Binding:  Late 19th- or early 20th-century full crimson calf, covers framed in triple gilt fillets with gilt-stamped corner fleurons, spine with gilt-dotted raised bands, gilt-stamped title and author labels, and gilt-stamped compartment decorations. Top edge gilt. The publisher's original brown cloth spine and blind-stamped covers arebound in at the back of the volume. Signed: Front free endpaper stamped “Root & Son.”

•  Hayward 258; Tinker 1509; NSTC 2M1220.   Binding as above, carefully refurbished; edges and extremities mildly rubbed, sides with unobtrusive scuffs and a few small smudges. Previous owner's small ticket on back pastedown, slightly scraped. Two leaves with offsetting from now-absent laid-in slip. Last few leaves with pinhole worming in lower margins, not touching text; worming to back fly-leaves and endpapers neatly repaired. Endpapers foxed; pages age-toned with occasional faint spots or smudges, generally clean. Solid and very attractive.  (29456)

Provenance:  Note in early ink on front fly-leaf by editor/translator Beke presenting the copy to “Adriano Relando” (Adriaan Reland, 1676–1718), professor of Oriental languages and Hebrew antiquity at Harderwijk and Utrecht whose own works on the ancient world include translations from Arabic and a treatise on Islam that landed on the Index. Ink library markings of Magdalen Hall on spine, front pastedown, front fly-leaf, and title-page.

•  STCN 170804. Not in Cowley, Hebrew ... Books in the Bodleian Library, or Steinschneider, Catalogus hebraeorum.   Contemporary full northern-European style vellum ruled in blind with blind-embossed central cartouches on the covers; spine with gilt lettering piece and old ink manuscript library markings (darkened and scuffed with age); faded red edges. Sparse scattered annotations and corrections in early ink. Inconsistently browned, age-toned, and waterstained (notably lower page halves); there are a few foxed spots and some tears, some of these possibly from problems in the press, and some creases across corners.  (29927)

This example is numbered copy 972 of 1500 printed, signed at the colophon by the illustrator; the appropriate LEC newsletter is laid in.

•  Bibliography of the Fine Books Published by the Limited Editions Club, 269.   Binding as above, in publisher's original slipcase; spine leather dried and chipping, slipcase with small scratches and mild shelfwear. Quite sound, and internally very clean and crisp; in fact, depending on taste, the look of the spine can suggest survivorship of a sort that Marcus Aurelius would have appreciated!  (30121)

•  NSTC 2S18901. Removed from a nonce volume. (16764)

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Provenance: 19th-century ownership signatures on front pastedown or front fly-leaf of John T. Wait (Dec. 14, 1839), Luther Spalding (undated), and W.H. Richards.

•  Evans 29025; ESTC W29507; Sabin 44848. On Cobbett, see: The Dictionary of National Biography, XI, 142–45. Contemporary sheep, framed in blind with a roll of a rope design, spine with gilt-stamped title-label; leather worn at edges and front cover expertly reattached, spine worn with chipping. Ownership inscriptions as above. Minor spotting and offsetting.

•  Publisher's blind-stamped cloth, spine with gilt-stamped title; cloth showing light wear over extremities and sides. Last few leaves with mild foxing. Text with pencilled marks of emphasis, including exclamation marks added at interesting points. (13564)

Also included is a woodcut map showing Europe, the Atlantic, and the New World.

•  Palau 159680; Alden & Landis, European Americana, 609/77; Medina, BHA, 123. Old vellum; red leather, gilt-lettered spine label; some staining, and chipping to edges and label. Old, careful repairs to interior worming occasionally cost individual letters (but never sense) or a little loss to an illustration. Old rubber-stamps and red and black ownership label on title-page; inked notations on title-page and front pastedown. All edges speckled red.

•  Lipperheide, Katalog der Freiherrlich von Lipperheide’schen Kostumbibliothek, 285m. Contemporary quarter morocco with marbled paper–covered sides, spine with gilt-stamped title; joints and edges rubbed, joints cracked and leather chipped at spine extremities. Front free endpaper separated but present; front pastedown and free endpaper institutionally rubber-stamped. Pages clean. Absorbing.

Of this first, 1797 American edition, vols. II–VI were printed 1798–99. Printed with ample notes, it has a series of chronological tables at the end. An eight- page Vindication of the Quakers disputing Mosheim's view of that denomination is also appended at the end of vol. VI, just before the list of subscribers. These latter include such noted names as John Adams, then President of the United States, and John Jay, then governor of New York.

•  Evans 32513 and 34154; ESTC W31794. On Mosheim, see: Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, 944. Contemporary sheep, spine modestly gilt with nice gilt-lettered morocco labels and old-fashioned paper library shelf labels; leather scuffed of old and with joints open, sewing holding. Foxing, browning, and staining, variously, the latter obscuring letters in a few places without loss of sense; some endpapers partially detached. Bookplates on some pastedowns. Untattered and a good, useable set.

The French humanist Muret (1526–85) has long been recognized as the best Latin prose stylist of the Renaissance, and his works were used as a model for students. Greatly admired for his excellent understanding and interpretation of classical texts, he was dubbed “le meilleur orateur du temps” in Italy and France by Montaigne, whom he tutored; and Scaliger mused that Muret “satirised the Ciceronians and at the same time expressed himself in a thoroughly Ciceronian style.” LIke most of Muret's published work, these Variae are based on his academic lectures; however the scholar Lambinus accused Muret of plagiarism, and indeed it seems Muret “borrowed” bits from his work without permission. (In retaliation, Lambinus published their personal correspondence.)

Muret's personal life was fraught with tribulation stemming from multiple accusations of homosexuality in various cities where he resided. From 1559 till his death, however, he lived in Rome under the protection of at least one cardinal and a pope.

The text is in Latin and Greek, printed in roman and italic, with decorative headpieces and floriated initials. A letterpress diagram on p. 547 shows the Greek alphabet corresponding to numerals.

Provenance:  John Saltar (19th-century adolescent's signature, front pastedown); Henry Johns Gibbons, Rittenhouse (Philadelphia), 1923 (signature, front fly-leaf verso).

•  Adams M1971. On Muret, see: Sandys, History of Classical Scholarship, II, pp. 148–52.   Contemporary vellum with evidence of four ties and trace of oval stamp to front cover center, ink title to spine and bottom edge; soiled, with worm to spine/ pastedowns, hinges (inside) cracked, textblock starting to loosen. Paper age-toned and foxed, with small holes from natural flaws on two leaves (and two others partially uncut); Hymni dampstained in lower inner portions (not horribly). A few early ink annotations present.  (30146)