•  Sutro 284.   One small pin-type wormhole, costing one letter. Very clean and nice.  (27251)

This edition is graced with four charming historiated woodcut initials: “I,” “C,” “R,” and “L.”

Provenance:  On verso of the front free endpaper in an 18th-century hand is a note that the the book belonged to the Capuchin Convent of Mexico City in 1787.

•  Medina, Mexico, 9208.   Publisher's limp vellum with ties, fore-edge of rear cover rodent-gnawed with a corner lost and both covers with part of lower edge likewise gnawed but in limited way; the hungry rodent also nibbled along the fore-edges of pp. 213 to 234, minimally and with remarkable neatness. Ownership notation as indicated. A good, clean volume.  (29589)

WorldCat locates only three U.S. libraries reporting ownership.

•  Palau 209844; Medina, BHA, 3925; not in Sabin but see 58289 for the 1767 Puebla printing.   Removed from a bound volume; old sewing holes visible in inner margin. Very good condition.  (28194)

Uncut bifolia are extremely rare.

This is handsomely printed!

•  Not in Medina, Mexico; not in González de Cossío, Cien; not in González de Cossío, 510.   Folded once and never bound. Crisp.  (24584)

WorldCat locates only four copies in the U.S., but we know of one other.

•  Medina, Mexico, 8973.   Sewn as issued with original plain wrappers and with later green marbled wrappers. One pin hole from front to rear occasionally affecting one letter.  (27224)

•  Not in Medina, Mexico.   Folded twice but never bound. Uncut.  (24565)

For RARE CATHOLICA solo,
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•  Medina, Mexico, 5472.   Contemporary limp vellum with remnants of ties. Worming in lower and inner margins of first portion of volume, not touching text; clean.  (29480)

Uncommon.  OCLC and NUC Pre-1956 locate only three copies in the U.S.

•  Medina, Mexico, 8711.   Contemporary vellum over paste boards of printer's waste, vellum cockled and that of the front cover lightly rodent-gnawed at board edges. Worming in text, some of which is meander type, costing letters. Not a great copy, but given the scarcity, an acceptable one.  (24103)

Evidence of readership: A few marginal notes here and there. Some of these are commentary, some just a word so one can find a section again.

•  Palau 51561; Alden & Landis 654/36; Sabin 11696. Borba de Moraes(2) 173.   Vellum over light boards with remnants of button and loop closures; text uniformly browned (but unembrittled).  (28771)

Sánchez Valverde was the first writer born in Santo Domingo to publish a book and he was a staunch defender of America and his native island against all prejudices and “calumnies” he perceived as directed against both.

Curiously, several sources (Palau, Sabin, WorldCat) give the terminal page of this work as 80 (or LXXX) and certainly the copy at the John Carter Brown Library conforms to that. This copy, however, clearly stops at page LXXIX with the word “Fin” and with what would be LXXX being blank: Ours is in line with Medina.

•  Palau 55495; Sabin 76308; Medina, BHA, 5155. On Clavigero, see: DeBacker-Sommervogel, II, 1209–12.   Loosely attached at one sewing point to a crude and ill-fitting vellum binding; binding soiled and pastedowns stained. Title-page with small splashy stains (dirty water?) in outer margin. Text clean with minimal light foxing here and there.  (29848)

Provenance: A copy of this work was given to each member upon admission and the last page of this copy indicates that it belonged to Joaquín Gorospe who was admitted to membership on 20 April 1803.

Uncommon: No U.S. library reports owning this edition.

•  Medina, Mexico, 9488.   Lacking the wrappers. Soiling to title-page and verso of last leaf. A few age spots.  (26871)

Provenance:  First in the University of Miami Library, deacessioned; then in the library of Robert Chamberlain and later in that of France V. Scholes, both noted scholars of the Yucatán. Their signatures are on the front free endpaper and their notes are penciled in the margins of many pages.

A mixed set in mixed bindings: all volumes except 11 are first editions, the exception being a 1966 reprint. Many original wrappers bound in. Volumes 1–10 in early quarter cloth, 11–42 in modern full cloth.

•  Griffin, Latin America: A guide to the historical literature, 2063; Palau 56442.   Bindings as above: Vols. 1–10 with abrasion/discoloration to spines, otherwise minor wear; moderate foxing, and some early annotations. Vols. 11–42, cloth bright; mostly clean internally, last 2 pages of last volume supplied in facsimile. Vol. 38 lacking fascicles 3, 4, 5, and 6.  (25828)

This copy bears the full-page woodcut portrait of Pope Clement VII on the verso of the fourth preliminary leaf, which is not found with all copies. Additionally, the title-page bears an interesting 14-piece composite woodcut border and the verso of that page has a stunning full-page woodcut of the coat of arms of Charles V, the Holy Roman emperor, to whom the letter is addressed. The coat of arms is surrounded by the collar of the Order of the Golden Fleece. The text is printed in roman with side- and shouldernotes; the lay-out is elegant and there is one large, handsome woodcut initial.

As usual, the letter is here bound with Peter Martyr's De Rebus, et insulis noviter repertis, which provides an account of the recently discovered islands of the West Indies and their inhabitants. It is often considered a substitute for the lost Cortés letter.

One of the most important early descriptions of Mexico and of the first encounter of the West with the Aztec civilization, this is a work of bedrock importance to the New World. No complete copy has appeared for sale since 1985.

•  Alden & Landis, European Americana, 524/5; Sabin 16947; Harrisse, BAV, 125. Sanz 933–34; Medina, BHA, 70; Church 53; Burden 5; JCB, German Americana, 524/4; Streeter Sale 190.   18th-century half vellum and sprinkled paper over boards, gilt red leather label. Map supplied in expert facsimile; blank leaf H8 lacking. Bookplate of John Carter Brown (Library) on front pastedown, with deaccession stamp. Occasional very minor soiling in the text, else very good — a copy clean and even crisp.  (26808)

Click the interior image for an enlargement.

•  Sabin 16953.   Contemporary treed calf, front joint (outside) starting at top to open. A good+ copy — in fact, a rather nice one.  (20510)

Unlike the earlier Mexican printing, this translation is by a Mexican: Alexandro Alvarez de Guitian, the “factor veedor” of the Treasury Office in Veracruz and in the port of San Juan de Ulua. Alvarez de Guitian seems to have liked Croiset's writings for he translated several into Spanish.

Searches of NUC Pre-1956 and WorldCat locate only two copies in U.S. libraries.

•  Medina, Mexico, 4389; DeBacker Sommervogel, II, 1668.   Contemporary limp vellum with remnants of ties, author and title inked in large handsome lettering to spine long ago, with an old library shelf mark also inked thereon (in red); textblock recased. Occasional foxing, occasional stain. Withal a rather nice copy.  (29772)

In the year before her pen is silenced and less than three before she falls victim to the plague while caring for her sick Sisters, Sor Juana, the New World’s greatest lyric poet, attests to a legal document concerning her convent’s economic investments. She was the nunnery’s contadora (bookkeeper). By way of horribly evocative contrast, opposite her signature on the facing page is that of Francisco Aguiar y Seijas, Archbishop of Mexico, the misogynist who caused her to give up her writing and quasi-secular ways.

Able to bully the most gifted member of his religious community only following the return to Spain of her last viceregal patron and protector, the Marquis de la Laguna, Aguiar y Seijas applied increasing pressure to Sor Juana and the prioress of her Hieronymite convent. It took him from 1688 until 1693 to put “la decima Musa” “in her place.”

Documents signed by the polymath Sor Juana are very rare and highly sought after; this one desirably shows the trust her Sisters placed in her. The pairing of her signature with her arch enemy's is chilling and visually impactful.

•  In very good condition.

The copy was made in Durango on 14 May 1668.

•  Written in a clear notarial hand. Several pin-type or other limited wormholes and one long fold tear horizontally at the middle not compromising sense of text.  (30379)

Binding:  Contemporary deep reddish-brown sheep in imitation of morocco, exuberantly flourished in gilt both as to both covers and the spine; front cover gilt extra with arabesque and floral designs surrounding a vignette of a girl bearing a basket of flowers on her head, spine with gilt-stamped title and similar motifs, back cover with blind-tooled foliate decorations and gilt-stamped arabesque motifs. All edges gilt. This binding is illustrated as “lamina XXVIII” in Manuel Romero de Terreros' Encuadernaciones artisticas mexicanas, siglos XVI al XIX.

•  Palau 66293; Sabin 65337 (for 1847 & 1852 eds.).   Binding as above, mild rubbing overall, especially to spine; front joint just starting from head. Hinges (inside) cracked across paper, with text block starting to pull away. Pages gently age-toned, with some light foxing generally to or around plates and a few corners crumpled. One plate with ragged outer edge, not touching image. Silk bookmarker laid in; many guard leaves still present. More solid than description might imply, and an all-around remarkable, beautiful volume.  (29091)