BOOKS IN FRENCH
BOOKS IN FRENCH
The Augsburg Confession — 51 Documents
The First Much Annotated 
(A
French REFORMATION Landmark). Chytraeus, David.
Histoire de la confession d'Auxpourg, contenante les principauls traittez &
ordonnances, faittes pour la religion, quand l'electeur Iehan, duc de Saxe auec
les citez & autres princes protestants presenterent leur confession de foy
(icy inserée) a l'Empereur Charles V. os estats generauls de l'empire,
tenus a Auxpourg, 1530. Anvers: Chez Arnould Coninx, 1582. 4to (24.3 cm, 9.55").
[8], 835, [5] pp.
Click the interior images for enlargements. 
Rare. OCLC lists only four U.S. holdings and one deaccessioned copy (the present example).
• Brunet 22420; Graesse, II, 154. Not in Adams. 19th-century quarter olive morocco with marbled paper–covered sides, spine with gilt-stamped author/title; edges and extremities rubbed. Top edge gilt. Front pastedown with bookplate as above; title-page and first text page each with early inked ownership inscription. Four leaves with small repaired tears from outer margins and three likewise from upper margins, not touching text in any case. Extensive early inked marginalia in first document, scattered examples elsewhere. (23536)
This entry is repeated in the
An Elegant Production!Académie
des Inscriptions et Belles-lettres. Choix des mémoires de l’Academie Royale des inscriptions et belles-lettres. Londres: T. Becket & P. Elmsly, 1777. 4to (27 cm, 10.6"). 3 vols. I: [2], iii, [1], lx, 656 pp. (pagination skips 17–32, text uninterrupted). II: [2], iii, [1], ccviii, 495, [1 (blank)] pp. III: [2], iii, lxviii, [1], 696 pp.; 1 fold. plt., 2 plts.
Click the image to the left The third volume includes two plates and one oversized, folding plate reproducing two inscriptions and a frieze, engraved by E. Malpas.
Uncommon outside of Great Britain.
• ESTC T113913; Brunet, I, 26; Lowndes, I, 5. Contemporary treed calf, spines gilt extra, with gilt-stamped leather title and volume labels; leather worn at edges and moderately rubbed with joints cracking. Front pastedowns with private bookplates and signs that a plate was removed on front free endpaper (one vol. endpaper holed); impressions of old pencilled shelf numbers on title-pages (and one lightly inked old date). First two leaves of vol. III with upper margins stained and final leaf browned; some pages with a few spots of faint foxing, most clean and crisp.
He Tries toCover It ALL!
Amelot de la Houssaye, Abraham-Nicolas, sieur. Memoires
historiques, politiques, critiques, et literraires. Par Amelot de la Houssaie. Ouvrage imprimé sur le propre manuscrit de l'auteur. Amsterdam: Michel Charles Le Cene, 1731. 12mo. 2 vols. I: 561 pp. II: 462 pp., [11 (adv.)] ff.
Provenance: From the collection of 19th-century scholar Dr. Johann August Neander (1789–1850), a convert from Judaism who became a leading scholar of Christian church history.
• Brunet 18324. Contemporary calf, spine with raised bands, gilt-stamped compartment decorations at top/bottom, and later black leather gilt-stamped labels; covers blind-tooled in concentric compartments. Rubbed with bits of leather lost at extremities; offsetting from leather along margins of endpapers and title-pages. Marbled endpapers, free ones missing in both volumes; front pastedowns each with library bookplate and both title-page versos with call number in pencil. Initial pages of vol. II toned. A good solid set. (21186)
Cortlandt Bishop Copy
Balzac, Honoré
de. La Vendetta. Paris: A. Ferroud, F. Ferroud, Successor,
1904. Tall 8vo. 
Binding: Bound by Granghaud in full red morocco with tooling in gilt and black. Wide turn-ins with gilt dentelles; marbled endpapers; top edge gilt. In marbled, morocco-edged slipcase.
• Excellent condition.
Bloeme, A. Question du jour pour l'epargue francaise. Le bilan actuel des travaux et l'avenir du
canal de Panama. Bordeux: Imprimerie Bordelaise, 1889. 8vo. 64 pp.
Scarce: Not traced via OCLC, RLIN, NUC-1956, METABASE. One copy in the OPAC of the Bibliotheque National.
• Not in Palau. 20th-century quarter leather. Private ownership stamp on title-page. Clean. (21259)
Lovely French Printing — GORGEOUS! French BindingBoileau
Despréaux, Nicolas. Œuvres diverses du Sieur D*** avec le traité du sublime ou du merveilleux dans le discours, traduit du Grec de Longin. Paris: Claude Barbin (pr. by Denys Thierry), 1674. 4to (25.3 cm, 10"). π2A–R4S8T–Y4Z
Click any image where the hand appears on
• Brunet, I, 1056; DeBacker, Auteurs du XVIIe siècle, 1020; Tchemerzine, II, 271. Binding as above, nearly perfect save for just a touch of rubbing to the spine extremities, in cloth-covered slipcase, worn, with cloth starting to split over edges. Frontispiece and title-page separating from binding; title with red-tinted signs, near edges, that the marbling process did not go entirely smoothly; upper margins of several other leaves with hints of very faint waterstaining. Otherwise, clean and quite lovely.
This Jesuit Got in aGreat Deal of Trouble[Bougeant, Guillaume-Hyacinthe]. Amusement philosophique sur le langage des bêtes. La Haye: Antoine van Dole, 1739. 8vo (16 cm, 6.25"). 135, [1], 8, [48 (adv.)] pp.
Following the piece is the text of a letter from Bougeant to Abbé Savalette of the Jesuit Council, in which Bougeant describes his regret at having brought about so much turmoil, renounces the positions taken in the Amusement, and notes that he would have chosen to suppress the work if it had been in his power to do so. The volume closes with a lengthy catalogue of books published by Pierre Humbert in Amsterdam from 1734 through 1740.
Provenance: Front pastedown with small bookplate of Augustine Legillon, dated 1809.
• DeBacker-Sommervogel I, 1879. Contemporary speckled calf with expectable acid-pitting; remarkably skillfully rebacked with the original gilt extra spine restored, and bearing a gilt-stamped leather title label. Advertising leaves with a few inked annotations in an early hand. 
Overall a very nice copy.
For
more JESUITANA, click here.
Sur le Mexique Brasseur de Bourbourg, Abbé Charles-Étienne. Quatre lettres sur le Mexique. Paris: F. Brachet; Mexico: Juan Buxo y Cia., 1868. 8vo (25 cm, 9.8"). xx, 463, [1] pp.
Click the interior image for an enlargement. The Abbé Brasseur de Bourbourg travelled throughout Mexico and Central America as part of his ecclesiastical duties, and channeled his interest in archeology and antiquities into a number of publications on the original Mesoamerican sources he collected or copied. The present work includes commentary by him on the Chichicastenango manuscript, and much speculation regarding the prehistoric connections between the Old World and the New.
• Leclerc, Bibliotheca Americana, 1082; Sabin 7437. Contemporary half morocco and paper-covered sides, spine gilt extra; edges/corners rubbed, small repairs to spine and joints. Front free endpaper with institutional rubber-stamp; back pastedown with rubber-stamp partially touching the small affixed ticket of a New York bookseller. Outer margin of half-title and one other leaf chipped. A few leaves towards back of volume unopened. (20651)
The Waldensians — Histoire & Catéchisme Brez, Jacques. Histoire des Vaudois, ou des habitans des vallées occidentales du Piémont, qui ont conservé le christianisme dans toute sa pureté ... Paris: Chez Leclerc, 1796. 8vo (20.5 cm, 8.1"). 7, [1], xliv, [4], [27]–132, 268 pp.
Click the interior images for enlargements. RLIN and OCLC locate only eight U.S. institutional holdings.
• Brunet, I, 1254. 19th-century quarter morocco with marbled paper–covered sides, spine with gilt-stamped title and gilt-stamped decorations between raised bands; edges and joints rubbed, foot of spine with inked call number. Front pastedown with institutional bookplate and with bookseller's small ticket, title-page with institutional pressure-stamp, dedication page with inked numeral in lower margin; back pastedown with paper abrasions and adhesions. Upper edges lightly waterstained, pages with varying degrees of spotting. One leaf with lower outer corner torn away, touching two letters. (20856)
Principles of Natural LawBurlamaqui, Jean Jacques. Principes du droit naturel. Geneve: Chez Barrillot & fils, 1747. 4to (24.3 cm, 9.55"). XXIV, 352 pp.
This may be a later issue of the 1747 first edition; the last line of p. 7 here begins with “de l’esprit” and the first line of p. 223 with “tage au préjudice.” A companion volume to the present work, Principes du droit politique, was to be printed posthumously in 1754 and it is not present here — this volume being a very satisfactory stand-alone, arriving at a conclusion describing the “heureux accord de la lumière Naturelle & Révélée.” (Conceiving of the two works as vols. I and II of a larger whole is an anachronism in period to 1766 when de Felice was to bring them together for the first time.)
• Quérard, I, 570; not in Brunet. Recent quarter calf over marbled paper–covered sides, spine with gilt-stamped leather labels and gilt-stamped decorations in compartments. Pages age-toned, with light foxing in spots; outer and lower edges of title-page showing offsetting from original turn-ins.
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II .
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