Provenance:  Ink signatures of “Mesange de St. Andre,” dated 1784, appear on front free endpaper and at top margin of title-page; gift inscription on front fly-leaf reads “Henri de Mesange St. Andre offr. au regt. de Barrois.” Later from the library of Helen de Guerry Simpson.

•  Pichon 2075; Coumont, Demonology and Witchcraft, S3.1.   Contemporary mottled calf, spine gilt extra and with gilt-stamped label; spine chipped at head and foot, joints open. Marbled endpapers. Ribbon placemarker. Edges stained red. Faint waterstain at lower margin of some leaves. Chip at lower outer corner of pp. 145/146. Slight loss of paper at lower edge of pp. 289/290. Ownership markings include a bookplate on the front pastedown and early ink inscriptions on the front free endpaper, front fly-leaf, and in the blank area of the top margin of the title-page.  (24562)

Click the interior image for an enlargement.

We find only two U.S. locations and a copy at the British Library.

•  Publisher’s printed paper wrappers; edges nicked, paper split and chipping along spine, text block cracked. Front pastedown with institutional bookplate. Lower margins of title-page and preface waterstained, inner margin of frontispiece waterstained; upper margin of title-page with portion torn away. Some plates lightly foxed or browned, one with waterstaining in lower margin. Pages untrimmed. One’s sense is that this was USED as a guidebook!

Click the images for enlargements.

WorldCat and Lindsay & Neu combine to locate seven copies in the U.S.

•  Lindsay & Neu 3576.   Recent paper–covered boards, front cover with printed paper label. All four leaves pressure-stamped by a now-defunct institution; title-page verso with inked numeral. Additional inked pagination. Clean.  (27775)

Very uncommon. OCLC and ESTC report only one holding, at Stanford.

•  Original printed boards, worn, paper almost entirely lost over spine. Without endpapers, apparently as bound. Sewing loosening, with several leaves separated. Scattered spots of mild foxing. Despite faults noted, a charmer.

No copy traced via OCLC.

•  Not in Banks. Not in Evans.   One leaf, folded. First page with half-inch long tear and another smaller tear at upper left corner, not touching text. Near fine.  (14758)

Click the interior image for an enlargement.

Provenance:  Signature on title-page of Howard Osgood, a prominent late 19th- and early 20th-century Hebrew scholar and noted collector.

•  Goldsmiths'-Kress 2558; Wing (2nd ed.) S3801B.   Contemporary speckled calf, spine gilt extra with gilt-stamped leather title-label, board edges stamped with gilt roll; corners and spine extremities worn, front joint cracked and back joint starting, sewing holding. Front pastedown with small French bookseller's ticket and early inked numeral. Title-page with small early inked owner's name and with institutional pressure stamp, reverse with pencilled numerals. Pages clean. (19511)

The works herein comprise the Four Empires, the Commentaries with the 26th book (the Geneva Council originally granted printer Jean Crespin a privilege for books 1–25 only), Sleidan's Apology, and the Two Orations, which were all so immensely popular as separate publications that Crespin issued no fewer than 16 editions in various combinations and languages in the decade 1556–66. His first was a vernacular translation of the Latin Commentaries, for which he employed the French Protestant minister Robert Le Prévost. That translation, published within just a year of the original, was Le Prévost's first of many, including the present volume.

Recognizing the steady demand for contemporary histories in France, Crespin continuously and speedily published those works from his press in Geneva. However, like most Protestant materialdestined for sale in France, this book bears no sign of Geneva on the imprint. Interestingly, in his Preface, Crespin denounces forgeries of his work “portans ma marque contrefaite,” showing he was well aware of the market for counterfeit editions.

The text is printed in roman with side- and shouldernotes, framed on some leaves by floral head- & tailpieces and decorated with large floriated initials, which also embellish the extensive tables at the end. A table at the beginning, following the preface, lists famous historians of the past.

Scarce: OCLC findsno copies in the U.S. and there is no copy of this edition in NUC Pre-1956 or COPAC.

Provenance:  Walter L. Pyle, M.D. (bookplate, front pastedown); John S. Altar, July 1923 (ink inscription, front pastedown).

•  Van der Vekene, Johann Sleidan, A/c 001; Gilmont, Bibliographie des éditions de Jean Crespin, I, 61/9; Graesse, VI, 420–21; Chaix–Dufour–Moeckli 49; Gilmont, Jean Crespin, pp. 148–14. On Sleidan, see: Kess, Johann Sleidan and the Protestant View of History, pp. 154–55; and Kelley, “Johann Sleidan and the Origins of History as a Profession,” Journal of Modern History 52, no. 4 (1980), pp. 573–98 and the source of our caption.   18th-century vellum stained green with paper spine label (faded), red edges; front joint cracked and the rear worn, a bit sprung. Small piece of tape between lower front pastedown and fly-leaf; varying degrees of water damage, browning, and other stains throughout, including the title-page; whole trimmed close in the upper margin affecting some headlines; small hole from lacing on one leaf; outer margins of five leaves repaired, and the majority of the final leaf (Z6) mounted on heavier stock. Manuscript notation on p. 33, and a three-line cancelled annotation in the bottom margin of f. 225v.  (30116)

•  Not in Von Hunersdorff, Coffee. Publisher's embossed gilt-paper binding, moderately worn with the spine and board edges a bit darkened; still a very attractive, unusual binding. Front pastedown with small bookseller's ticket and with remnants of a school prize bookplate. Pages mostly clean, with scattered hints of light foxing. (10592)

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