
JAPAN
The
FIRST ENTIRELY
ENGRAVED Book
Printed in
the
AMERICAS

(A
Famous, REMARKABLE Book). Montes de Oca, José. Vida
de
San
Felipe de Jesus protomartir de Japon y patron de su
patria Mexico. Mexico: Montes de Oca ... Calle del. Baustisterio de S. Catalina
m.e n.o 3, 1801. 4to (23 cm; 9"). [1] f., 28 [of 30] plts.
$8750.00
Click the interior images for enlargements.
With this work Montes de Oca secured for himself the position of the most important and talented engraver in the New World at the beginning of the 19th century. He conceived and
self-published this, the first entirely engraved book printed in the Americas. In a series of 30 plates with captions he told the biography of St. Philip of Jesus (1572–97), the protomartyr of Japan.
This is a rare book with only nine U.S. libraries reporting ownership: Several of those copies are lacking either one, two, or three of the plates, and it is certain that the book was issued unbound, as a gathering of 31 individual leaves, thus accounting for copies with less than the “requisite” engraved title and 30 plates. This copy in fact confirms that the plates spent part of their lives unbound, as two of them are touched by small instances of worming that have not touched their next neighbors!
Montes de Oca's plates are particularly detailed and moving when they show the saint in Japan being abused and tortured, but all are strong and striking.
Uncut.
Palau 363045. Late 19th-century plain sheep binding. Uncut; lacking two plates and two with minor worming as noted above; all plates well impressed, as would be expected of a work that the artist himself saw through the press!
A very good copy of a scarce and important work. (25095)

A Jesuit Pioneer in
India & Japan
Bouhours, Dominique. La vie de Saint François Xavier, de la Compagnie de Jésus, apostre des Indes et du Japon. Nouvelle édition. Paris: Chez Guillot, 1787. 12mo (16 cm, 6.5"). 2 (of 2) vols. I: 24, 442, [2] pp. (lacks frontis.) II: [4], 418, [1] pp.
$900.00

Later edition of this French Jesuit's biography of Saint Francis Xavier, in two volumes; first pu blished in Paris, in 1682, it is here complete in six books, with a “Table des Matières” at end of second volume. Per Sommervogel, it is the “edition du P. Brolier, qui a mis on tête la lettre de Condé au P. Talon sur cette Vie et l'a fait suivre d'observations.”
Click the interior image for an enlargement.
The New Advent Catholic Encyclopedia notes that Dominique Bouhours (1632–1702) was best known to English readers as the author of this much-reprinted work and an earlier life of Ignatius of Loyola; for a long time these were “the most widely circulated biographies” of the two saints. Bouhours also achieved prominence for his anti-Jansenist writings.
The pair of volumes were nicely printed, with some nicely engraved head- and tailpieces. The text offers sidenotes.
Rare. A search of OCLC records only two copies, of which this is one, now deaccessioned.
De Backer-Sommervogel, I, 1904–1905; Cordier, Bibliotheca Japonica, 146. Recent full calf, covers framed and panelled with single gilt fillets and with gilt-stamped corner fleurons; spines gilt extra, with gilt-ruled raised bands, gilt-stamped leather title and volume labels, gilt publication date at foot, and elaborately gilt-tooled floral decorations in compartments; marbled endpapers. Tear in outer margin of pp. 269/270, just barely touching sidenotes; very occasional foxing; offsetting from leather of previous binding affecting first and last leaves at margins, including title-pages. Ex-library, with faint penciled notations on verso of title-page and at base of following page in each volume. Vol. I lacks the frontispiece portrait. Faults noted, still a good copy and in an attractive binding. (24526)

Japan during the
Years of Seclusion, for an American Audience
Busk, Mary Margaret, & Philipp Franz von Siebold. Manners and customs of the Japanese, in the nineteenth century. From the accounts of recent Dutch residents in Japan, and from the German work of Dr. Ph. Fr. von Siebold. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1841. 12mo (15.7 cm, 6.2"). Add. engr. t.-p., [2], 298 pp.
$150.00
First U.S. edition, printed in the same year as the London
first, here part of Harper's “Family Library” series. The volume
was edited by Mrs. William Busk (Mary Margaret Busk), an author and literary
critic; Busk nicely summarized what was then known of Japan via the Dutch traders
at Dejima, using as her sources not only the writings of von Siebold, but also
those of Engelbert Kaempfer, Hendrik Doeff, Germain Felix Meylan, and Overmeer
Fischer. The additional title-page bears a steel-engraved vignette depicting
a Japanese man courting a fan-wielding lady, and there are chapters on “Social
and Domestic Life,” “Language, etc.,” and the “Religion
of Japan.”
Click the images for enlargements.
Binding: Publisher's olive-brown vermiform embossed cloth of Krupp's style Mis1, spine with gilt-stamped series and individual title.
American Imprints 41-3339; Cordier, Bibliotheca Japonica, 475–76. Binding as above, cocked and front board slightly warped, sides with light discolorations; spine faded and head with strip of dark cloth tape extending onto sides. Ex–social club library: 19th-century bookplate and call number on front pastedown, first three leaves pressure-stamped, no other markings. First half of volume with pages faintly waterstained in upper portions and cockled; a sound book and as good a “read” as it was for the club members. (26428)

Michener on
Japanese Woodblocks
Michener, James A. Japanese prints from the early masters to the modern. Rutland, VT & Tokyo, Japan: Charles E. Tuttle Co., (copyright 1959). Folio (31.7 cm, 12.5"). 287, [1] pp.; plts., 6 fold.
$250.00
First edition of this “tour of three centuries of art,” conducted by famed novelist Michener. 257 illustrations decorate the substantial volume, including 55 in full color; many are full-page, others in-text or several to a page.
Publisher's textured taupe silk binding, front cover with patterned coral silk insert; spine with gilt-stamped title. Dust wrapper and original slipcase present, lower back corner of jacket slightly crumpled; otherwise a gorgeous, clean copy in an undamaged slipcase. (24683)

Courting
the Anglo-American Tourist before WWII
Nisizawa, Tekiho. Japanese folk-toys. [Tokyo]: Board of Tourist Industry, Japanese Government Railways, © 1939. 12mo. Col. frontis., 82 pp.; col. illus.
$38.50
First edition: “Tourist Library: 26,” translated by S. Sakabe. Illustrated overview of Japanese toys from the archaic period forward: The illustrations are
in color, and charming.
Click the image for an enlargement.
Publisher's printed paper wrappers, front wrapper with affixed color-printed illustration; corners and edges rubbed, wrappers sunned and lightly soiled, front wrapper with small area of discoloration from now-absent label. Ex–social club library with its attractive bookplate, back inside wrapper with charge-slip, inked numeral in lower margin of preface, no other markings. Pages clean; a few corners bumped. (27469)

WORLD MYTHOLOGY — 8 Vols. & Thousands of Entries
Pozzoli, Giovanni; Felice Romani; Antonio Peracchi, et al. Dizionario storico-mitologico di tutti i popoli del mondo. Livorno: Stamperia Vignozzi, 1824–28. 8 vols. 8vo (21 cm, 8.25"). I: 580 pp. II: 581–1163, [1] pp. (pp. 1057–64 repeated in place of pp. 1065–72). III: [1165]–1708 pp. (pagination 1551–52 repeated, 1687–88 skipped). IV: [1709]–2342 pp. V: 2351–3086 pp. (pagination skips 2519–26). VI: 3087–3855 pp. (pagination skips 3407–08). VII: 576 pp. VIII: 577–1074 pp.
$2500.00
Click the middle and right hand-images for enlargements.
Second edition of this classic dictionary of comparative mythology,
a hefty collection of the deities, heroes, tales, festivals, antiquities, and
other folklore of numerous cultures and countries including Mexico, Peru, America,
Africa, India,
Japan,
China, etc, along with Jewish, Greek, and Roman antiquities. The foundation
of the work was François Noel's Dictionnaire de la Fable; copious
additions and corrections were made by Pozzoli, Romani (the famed poet, scholar,
and librettist for La Scala), and Peracchi (another librettist). The resulting
encyclopedic endeavor was originally published from 1809–27 under the
title Dizionario d'ogni mitologia e antichità incominciato, according
to Graesse and Brunet, who both give Pozzoli's first name as Girolamo.
This set includes two volumes of supplemental text, adding a number of entries.
The first edition was followed by two volumes of supplemental plates, not
present here and not called for: Graesse describes this edition as “sans
grav.”
The pagination is erratic in a number of places; there is a numbering gap
from 2342 to 2351 between vols. IV and V, but the text and signatures are
uninterrupted.
Uncommon:
OCLC locates only two U.S. institutional holdings of this second edition.
Provenance:
Most volumes with small inked ownership inscription in an outer margin:
“G.R.W.” the mark of William Rollinson Whittingham (1805–79),
fourth Episcopal Bishop of Maryland and an enthusiastic book collector.
Brunet, IV, 851; Graesse, V, 429. Not in Sabin. Contemporary
half binding, recently rebacked with tan paper, spines with printed paper
labels; boards rubbed and faded with small chips, one vol. with front cover
waterstained. Foxing almost throughout, generally no worse than moderate;
light waterstaining in upper margins of vol. I; one leaf in vol. VII with
lower outer portion torn away, with loss of words from about 18 lines on each
side. Vol. II with printer's error replacing pp. 1065–72 with duplicates
of pp. 1057–64; pagination erratic in other places. Most vols. with
ownership mark as above; vol. VI with one pencilled and one inked marginal
annotation. (25862)

“If a Woman Has Long Hair, It Is Glory to Her”
Saito, R. Japanese coiffure. [Tokyo]: Board of Tourist Industry, Japanese Government Railways, © 1939. 8vo. Col. frontis., 88 pp.; illus.
$25.00

First edition: “Tourist Library: 28,” translated by M.G. Mori. Illustrated overview of Japanese men's and women's hairstyles from the Edo period to the early 20th century.
Click the image for an enlargement.
Publisher's printed paper wrappers, front wrapper with affixed color-printed illustration; corners and edges rubbed, wrappers lightly soiled and sunned, front wrapper with small area of discoloration from now-absent label. Ex–social club library with its very attractive bookplate, back inside wrapper with check-out slip, inked numeral in lower margin of preface, no other markings. Pages clean. (27468)