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It is a study of the Society of Jesus and its expulsion from Spain and France and the consequences thereof, and it was presented to Joseph of Portugal so that he might anticipate similar consequences following his order of expulsion.

•  DeBacker-Sommervogel, XI, 1205.   Contemporary vellum over paste boards. Blackened area on spine; bookplate. A clean copy. (20462)

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•  Wright, II, 2174; Sabin 78641.   Publisher's brown cloth, covers blind-stamped with star-shaped design, spine with gilt-stamped title and blind-stamped decoration; binding cocked and rubbed, spine extremities chipped. Ex–social club library: 19th-century bookplate and call number on pastedown and fly-leaf, front free endpaper lacking, title-page pressure-stamped. No other markings. Pages faintly age-toned, otherwise clean.  (26565)

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)

A Roman edition also appeared in 1694, the year of the work’s first appearance; the present edition is more uncommon: We trace only one U.S. library copy of it.

•  DeBacker-Sommervogel, VII, 1079. Boards covered in music-printed paper from an 18th-century antiphonal, spine with gilt-stamped leather title-label. Title-page and one other stamped by a now-defunct institution. Light spotting throughout, more pronounced to first and last few leaves; some corners dog-eared.

“Negro Poison” (p. 45), a.k.a. tuberculosis

The final portion of the volume is dedicated to American materia medica, an extensive listing of native plants and how to use them to cure various ailments that offers a good number of entries that may well have had legitimate medicinal value, e.g., bowman's root (“Indian physic”), plantain juice, mountain birch bark, Seneca snakeroot, etc.

Dr. Selman, who seems to have operated on the fringes of the Thomsonian movement, was the son-in-law of Kentucky physician Richard Carter (“commonly called the 'indian doctor,'” p. iv); his background and education are otherwise unclear. Here, he occasionally breaks into verse (!).

•  American Imprints 40126; Byrd & Peckham, Indiana Imprints, 658.   Contemporary treed sheep, spine with gilt-stamped leather title-label; rebacked with compatible leather preserving original spine label, corners rubbed. Front pastedown and free endpaper with early pencilled inscriptions. Pages age-toned, with mild foxing and cockling. A nice copy of an uncommon item.  (30147)

The last third of page 5 through page 8 is taken up by a detailed commentary on the preceding verses, amplifying and explicating their content.

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•  Very good. Original self wrappers [unbound; removed].  (17559)

•  Palau 307020. Wrappers stencilled in green with manuscript title on paper label affixed to front wrapper; all edges speckled red. Wrappers with a few tears and a little tattering. Small wormhole in front fly-leaf. A few pencil marks. Inked number on verso of front fly-leaf.

For more PORTUGAL / PORTUGUESE,  click here.

This is numbered copy 146 of 425 printed, signed at the colophon by the author and additionally inscribed by him to “Professor Harry” on the half-title.

•  Publisher's half tan cloth and orange paper–covered sides, front cover with design printed in black, spine with printed paper label; lacking the slipcase, binding with old smudges and areas of discoloration, front cover with small scrape, back outer edge with small dent. Minor offsetting from illustrations, pages otherwise clean.  (28213)

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Presentation copy:  Front free endpaper inscribed “Compliments of the Author. To Dr. Franklin Feb. 19th 1930.”

•  Starr, Baptist Bibliography, S2241.   Publisher's maroon cloth, front cover and spine with gilt-stamped title; insignificant wear to corners and spine extremities, foot of spine with small area of faint discoloration. Title-page institutionally pressure-stamped, dedication page with inked notation along inner margin and rubber-stamped numeral in lower margin. Back pastedown with traces of now-absent bookplate. Sewing starting to loosen. Pages and plates clean.  (26041)

•  Richmond, Shaker Literature, I, 1279; MacLean, Shaker Literature, 441; McKinstry, Andrews Shaker Collection, 397.   Publisher's printed paper wrappers, unevenly age-toned; front wrapper with minor offsetting of printed text. Pages clean and crisp.  (27503)

For more BOOKS IN GERMAN,  click here.
For more POST-1820 AMERICANA,  click here.
For more RELIGION,  click here.
For more TRANSLATIONS,  click here.
For CONSTITUTIONS & CONSTITUTIONAL
ISSUES,  click here.
For more “GIFTABLES” — mostly $150
      & UNDER,  click here.

A glossary at the end here defines select vocabulary.

Binding: Full moss green pebbled morocco, spine with raised bands and gilt extra; covers bordered with gilt double fillets and an interesting rod, vine, and flower frame gilt within that; gilt board edges and turn-ins. All edges gilt.

Provenance:  Robert George Arbuthnot (?) to Francis Edward Dumford, December 1857 (ink inscription, front fly-leaf verso).

•  Lowndes 2266; Keynes, Pickering, p. 88; Colbeck, A Bookman's Catalogue: The Norman Colbeck Collection (University of British Columbia Press, 1987), Vol. II, p. 976, no. 15.   Bound as above, rubbed at extremities; spine darkened to deeper green. Mild offsetting to yellow endpapers from turn-ins, very light foxing on some leaves mostly at the rear. Bookmark cut from an old envelope (“Official Business”) postmarked Washington, D.C., May 3, 1917. A sound, clean, lovely example of a beautiful little production.  (30119)

George Him both illustrated and designed the book, and also signed the colophon. The book is heavily illustrated with a considerable number of black-and-white line-and-wash drawings and 14 full-page color illustrations which were hand-colored by the pochoir process at the studio of Walter Fischer. These drawings are both beautiful and witty. In one color plate, for example, we see a line of picketing Egyptian soldiers carrying placards reading, “Egypt for the Egyptians,” and “Caesar Go Home,” the latter appearing in “Egyptian Hieroglyphs”; in another plate, we are treated to a breathtaking scene of the library at Alexandria being consumed by fire; in yet another drawing, we see an amusing little rendering of Belzanor's description of a seven-armed wife-eating Roman soldier!

Him chose a monotype Plantin font for the text which was printed in Bloomfield, Connecticut, at the Sign of the Stone Book. The binding is full bright red “vellum book-cloth” stamped on the front with a double-eagle (one American, one Roman) design in gold, and stamped on the spine in black and gold leaf with a design of a Roman legionary standard bearing the title and the author's initials. The endpapers are “nugget-gold” Tweedweave.

This offering does not include the monthly newsletter or the mailing notice.

•  Limited Editions Club, Bibliography of the Fine Books Published by The Limited Editions Club, 1929–1985, 381.   A fine copy with the slipcase, which is covered in “nugget-gold” paper and stamped in black and gold. Slipcase showing traces of rubbing at top and bottom. A great treat for a Shaw-lover!   (21756)

Her lectures were so sensationalized that in Brooklyn a warrant was issued for her on obscenity charges. The current four-page publication describes the topics for three days' worth of lectures, some gender-segregated; admission to Shepherd's talks on the “unspeakable rascality and depravity of the priests of Rome” cost 25 cents per lecture, and this advertisement offers breathless testimonial to the shock value of the scandal revealed for such a reasonable fee. A portrait of Shepherd in nun's habit graces the front page.

We trace only one library copy: This one, now deaccessioned.

•  Folded as issued. Printed on pulp paper: moderately age-toned; creased, with short tears to outer edges. Fragile butnot disintegrating.  (30267)

Provenance:  Inside front wrapper with inked inscription reading “Isaac Gara his Book Bought in Lancaster, August the 23rd, 1827 by his Mother” (the recipient likely being the Hon. Isaac B. Gara [1821–95], journalist, philanthropist, and postmaster of Erie, PA).

•  Shoemaker 30586.   Sewn in publisher's printed paper wrappers as issued; spine starting to split from head and foot, front wrapper with minor bleedthrough from inscription. Inscription as above. Foxed, one leaf with short edge tears from upper margin. In fact a pleasing example of such a thing as it is and with a charming inscription.  (30229)

All images were drawn and etched by the author himself.

Provenance:  Front free endpaper with inked inscription of Fairman R. Furness, of the prominent Furness-Bullitt family. Title-page with earlier signature of “A.G. Findlay.”

•  Hill, Collection of Pacific Voyages, 1563; Howgego, Encyclopedia of Exploration, II, S42; Sabin 80483; NSTC 2S19683.   Contemporary half calf and marbled paper–covered sides, spine with gilt-stamped leather title-label; binding rubbed and abraded overall, spine head and label chipped. Front pastedown with small booklplate bearing no name; ownership inscriptions as above. Lower outer corner of title-page torn away; list of Briton officers with small tear repaired some time ago, tissue now lifting from repair. Pages and plates browned at edges with moderate spotting, staining, and dust-soiling; four pages with ink blurred from press. A fascinating book, an interesting copy.  (28374)

Binding:  Publisher's light brown near-herringbone cloth, covers elegantly stamped in border-and-medallion style in blind, with spine quite interestingly embossed in blind in “compartments” and lettered in gilt.

•  Bound as above, spines sunned and upper corners bumped; tops of spines slightly discolored and each with slight tearing in same area. A few gatherings carelessly opened, in one case with upper outer corners torn across yet no actual loss. Ex–social club library, and each volume has: 19th-century bookplate, call number on endpaper, no other markings. A nice set.  (28758)

Indited in secretary hand with witnesses' signatures in both italic and secretary, the deed is followed by two blank pages on the interior (as usual); the witnesses were John Morroy (Morrey?) and John Best (Lest?), who both had fine signatures. Not unexpectedly, the widow signed with her mark. A docket on the last leaf's verso reads, “Xher [Christopher] Libthorpe To George Rothe” and another, in a second hand, adds, “and a Deed from Pickering to Post for a lot,” with a computation below on the same page.

The watermark appears to be a heart-shaped shield crowned by a fleur de lis, or trefoil; however we find no match in Briquet or Gravell.

•  Parry, E.C., “A Widow's Might,” Old York Road Historical Society Bulletin, Vol. XXVII, 1966. For the early history of Philadelphia, its incidents and denizens, see: Watson, Annals of Philadelphia (1850).   Previously folded in multiple places, and now along bifolium crease only; four small holes in the upper corner where previously stapled or pinned. “Lacing,” a result of the iron gall ink's exposure to moisture, is in evidence here but does not affect the legibility or stability of the deed, which is neatly repaired in two places at the outer edge of the first recto near the remnants of the red wax seal. An attractive relic of colonial American, Pennsylvania/Philadelphia, commercial, and women's history.  (29823)

This is the second U.S. edition of the original German text, following Saur's printing of the previous year; Saur had previously published an English translation, The Everlasting Gospel, in 1753. Neither the present example nor the 1768 printing are widely held institutionally outside of Pennsylvania.

•  ESTC W21009; Evans 11304; Sabin 80878; Hildeburn, Pennsylvania, 2484; Arndt & Eck, German Language Printing in the U.S., 368.   Period-style mottled calf, covers framed in blind double and triple fillets, spine with raised bands ruled in blind; entirely plain without spine labels. Title-page with repaired tear; upper outer corner and portion from middle to outer part of page lost and replaced some time ago, with loss to up to half of nine lines.  (25486)

Harold Lamb wrote the introduction. Of the author's attention to the minutiae of daily life in the Rome of A.D. 63–66 he writes, “The city itself appears in exact historical detail. Praetorians idling at their posts pass the time with their favorite dice games; girl attendants at Petronius' bath finish their duties punctiliously and break away to their own diversions as soon as the door curtain falls behind the master. Sienkiewicz knows how the dishes, including blackbirds, were prepared for a nobleman's feast; he knows what the oriental dancers wore on their heads and what the priests of Cybele carried in their hands, and what you see when you round a corner of the Vicus Sceleratus.”

Salvatore Fiume created the 35 drawings which were reproduced in three-tone process and mounted by hand. Giovanni Madersteig designed this edition, which is limited to 1500 copies, choosing a monotype Old Face font; the composition and printing of the text and illustrations was done by Madersteing at the Officina Bodoni in Verona.

The binding is full natural linen printed, in grey-blue, with an overall pattern derived from an old wood engraving. The signatures of Salvatore Fiume and Giovanni Madersteig appear on the colophon.

•  Limited Editions Club, Bibliography of the Fine Books Published by The Limited Editions Club, 1929–1985, 302.   In the original slipcase, spine sunned with a long closed crack to paper and paper cracked/chipped; case good overall. Book with spine lightly faded and rear pastedown with small gold bookseller's label; volume in the original dust jacket (spine sunned to darker than sides are); near fine.  (22293)

This is this history’s first edition and was followed by 1579, 1593, and 1628 editions. It is printed with a woodcut printer’s device on the title-page showing the goddess Liberty with two books labelled “Bononia docet” (“Bologna teaches”) at her feet. The text is enclosed in double-ruled borders and simply ornamented with a few woodcut initials, one of which shows Juno being pulled in her chariot by peacocks.

•  Adams S1117; Soltész, Catalogus librorum sedecimo saeculo . . . in Bibliotheca Nationali Hungariae . . . S524. On Sigonius, see: Encyclopædia Britannica, 11th ed., XXV, 82; and Sandys, History of Classical Scholarship, II, 143–45. Full calf old style: Round spine with raised bands, accented in gilt beading; tan leather title label; fillets in blind extending onto covers from each band to terminate in trefoils with blind double fillets beyond. Pages lightly washed, clean, and crisp: a few instances of staining, not obscuring text; a few short notations in ink and occasional worming in the margins, neither affecting text; ink stain on p. 95 obscuring letters without loss of sense. Inked title on lower edge, old style. Three ink ownership stamps on title-page. EEe3–4, the last two leaves of the index, are lacking. (4561)

The pairing of Zelaa’s two efforts in one volume is both uncommon and intellectually reinforcing. But here, it is more than that: It is a personal memento of a life’s work as well, forthis copy bears the bookplate of the editor himself.

Provenance:  Bookplate of José María Zelaa é Hidalgo. 20th-century rubber-stamp with initials only of a private Mexican collector.

•  Sigüenza: Medina, Mexico, 9637; Palau 312964. Zelaa: Medina, Mexico, 10540; Garritz 940; not in Palau. Publisher's sheep, gilt spine; small amount of leather missing from base of spine. Collector’s stamp partly offset to title-page; otherwise, the occasional stray stain only. “Association copies” don’t get much more “associated” than this.

ten oversized, folding maps

•  Sabin 81135; Howes S461; American Imprints 44-5635.   Publisher's plain paper–covered boards, recently rebacked with olive green cloth, spine with new antiqued printed paper label; paper rubbed and stained. Hinges (inside) reinforced. Ex–social club library: 19th-century bookplate, call number on endpaper, pressure-stamp on title-page and sectional title, no other markings. All leaves affected by an unusual sort of very light and remarkably even waterstaining that left the upper outer corners (only) untouched and even bright, with a variously wavy line of light to moderate brown marking the “border”; otherwise a few other pages with other soiling or staining; one page with smudge of green ink, touching but not obscuring text; one leaf with short tear from upper margin, not extending into text; and a bit of cockling. An excellent example of a good book that has suffered accidents but also is “better than it sounds.”  (29420)

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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)

•  NSTC S2029; Bitting 436–37; Cagle 990 (first ed.); Oxford 134–35; Vicaire 792 (first ed.).   Contemporary speckled calf, covers framed in gilt double fillets; rebacked some time ago, spine with gilt-ruled raised bands and gilt-stamped leather title-label, spine leather showing small cracks, edges and extremities lightly rubbed. New endpapers. Title-page with small early inked ownership inscription in upper margin; one recipe with tiny, early inked annotation (“1 leg [of beef] will make 5 qts. [of stock]”). Pages untrimmed. Light foxing. A desirable copy.  (26834)

This copy bears an inked dedication to “Marian” (Marianne Case, also addressed as “Mary”), dated 1853.

•  Not in Faxon.   Publisher's red sheep in imitation of morocco, covers framed in gilt double fillets surrounding a blind roll inner border incorporating blind-tooled corner fleurons; central title gilt-stamped on front cover and blind-stamped on back; worn and rubbed overall, with spine leather lost and hinges (inside) tender. Back free endpaper lacking; one guard leaf mostly torn away. Some colored leaves faded; incidents of foxing varying from mild to moderate.  (26148)

This copy matches the copy described in the catalogue of the American Antiquarian Society that is dated as having been printed in 1867.

•  Series not in Sternick.   Publisher's red paper wrappers adhered to oiled linen. Front cover printed in black andgilt with series, publisher, and title information composed to complement a vignette and within a frame; back cover with publisher's list. Spine rubbed, back wrapper with short edge tear to paper (apparently done before the paper was affixed to the final cloth leaf); top line of front wrapper (“INDESTRUCTIBLE”) shaved but readable (and is it just us or is that funny?). Pages slightly darkened, otherwise clean.  (29587)

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)

•  Shoemaker 17997; NSTC 2S24902.   Period-style quarter light grey cloth and light blue paper–covered sides, spine with printed paper label. Pages gently age-toned, a few faintly foxed. A nice copy of one of the most highly regarded natural histories of the time.  (30335)

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Original edition, not a modern reprint.

•  Publisher's oxblood cloth, covers decoratively stamped in black, spine black- and gilt-stamped; corners and spine extremities rubbed, sides with small areas of minor discoloration, spine sunned with paper shelving label at head, a little cocked. Ex–social club library: call number on endpapers, rubber-stamp on title-page and four others. Final blank leaf excised. Clean, sound for use.  (27367)

The volume is illustrated with an additional engraved title-page and eight other steel-engraved plates, as well as several in-text engravings of dramatic moments in soldiers' lives.

•  Sabin 82457.   Publisher's dark red/plum cloth, covers blind-stamped, spine with gilt-stamped title; spine sunned, corners and spine extremities moderately rubbed. Ex–social club library; front fly-leaf with inked numerals covered over with paper, rubber-stamps on frontispiece recto, title-page, and several other pages. Paper slightly embrittled; occasional short edge tears. Title-page and five plates with very faintest waterstaining in lower margins, other pages seemingly untouched.  (26273)

•  ESTC S103687; STC (rev.), 22734. ESTC S106857; STC (rev.) 22676. ESTC S104574; STC (rev.) 22747. ESTC S125529; STC (rev.) 22783. On Smith, see: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.   Later half black sheep in imitation of morocco with red marbled paper–covered boards; moderately rubbed. Ex-library: spine with faded traces of call number and label, front pastedown with institutional bookplate, rubber-stamp on bottom edges of closed book. Pp. 593–757 partially and very neatly paginated in red pen as in continuation of the first portion of the volume; some inked letter corrections as above. Pages age-toned, with intermittent moderate to dark spotting; final portion of volume with a few leaves waterstained. Shouldernotes occasionally shaved and page edges with occasional short tears. First two leaves with outer edges ragged; several with lower margins or outer corners repaired, in one case with loss of about ten words. On the whole, a volume that shows its age but is not giving in to it.  (24098)

Binding:  Publisher's green cloth with textured covers; spine stamped and lettered in gilt. Front cover stamped in gilt with a frame with corner brackets; a very large oval center medallion shows an angel with harp posed between a broken pediment and an hour glass on a closed book, all flanked by weeping willows. Rear cover stamped in blind with same decorative elements. All edges gilt.

•  Sabin 83734.   Binding modestly rubbed, with spine faded and its gilt dimmed; cover gilt in parts “gone to copper” rather attractively. Scattered foxing; several sorts of spotting/staining, darkest stains in upper margins. Overall, a beautiful book in a better than decent copy.  (26863)

•  Pebbled cloth, lightly worn. Leaves with minor cockling, some staining and offsetting. Some pages with portions excised; one leaf excised entirely.

The minister-turned-printer Kuyper (1629–91) produced only Socinian works in the decade 1663–73, many edited by Andreas Wissowatius, Socinus's grandson who had an influential hand in the present opera. The printer Samuel Przypkowski, whose shop produced earlier volumes in the series of which these are a part, contributed the brief biography of Socinus here; and he has graced the text with refined tailpieces, large initials against a floriated background, and woodcut devices to the section titles (some initialed “HB” for printer Hendrick Boom). There are occasional Hebrew references in vol. II.

Provenance:  Early inscription “Middeldorpf” on front flyleaf; bookplate and stamp of Rochester Theological Seminary (later the Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School). Deaccessioned 2005.

Evidence of readership: Sparse ink annotations in a contemporary hand; underlining throughout, heavy in quires R–S and Nnn–Ppp in vol. I.

•  Knijff & Visser, Bibliographia sociniana, 2004–5 (for Bib. fratrum polonorum, see 2001–11); Estreicher Bibliografia polska, XIII: 45–48; Knuttel, Verboden boeken 60; STCN/ Bock I: 46–54; Wallace, Antitrinitarian Biography (for notes on protagonists of the movement); NCE 13: 397–8 (Socinianism).   Contemporary northern-European style vellum over boards ruled in blind, panels with blind-stamped central cartouches, blue speckled edges and evidence of ties; old spotting and soiling with front joint (outside) of vol. II partially open at top and bottom but binding sound. Institutional stamps to each title-page and another few places as above, and additionally an old library sticker to spine of vol. II; old underlining and other inkings as above. Paper somewhat age-toned, with foxing and the occasional stain or short tear; indices (only) with light waterstains in some lower margins (only). A good, solid, clean set.  (29264)

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Binding: Publisher's ribbon-embossed green geometric-patterned cloth of Krupp's style Gt2; original printed paper labels.Do please click to enhance the image of this handsome American binding cloth— it's hard to show, but worth trying to see!

•  American Imprints 49627. On the binding, see: Krupp, Bookcloth in England & America, 1823–1850, Gt2.   Bindings as above, cocked; edges, extremities, labels rubbed, chipped, spotted — far from fresh, but also far from devastated. Ex–social club library: bookplate on each front pastedown, call numbers in a 19th-century hand (lined through) on pastedown and front free endpaper, title-pages and a few others rubber-stamped. No other institutional markings. Front hinge (inside) of vol. I starting, text block pulling away from spine, first few leaves starting to separate. Front fly-leaf with pencilled numeral and pencilled doodle/sketch of a chubby child; occasional faint pencilled annotations. A few scattered spots of staining, pages mostly clean.  (26294)

The Italian text is accompanied by citations and original documentation, which is in both Italian and, mostly, Latin; it is printed in roman and italic, with one large floriated woodcut initial and a decorative headpiece at the beginning of the first chapter. The final leaf contains the imprimatur and errata.

Searches of NUC Pre-1956 and WorldCat locate only two copies in U.S. libraries, one of which has been deaccessioned.

•  Contemporary vellum over boards with four laces visible on covers at spine extremities, gilt title in painted spine compartment, red marbled edges; binding somewhat soiled and bumped and a bit warped, with light worming not penetrating the leather. Title rubbed affecting a few letters; a light brown stain running along the gutter on two leaves and a crescent stain at the bottom of one other not affecting text; small tears at a couple of outer margins; and a handful of natural paper flaws, especially notable to two leaves that literally came up short in the press and therefore have “deckle” lower edges. Old pressure-stamps to title-leaf and a few others, a five-digit accession number stamped in two places, old library pencillings, indications of removed bookplates and card pocket; minor dampstaining, foxing, and age-toning throughout, most notable in the first and last two gatherings. Recital of faults and “library features” makes this sound much less appealing than it is.This is a sound, attractive, pleasing book.  (29568)

•  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)