Search results
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DIOMEDES; Aelius DONATUS; Johann CAESARIUS, editor.
Grammatici opus, ab Iohanne Caesario, ita emendatum, Scholiisque illustratum,...
Hagenau, Johann Setzer, 1526.
A sammelband of four early sixteenth-century Latin grammars, from the Macclesfield Library at Shirburn Castle. The first work comprises two fourth-century Latin grammars, of which one is a rare complete survival from antiquity; this is bound with three early sixteenth-century schoolbooks on grammar...
£1250
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DESPAUTÈRE, Jean, and Gabriel DU PRÉAU.
Universa grammatica, cum doctissimis commentariis, ex praestantissimis quibusque...
Lyons, Pierre Rigaud, 1608.
A seemingly unrecorded issue of this comprehensive Latin grammar aimed at children, in a simple contemporary binding.
£400
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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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[BREVIARY, Use of Passau.]
Breviarium s[ecundu]m chorum alme Ecclesie Pataviensis.
[(Colophon:) Venice, Petrus Liechtenstein for Vienna, Lukas and Leonhard Alantsee, 25 May 1515.]
A rare Passau breviary with numerous woodcut illustrations in a contemporary Austrian binding, printed in Venice for the Austrian market.
£4500
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BOCCACCIO, Giovanni.
Philocholo opera elegantissima de lo excellente Poeta & Oratore Joanne boccacio.
[(Colophon:) Milan, [Alessandro Minuziano], 25 March 1520.]
An uncommon edition of Boccaccio’s first prose narrative, a fantastical tale of love overcoming all obstacles.
£950
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[GUNPOWDER PLOT.] William CAMDEN, translator
Actio in Henricum Garnetum Societatis Iesuiticae in Anglia superiorem, et caeteros...
London, John Norton, 1607.
First and only edition in Latin of the official account of the Gunpowder Treason trials, ‘a masterpiece of official propaganda’ (Marotti, p. 133) influential both in England – where it was seemingly mined by Shakespeare – and abroad, our copy with early continental annotations attesting to...
£1000
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GOFFE, Thomas.
The Couragious Turke, or, Amurath the First. A Tragedie.
London, Bernard Alsop and Thomas Fawcett for Richard Meighen, 1632.
First edition of this violent Near Eastern tragedy influenced by Marlowe and Shakespeare, this copy with rare and unrecorded issue points.
£3000
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CULPEPER, Thomas.
The English Physician enlarged: with three hundred, sixty, and nine Medicines made of English Herbs that were...
London, Peter Cole, 1653.
Second (first octavo) edition, enlarged with ‘very many Additions to every Sheet’, of Culpeper’s magnum opus, The English Physician (1652), this copy from the library of Thomas Elwood (1639–1714), the Quaker friend of John Milton who provided him with the cottage at Chalfont St Giles...
£1850
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[BECKFORD, William.]
Vathek, conte arabe.
Paris, Chez Poinçot ... 1787.
First Paris edition of Beckford’s Gothic masterpiece in the original French, so considerably revised from the Lausanne edition (also 1787) as to amount to ‘almost a new version’ (Chapman & Hodgkin, p. 127). Beckford also took the opportunity to expand the notes from one to twenty-four pages.
£3250
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HAKLUYT, Richard.
The Principall Navigations, Voiages and Discoveries of the English Nation, made by Sea or over Land, to the most...
London, ‘George Bishop and Ralph Newberie, Deputies to Christopher Barker, Printer to the Queenes most excellent Maiestie’, 1589.
First edition, a fine copy, with the world map, in a strictly contemporary London binding, of the first collection of English voyages.
£350000
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HAKLUYT, Richard.
The principal Navigations, Voiages, Traffiques and Discoveries of the English Nation, made by Sea or over-land,...
London, George Bishop, Ralph Newberie, and Robert Barker, 1598 [–1600].
Second edition, first issue of ‘Hakluyt’s monumental masterpiece, and the great prose epic of the Elizabethan period’ (Penrose), complete with the section on the conquest of Cadiz by Essex (vol. I, pp. 607-619) ordered suppressed by Elizabeth I in 1599 (in ESTC state 1a).
£20000
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[IRWIN, Eyles.]
Eastern Eclogues; written during a Tour through Arabia, Egypt, and other Parts of Asia and Africa, in the Year...
London, for J. Dodsley, 1780.
First edition of these travel-inspired poems by the Calcutta-born East India Company servant Eyles Irwin (1751–1817), composed during his journey from India to England in 1777, and containing several interesting references to the British presence in India.
£850
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DU HALDE, Jean-Baptiste.
A Description of the Empire of China and Chinese-Tartary, together with the Kingdoms of Korea, and Tibet,...
London, T. Gardner for Edward Cave, 1738 [–1741].
The first complete English translation of Jean-Baptiste Du Halde’s Description géographique … de l’Empire de la Chine (1735), the ‘Bible of European sinophilia’ (Löwendahl). Based on the reports of major Jesuit missionaries, and shaped by the earlier Historia of Martini...
£15000
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WINES, Enoch Cobb.
A Peep at China, in Mr. Dunn’s Chinese Collection; with miscellaneous Notices relating to the Institutions...
Philadelphia, for Nathan Dunn, 1839.
Scarce first edition of a guide to the remarkable collection of Chinese artefacts accumulated by the American businessman Nathan Dunn (1782–1844).
£1250
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[GIRALDI, Giovanni Battista.]
Giuditio sopra la tragedia di Canace et Macareo con molte utili considerationi circa l’arte tragica,...
(Colophon:) Lucca, Vincenzo Busdraghi, 4 May 1550.
First edition of this criticism, in the form of a dialogue, of Speroni’s play Canace et Macareo, which sparked one of the most remarkable literary debates of the time. The text was previously attributed to Bartolomeo Cavalcanti, but the authorship of Giraldi is now generally accepted....
£650
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ROTH, Henry.
Call it Sleep.
London, Michael Joseph, 1963.
First UK edition of Roth’s precocious masterpiece, generally regarded as the finest novel of Jewish immigration to America before and after the turn of the century.
£250
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GOETHE, Johann Wolfgang von; Thomas HOLCROFT, translator.
Herman and Dorothea. A Poem, from the German …
London, Biggs and Cottle (Bristol), for T. N. Longman and O. Rees, 1801.
First edition in English of Hermann und Dorothea (1798), translated into verse by the radical, novelist, and friend of Godwin, Thomas Holcroft. Goethe’s epic, set against the background of the French Revolutionary Wars, was immensely popular in its day; Goethe praised Holcroft’s rendition...
£350
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[JUSTICES OF THE PEACE.]
The Boke of Justices of Peas the Charge with all the Processe of the Cessions, Warrantes Supercedias &...
[Colophon: London, Richard Pynson], [1505–6?].
First edition(?), very rare, of the first printed guide for Justices of the Peace, issued with a short guide to land law.
£27500
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ROUGEMONT, François de; [Sebastião de MAGALHÃES, translator].
Relacam do estado politico e espiritual do imperio da China, pellos...
Lisbon, Joao da Costa, 1672.
Portuguese translation, the first appearance of the text, of the Dutch Jesuit François de Rougemont’s history of mid seventeenth-century China, published a year before the Latin original. Inspired to join the Chinese missions after meeting the famed Jesuit sinologist Martino Martini in Louvain,...
£2500
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NAVARRETE, Domingo Fernández.
Tratados historicos, politicos, ethicos, y religiosos de la monarchia de China. Descripcion breve...
Madrid, Juan Garcia Infançon for Florian Anisson, 1676.
Scarce first edition, one of the most important early studies of Chinese history, religion, philosophy, and culture, by the Spanish Dominican Domingo Navarrete (d. 1689).
£4750