tipografia’, 1797.
A rare typographic marvel featuring three distinct Hebrew typefaces by Giambattista Bodoni (1740–1813), in which Rabbi-turned-Catholic-zealot Giacomo Gazzoli exhorts the Jews of Italy to ‘emerge from a state of blindness into the light of Christianity’.
£850
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CANTINE, Holley, and Dachine RAINER (editors), and Lowell NAEVE (illustrator).
Prison Etiquette:...
Bearsville (NY), Retort Press, 1950.
First edition of this anthology of conscientious objectors incarcerated during the Second World War, ‘entirely hand-set, hand-bound, and printed on a footpedal press by the editors’ (jacket flap) in an edition of two thousand copies.
£275
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GRAY, [Thomas].
Poems by Mr. Gray.
Dublin, William Sleater, 1775.
An attractive Dublin edition of Gray’s poems, joined by two parodies and a ‘burlesque ode’, and parallel translations of his Elegy written in a Country Churchyard into Italian and Latin.
£125
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POPE, Alexander.
The Poetical Works of Alexander Pope, with his last Corrections, Additions, and Improvements, in four Volumes,...
London, ‘printed under the direction of J. Bell, British Library, Strand, bookseller to His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales,’ 1787...
A good set of Pope’s works, printed for inclusion in Bell’s The Poets of Great Britain. Initially imported from Edinburgh and issued with new titles, Bell’s Poets of Great Britain was intended to provide attractive and portable works of British poets ‘from Chaucer to Churchill’,...
£175
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POPE, Alexander.
An Essay on Man, in four Epistles to Henry St. John, Lord Bolingbroke …
London: Printed for Robert Jennings … by James Moyes … 1819.
A very fine edition, one of two hundred copies according to Lowndes. The four plates in the text were engraved for a forthcoming parallel-text English–Portuguese edition published by Charles Whittington – the prints here being proofs before lettering. Their inclusion along with ‘the...
£450
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[JAMES II.]
His Majesties gracious Declaration to all his loving Subjects for Liberty of Conscience.
[Colophon:] London, Printed by Charles Bill, Henry Hills, and Thomas Newcomb, Printers to the Kings most excellent Majesty. 1687.
A major document in the history of free speech and the first step towards religious freedom in Britain, the 1687 Declaration of Indulgence granted liberty of conscience for all religions, and the freedom ‘to meet and serve God after their own way and manner, be it in private houses, or places...
£650
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SENECA, Lucius Annaeus.
L. Annaei Senecae Cordubensis tragoediae decem. Quibus adiectae sunt variae lectiones. Et selectis exemplaribus...
Milan, Pandolfo Malatesta, 1617.
An extremely rare pocket-sized Jesuit school edition of the tragedies of Seneca, likely intended for use at the Jesuit College at Brera, in Milan, with a charming doodle from a bored young student.
£650
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JUSTI, Johann Heinrich Gottlob von.
Staatswirtschaft oder systematische Abhandlung aller oekonomischen und Cameralwissenschaften,...
Leipzig, Bernhard Christoph Breitkopf, 1755.
First edition of this fundamental work in the understanding of market economies. Justi was a German political and economic thinker, usually described as an exponent of Cameralism; his background was the power struggle of the Seven Years War, and his drive was a need to create a modern, commercial...
£2750
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[GREATTI, Giuseppe.]
L’educazione: Poemetto in ottava rima.
Padua, 1796.
Only edition of this poem on the theme of education, dedicated to the Paduan noblewoman Arpalice Savorgnan di Brazzà, well-known in the city for her embrace of radicals and revolutionaries, which led her salon to be known as ‘l’unione dei giacobini’ (see di Brazzà, p. 714).
£650
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CELALEDDIN, Mahmud (calligrapher).
[A muraqqa or calligraphic album.]
Cairo, Ministry of Public Education, 1309 AH [i.e. 1891/2].
Unrecorded album of lithographed examples of calligraphy, mixing prayers and pen exercises, reproducing the calligraphy of a Daghestani émigré to Istanbul, Mahmud Celaleddin Efendi (d. 1829), and published in Cairo by Egypt’s Ministry of Public Education.
£2200
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[JUVENILE.]
Preliminary lessons on the history of England, originally compiled for private use, and now adapted to the junior...
Taunton, J. Poole, 1821.
Later edition of this uncommon Taunton-printed sketch of English history for use in primary schools, which first appeared in 1809. After brief notes on Julius Caesar, the Saxons, and notable pre-Conquest kings, the book offers a short overview of the character of each monarch (and monarch substitute)...
£135
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ELIOT, George.
The Writings …
Boston and New York, Houghton Mifflin and Company, 1908.
The Large-Paper edition of Eliot’s complete works, no. 184 of 750 sets.
£2500
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PIRON, Alexis.
Oeuvres badines …
Paris, chez les marchands de nouveautés, 1797.
Scarce illustrated edition of the ‘frolicsome works’ of the French dramatist and wit Piron (1689–1773), collecting sixty-eight salacious poems accompanied by eight erotic engraved plates. The collection includes the notorious Ode à Priape, the publication of which obliged Piron to...
£975
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HUGHES, Ted.
T.S. Eliot: A Tribute by the Poet Laureate.
[London,] ‘Privately Printed by [the Salient Seedling for] Faber and Faber’, [August 1987].
A privately printed tribute to T.S. Eliot, limited to 250 copies signed by Ted Hughes. The text comprises an address given by Hughes on 26 September 1986, at the unveiling of Eliot’s blue plaque at Kensington Court Gardens.
£175
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PRIOR, Matthew.
Poems on several Occasions.
London: Printed for Jacob Tonson … 1709.
First authorised edition, preceded by Curll’s pirated collection of 1707. In the preface Prior complains that in Curll’s edition poems by other authors have been misattributed to him and that some of his own poems are ‘transcribed … so imperfectly, that I hardly knew them to be mine’....
£400
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GALIER, W.H.
A visit to Blestland.
London, George Robertson & co., 1896.
First edition of this novel of utopian socialism which lambasts capitalism and religion. Blestland is a republican workers’ paradise located on a different planet which reveals how the divisions of earth can be abolished: by limiting ‘the enormous power for evil which capital can wield’....
£280
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POPE, Alexander.
The Dunciad. With Notes variorum, and the Prologomena of Scriblerus. The second Edition, with some Additional Notes.
London: Printed for Lawton Gilliver … 1729.
‘Second’ octavo edition, revised. This is Griffith’s variant d, with an extra unpaginated leaf of terminal errata (printed on the same half-sheet as the cancel P3).
£450
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FIELDING, Henry.
The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling …
Paris: Printed by Fr. Amb. Didot the eldest, and sold by J. N. Pissot, and Barrois Junior … Booksellers. 1780.
The first French edition in English of Fielding’s masterpiece, only the second English edition to be printed abroad (after Dresden, 1774). Here the text benefits from critical attention by Didot, who collated Murphy’s edition of Fielding’s Works with the last separate English edition.
£425
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ANDREWS, Mark E.
The Science and Engineering of Water: An illustrated catalogue of books and manuscripts on Italian hydraulics,...
Toronto, A.E. Publications, 2022.
A lavishly illustrated catalogue, tracing the development of science and engineering through the early modern period. Some 367 printed books, manuscripts, and maps are presented in chronological order, highlighting the relationship between the evolution of ideas and the authors who documented...
£85