Further BOOKS from the LIBRARY of
THE EARLS OF MACCLESFIELD
CATALOGUE 1459
MAGGS BROS. LTD.
Further Books from the Library of
The Earls of Macclesfield
CATALOGUE 1459
MAGGS BROS. LTD.
2012
Item 80; Fludd.
5
Front cover illustration:
The arms of the first Earl of Macclesfield taken from an armorial head-piece
to the dedication of Xenophon Cyropaedia ed. T. Hutchinson, Oxford, 1727.
A FURTHER SELECTION OF BOOKS FROM THE LIBRARY OF
THE EARLS OF MACCLESFIELD AT SHIRBURN CASTLE
Back cover: item 80, Robert Fludd.
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T
he library of the earls of Macclesfield was created
in the first fifty years or so of the eighteenth
century, and was one of the great Country House
libraries of England. It was housed in two large
rooms, the larger North library and the South
Library at Shirburn Castle, Shirburn, a small hamlet
near Watlington, Oxfordshire, England, a house
and estate acquired by Thomas Parker first earl
of Macclesfield (1667-1732), a distinguished lawyer,
and founder of the family’s fortunes. The first earl
was a fellow of the Royal Society of London, and
was one of the pall-bearers at the exequies of Sir
Isaac Newton in 1727. It was his son George, the
second earl (1697-1764) who was president of the
Royal Society, and who introduced into the House
of Lords the bill for changing the calendar from
the Julian to the Gregorian, thereby bringing the
United Kingdom, and its colonies, into line with the
rest of Europe. In the form in which it reached the
twentieth century, the library had essentially been
created by 1750, and the man whose influence and
interests, apart from those of the first and second
earls, played a major role in this was William
Jones (c. 1675-1749), another fellow of the Royal
Society, himself a mathematician and scientist, but
someone with a wide range of interests. It was this
conjunction of money and interests which lay behind
the extraordinarily rich holdings of manuscript and
printed books concerned with the physical sciences,
with such matters as calendrical establishment and
reform, and with the study of language, this last
element in large part founded upon the acquisition
in the 1740s of the collections of Moses Williams
(1685–1742), Welsh scholar and translator, son of
Samuel Williams (c.1660–c.1722). The lawyer Sir
Thomas Clarke (1703/4-1764), a protegé of the first
earl, also played a part in the creation of the library.
The activities of all of these men may be seen in
this catalogue.
In the nineteenth century some of its treasures,
particularly the collection of letters of scientists,
amongst them Isaac Newton, were published
and made available. Throughout the twentieth
century access was limited. Before 2000 the sole
element of the library which had been sold was
the important collection of Welsh material (from
Williams) which went to form part of the foundation
collections of the National Library of Wales. Since
the sale to Cambridge University library of the
Newton and other scientific papers, which was
commemorated by an exhibition in 2001-2002,
the library has been largely dispersed, either in
twelve auction sales, divided by subject, at Sotheby’s,
London, or by sales of individual items through
Maggs Bros Ltd. The auction sales included the
mass of scientific material and a small number of
medieval manuscripts, amongst them, and now
in the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, what is
known as the Macclesfield Psalter. Some later private
sales of manuscript material have been to the British
Library, amongst them the Shirburn Ballads and
the Macclesfield Alphabet Book. Of the last and of
the Psalter facsimiles have been published.
Many notable books have been acquired by
institutions and private collectors in the United
Kingdom, in Europe and in the United States.
But all libraries contain ‘ordinary’ books as well
as outstanding rarities. In 2010 our catalogue
1440 offered a selection of these, and this present
catalogue offers another group of books in many
languages and on many subjects. There are a few
books previously offered, but for the most part
the material here offered is fresh, and affords an
opportunity for all to obtain something from this
5
remarkable and very large library. All books have
the 19th-century armorial bookplate of the library
and are stamped with the small armorial embossed
stamp. A few have the 18th-century bookplate of
the Military Collection of Lt. General the Hon. G.L.
Parker, whose collection of military books passed
into the library, and a very few have the engraved
bookplate of Thomas Parker of the Middle Temple,
that is the first earl. Details of other provenances
are given where applicable.
5
SUBJECT INDEX
ANTIQUITIES. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4, 10, 19, 21, 22, 41, 46, 60, 66, 67, 74, 90, 112, 118, 159, 160
ARABIC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53, 165
ART. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106, 185, 190, 194
BIOGRAPHY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28, 64, 81, 162, 182
CARTOGRAPHY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83, 100, 172
CLASSICAL TEXTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7, 8, 12, 13, 42, 48, 56, 88, 89, 116, 117, 119, 122, 127
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138, 139, 143, 146, 163, 164, 180, 187, 188, 200, 203
EDUCATION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14, 109
ENGLISH & MODERN LANGUAGE TEXTS. . . . . . . . . . . . . 8, 9, 33, 40, 50, 97, 103, 104, 124
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138, 139, 148, 161, 191
ENGRAVINGS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
FOOD AND DRINK. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12, 72, 111
HISTORY. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17, 18, 20, 27, 29, 39, 50, 51, 61, 65, 71, 105, 125
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150, 151, 153, 154, 170, 177, 186, 193, 196
HUMANISM, LATIN VERSE, LIT. HISTORY . . . . . . . 6, 24, 37, 43, 62, 69, 75, 76, 136, 147
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158, 173, 178, 179, 188, 201, 202
LANGUAGE. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8, 35, 45, 47, 52, 53, 57, 58, 73, 77, 78, 87, 95
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96, 113, 142, 156, 157, 167, 174, 184, 200
LAW . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91, 98
1 ACARETE DU BISCAY. A relation
of Mr. R.M.’s voyage to Buenos-Ayres:
and then by land to Potosi. Dedicated to the
honourable the court of the South-Sea Company.
8vo (150 x 96mm.) v, [1], 3-117, [3]p., engraved map
‘Part of the great river de la Plata, of Tucuman’
by H. Moll, contemporary sheep, flat spine, upper
cover loose.
London: John Darby, 1716 £1500
Acarete made two journeys up the river Plate, one if the
late 1650s and the other in the early 1660s. It was first
published in French as no. 37 in Thevenot’s Relation de
voyages of 1672, and no account of the author, other than
his name, seems to exist, but he may well have been a
French Basque This English translation first appeared
in 1698 as part of a volume published by Samuel Buckley,
Voyages and discoveries in South America (Wing V 746). There
is a modern Spanish translation of the work (Alicante 2001).
A variant of this edition with the name of the printer
at the end of the prelims is also known.
Sabin 42918; Palau 260451.
SWEDENBORG
2 ACTA LITERARIA SUECIAE. Acta
literaria Sueciae Upsaliae publicata.
Volumen primum [only] continens
annos 1720. 1721. 1722. 1723. & 1724.
4to (200 x 155mm.) [14], 1-90, 95-122, [2], 123- 246,
[4], 247-366, 2], 367-490, [2], 491-608, [24], engraved
frontispiece, plates, one woodcut, contemporary half
vellum.
Upsala & Stockholm: literis Wernerianis, prostat apud
J.H. Russworm, [1724] £450
LIBRARIES. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
This is the first of four volumes. The full series seems to
have run to 1742.
MILITARY SCIENCES. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36, 38, 49, 79, 120, 130, 131, 139, 145
Contains a number of pieces by Swedenborg.
PHILOSOPHY. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84, 101, 132, 155
POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134, 135
SCIENCE. . . . . . . . 2, 5, 13, 16 ,20, 23, 44, 55, 59, 63, 80, 82, 85, 86, 93, 99, 102, 104, 107, 108
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121 123, 126, 137, 141, 144, 149, 151, 168, 169, 181, 192, 195, 198, 199
SHIPS & SHIPPING. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94, 123
SILK WORMS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
SLAVONIC BOOKS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114, 115, 140
THEOLOGY. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3, 11, 14, 25, 26, 34, 51, 54, 102, 105, 133, 152, 155, 171, 197
TRAVEL, NAVIGATION &c.. . . . . . . . . . . . 1, 4, 15, 18, 30, 68, 92, 110, 123, 129, 151, 166, 176
5
3 AGOPIAN, Youhannes. T’argmanout iwn italakansrbazani Xorhdatetern. La
dichiaratione della liturgia armena. Fatta
in Italliano [sic]… Ad instanza delli signori
Armeni habitanti in questa città di Venetia.
4to (190 x 140mm.) 51, [1]pp., title and text printed
in red and black, some leaves cropped close at head
with loss of page numbers, modern half calf.
Venice: M.A. Barboni, 1690 £1000
This work, apparently meant for those members of the
Armenian community in Venice, who needed an Italian
aid with the language of the liturgy, encompasses the text
of the liturgy with a facing Italian translation. Yovhannes
Agopian is described as a papal missionary in the title
but he is better known as Yovhannes of Constantinople
(Kostandbupolsec’i) the author of an Armenian grammar,
found with his Puritas linguae armenicae (Rome, 1675), a
manual of oratory published in Marseilles in 1674. He also
published an Armenian translation of Flos virtutum (Rome,
1675) and an Armenian-Latin catechism, Speculum veritatis,
published in Venice by Barboni in 1680 (see Nersessian
40-44 and 47).
A similar work in Latin was published in Rome, again
by the Propaganda Press, in 1677 - Lyturgia Armena.
Ministerium missae etc. in Armenian of which the BL copy
(17024.e.2) also has a Latin version - Codex mysterii missae
Armenorum etc.
Michiel Angelo Barboni, whose activity in Venice
is attested from the late 1660s published an Armenian
breviary (Zhamagirk) and Tagharan in 1681, in 1682 a
Psalter (Saghmosaran) and Dashants tught - Lettera dell
amicitia a dell unione di Costantino gran cesare a disan Siluestro
sommo pontefice, e di Tirdade re della armenia, e dis. Gregorio /
iluminatore della natione armena scritta nell anno del Signore
316 [Letter of Concord] and in 1685 a prayerbook based
on Latin sources, a Gospels, and a Calendar (N. 49-51).
The latest date of any item from his press seems to be 1690,
this work and a confession of faith by Nerses Snorhali.
Of this extremely rare item we have located one copy in
the BNF and one in Venice at the Mekhitarist monastery.
4 ALDRETE, Bernardo. Varias antiguedades
de España Africa y otras provincias.
4to (235 x 165mm.) [16 (incl. engr. title)], 640, [72]
pp., engr. title, and 3 engr. illustrations (maps on
pp. 44, 528, coins p. [179]) contemporary English
calf, later gilt spine, English (biblical) pastedowns,
title-leaf somewhat dusty, upper joint weak, spine
splitting, rubbed.
Antwerp: (G. Wolschaeten & H. Aertsens for) J. Hafrey,
1614 (1615) £1800
First edition (the work was reprinted in 1724).
This extensive and learned work is divided into four books,
two dealing with Spain and two with Africa. It is much
concerned with language and The work makes use of
Greek and Hebrew type and a woodcut Syriac alphabet
appears on p. 177, with Arabic (final letter forms only)
on p. 178.
Aldrete (1568 -1645) who came from Malaga is described
on the title as a Canon of Cordoba, a preferment which
3
his brother Jose (1560-1616, a Jesuit; see Sommervogel i,
151) made over to him. The two brothers were apparently
so alike, that Gongora called them las vinagreras (see the
note in E. Todart y Güell, Bibliografia espanyola d’Italia dels
origens de la imprempta (1927) i, 53-54). He is chiefly known
for his work on the Castilian language (which amongst
other things, he first saw as being derived from Latin)
published in Rome in 1606 (Del origen y principio de la
lengua castellana…). According to Todart y Güell, he left
a large library to the Jesuits, dispersed in 1767.
In some copies there is a final quire of 4 leaves signed
with a paraph, which contains according to PeetersFontainas, errata and contents. It is not here present. It
is not present in the 3 copies in the BL (nor in the 4 copies
in Oxford) and the late Anna Simoni classes the makeup
as here, as a separate issue.
Palau 6391; Peeters Fontainas 30; Simoni A59.
Provenance: Juan Maurizio written in capitals on engraved
title-page.
5ANDERSON, Robert. The Making of
Rockets. in Two Parts. The first containing
the Making of Rockets for the meanest
Capacity. The other to make Rockets by a
Duplicate Proposition, to 1000 pound Weight
or higher. Experimentally and Mathematically
Demonstrated, by Robert Anderson.
8vo (154 x 94mm.) [16], 48pp., a few woodcut
diagrams, heading on D3r “Necessary Tables for
Rockets” cropped off, a few page numbers shaved.
Contemporary sheep (spine and edges rubbed,
joints cracked).
London: for R. Morden, 1696 £4000
First edition. Anderson began life as a silk-weaver and in
the 1660 published a work on mathematics. Subsequently
he became interested in ballistics and in 1674 published
a work on guns. This work on rockets and propellants
is also concerned also with the strength of gun metal
and how to increase (or decrease) this. In his address
to “young pyrobolistes” he mentions the sort of rocket
“suitable for all private occasions”, and the last leaf of the
prelims. advertises where and from whom one may buy
rocket moulds, taper bits for rockets, and rods for rockets,
these last available from ‘Mr. Stateham in Token-HouseYard, Lothbury’. All the providers are described as “right
good workmen”.
Wing A3105 (BL & Glasgow University only). In addition
there is now a copy at Huntington (ex Burndy Library).
MAGGS
6 ANGELI, Pietro. Syrias hoc est expeditio
illa celeberrima christianorum principum,
qua Hierosolyma ductu Goffredi Bolionis
Lotharinguiae ducis a Turcarum tyrannide
liberata est. Eiusdem votivum carmen in
D. Catharinam. (Roberti Titii… scholia).
9 ARETINO, Pietro. Quatro comedie…
cioè Il Marescalco la Talanta. La Cortegiana
L’Hipocrito. Nouellamente ritornate, etc.
4to (212 x 150mm.) [24], 496pp., italic type, woodcut
initials, eighteenth-century English calf, triple gilt
fillet on covers, a little rubbed.
Florence: F. Giunta, 1591 £800
A very nice copy of this English edition, one of John Wolfe’s
pseudo-Italian imprints, a group of books printed in
London either with false imprints, Palermo and the like,
or, as here, no imprint at all, and all intended to deceive the
English authorities. These four comedies collected together
had all been published before, and were well known. La
Cortegiana is a comic take on Castiglione’s famous book,
and seems to have been first published in 1534 (edition
mis-dated 1544). L’Hipocrito was again published in 1542 by
Marcolini in Venice, and Il Marescalco, based on Aretino’s
own experiences at the court of Mantua, first in 1533,
being several times reprinted. La Talanta was written in
1542 for the Compagnia della Calza I Sempiterni, and
produced with magnificent sets setting the scene in Rome
(like la Cortegiana).
Pietro Aretino (1492-1556) ‘the divine Aretino’ as he
was called by Ariosto, was born at Arezzo, and was a highly
successful satirical writer. Today his name is a by-word
for erotic literature solely because of one of his works,
the Modi a series of erotic sonnets illustrative of sexual
positions, first published in 1525, and the subject of some
striking engravings.
8vo (142 x 88mm.) ff. [8], 485, [3 (errata)], early 18thcentury English calf, spine gilt in compartments.
[London: J. Wolfe]: 1588 £1150
First edition of all twelve books of this poem, retelling in
hexameter verse of the story of the first crusade, led by
Godfrey of Bouillon (ca. 1060-1100), a story also told by
Tasso in Gierusalemme liberata. The book is handsomely
printed in italic type with large woodcut initials. The first
four books were published in Paris 1582-84 by Patisson
and books V-VI were published as part of Angeli’s Poemata
in 1585.
The author (1517-96) was from Barga, hence the
toponymic Bargaeus, a name commemorated in the lines
of Latin verse inscribed in a 17th-century French hand at
the end of the preliminary leaves. During his long life he
worked as Greek scribe and editor, and indeed translated
Sophocles Oedipus rex into Italian (1588).
Provenance: 17th century French inscription of - Vallognes
on title-page (name found also elsewhere in books from
this library).
STC 19911; Pforzheimer 800; Woodfield Surreptitious
Printing; Censimento 2486.
7APOLLONIUS Rhodius. Argonauticorum
libri IV. Ab Jeremia Hoelzlino in latinum
conversi; commentario & notis illustrati, etc.
8vo (172 x 105mm.) [16], 42, [2], 543, [1]; 368, [16]
pp., contemporary English calf, red edges.
Leiden: ex officina Elzeviriana, 1641 £450
Jeremias Hoelzlin (1583-1641) is chiefly remembered as
editor of the textus receptus of the Greek NT. Sebastiano
Timpanaro in The genesis of Lachmann’s method mentions
him briefly.
Willems 504.
8APPIAN of Alexandria. Appian
Alexandrin des guerres des Romains.
Traduit de grec en françois par M. Odet Philippe,
Sieur des Mares.
Folio (348 x 210mm.) [16][, 549, [25]p., late eighteenth
century tree calf, spine elaborately gilt, red morocco
lettering-piece, yellow edges, some leaves at end
slightly damp-stained.
Paris: A. Sommaville, 1659
£550
THE REVIVAL OF
THE ORDER OF THE GARTER
The translator tells us that he used the 1551 Paris edition
of the Greek text printed by Estienne, and kept in view
differing Latin versions, some of them better than others,
as well as the sixteenth-century version in french by Claude
de Seyssel. He is particularly insistent on using ancient
geographical names: ‘for example, I believe that more
people understand me when I speak of the Peloponnese
than when I speak of the Morea’. The preface also mentions
a map, and a ‘Paralèlle de la géographie ancienne avec
la moderne’. Neither is here present, although found in
some copies. The book seems to be remarkably uncommon,
whether dated, as here, 1659, or as in some copies 1660.
Provenance: Military Collection of Lt. Gen. Hon. George
Parker.
10 ASHMOLE, Elias. The Institution,
Laws & Ceremonies of the Most Noble
Order of the Garter; and a brief account of
all the other military orders of knighthood
in England, Scotland, France, Spain,
Germany, Italy, Swedeland, Denmark, &c.
With the ensigns of the several orders.
Folio (360 x 210mm.) [12], 720, [104] pp., engraved
frontispiece of Charles II by W. Sherwin, 13
folding engraved plates, two full page engravings
and numerous illustrations throughout the text,
contemporary calf, corners tooled in gilt, red
morocco spine label (edges and corners a little
rubbed and bumped, upper joint split but held by
cords, flyleaves a little torn in places), small spot on
a1, K2, Pp1, Pp2, Gggg4 and Nnnn1 (occasionally
5
touching a couple of lines of text), very minor paper
flaw to the blank fore-corner of Bbb2, corner of Lll2
miscut and folded.
London: Thomas Dring, 1693 £1300
Originally published in 1672 this magnificent work was
Ashmole’s attempt to revive the order of the Garter after
the Restoration. The fine full length engraved portrait of
Charles II precedes the Royal dedication of the book by
Ashmole to the King. Many of the handsome plates are by
the Czech émigré etcher Wenceslaus Hollar which show
various articles of ceremonial dress, formal processions,
and a series of impressive views of Windsor Castle (St
George’s chapel is the chapel of the Order of the Garter).
Ashmole records in his diary that on ‘May 24, 1659 I went
to Windsor and took Mr. Hollar with me to take views
of the castle’.
Michal Hunter notes Ashmole’s ‘extensive research’
in the production of this ‘lavish folio […] densely packed
with detail about the history of the order’ (ODNB). Of
particular note is Ashmole’s attempt to trace the history
of ceremonial dress back to the Romans before tracing
the history forwards into the modern period, he writes:
‘Among the Ancient, the Romans were most exact, in
assigning each Degree, a peculiar Habit and vesture; by
which alone the quality and condition of their citizens might
be known and distinguished, The custom of distinction in
Apparel was afterwards taken up by sundry other Nations
also, whence it came to pass that every Military as well as
Ecclesiastick order of Knighthood did appropriate to itself
a peculiar Habit, Ensign, or Badge; and these, the Fellows
and Companions of those orders, were appointed and
enjoined to wear. to the end, they might be distinguished
by them, as from others, so from one another, and best set
forth State and Honor of their several societies’.
Wing A3984.
11 ATHANASIUS, St. Aq anasiou
d ialog o i e… Dialogi V, de sancta
trinitate. Basilii libri IIII, adversus impium
Eunomium. Anastasii et Cyrilli compendiaria
orthodoxae fidei explicatio. Ex interpretatione
Theodori Bezae. Foebadi sive Soebadii
[rectè Phoebadii] contra Arianos, etc.
8vo (170 x 100mm.) [16], 431, [1]; 27p., last leaf
of prelims a blank, eighteenth century English
sprinkled calf.
[Geneva]: H. Estienne, 1570 £650
In this volume Beza has combined a group of antiheterodox, and strongly Trinitarian, texts by Athanasius
(five dialogues between an orthodox believer and an Arian),
MAGGS
and St. Basil, Adversus Eunomium, by far the longest text (pp.
191-423). The slightly imperfect manuscript of Athanasius
we are told in the dedication p. [vi] had been bought from
a ‘Graeculus’ (the opprobrious diminutive used by Juvenal)
who happened to be passing through Geneva. The text
of Basil was generally said to be in five books, but Beza
notes that books four and five are not by him, although
he has included book four. At the end, there is the short
catechism of Athanasius and St. Cyril (pp. 425-431), the
manuscript of which had been provided by the lawyer
Basilius Amerbach the younger (1533-1591).
The volume, which has a parallel Latin translation by
Beza, is dedicated to the faithful ‘professing the catholic
and orthodox faith on the unique essence of God, and on
the three persons subsisting in that essence’ (the Trinity)
in Eastern Europe (Poland, Lithuania etc.), where antiTrinitarianism flourished at this date. Beza actually
mentions various contemporary ‘heretics, including
Giorgio Biandrata (Blandrata, 1516-1588) and Fausto
Sozzini (Socinus- here spelled Sosinus-, 1530-1604). The
dedication has a somewhat papal feel to its opening:
‘Laetentur caeli, & exultet terra…’. It is printed in full
with commentary in Correspondance tome 11 1570 (Geneva,
Droz, 1983).
Appended at the end is the short work of Phoebadius, a
copy of which had been provided by Pierre Pithou (153996) Phoebadius was (probably) the first Bishop of Agen
in the middle of the 4th century AD. He seems to have
lived right until the end of the century, as St. Jerome, who
attributes this work to him in De viris illustribus, speaks
of him in 392 as alive.
13 AUGUST II Duke of Branschweig-Lüneburg.
Gustavi Seleni Cryptomenytices
et cryptographiae libri IX, etc.
Folio (295 x 185mm.) [36], 493, [1]pp., half-title
folding letterpress table, engraved border on titlepage, 3 engraved illustrations, woodcut diagrams,
printer’s device on final verso, contemporary Dutch
vellum, yapp edges, title leaf trimmed at foot &
mounted on a stub.
(Lüneburg: J. & H. Stern, 1624) £6000
First edition, and an extremely fine, unspotted copy of this
important book which combines practical cryptography
with the urge for universal knowledge which Duke Augustus
(1579-1666), founder of the great Wolfenbüttel library,
sought to create in that very library. The work is presented
as a commentary on Steganographia of Trithemius, abbot of
Würzburg, whose own works, published at the end of the
fifteenth century, played such an important role in both
cryptography and bibliography. The encoding of messages
became an important factor in the seventeenth century,
and was much used, for example, in the English Civil War.
The English mathematician John Wallis, for example, was
a skilled cryptographer, and shorthand or tachgraphy
as it was called was much used, most famously by Pepys.
This ducal book (like many others) has been enrolled as
a weapon in the Bacon – Shakespeare controversy.
VD17 23:285820R; Caillet 10114; J.S. Galland, An historical
and analytical bibliography of the liturgy of cryptography (NY
1970) pp. 166-167.
Renouard 133.2.; not in Schreiber.
12 ATHENAEUS of Naucratis. Aq hna iou
Deipnosfistwn b iblia penteka i d eka .
Athenæi Deipnosophistarum libri quindecim.
Cum Iacobi Dalechampii Cadomensis Latina
uersione: necnon eiusdem adnotationibus &
emendationibus, ad operis calcem reiectis.
Iuxta Isaaci Casauboni recensionem, etc.
Folio (360 x 230mm.) [48], 812, [48] pp., title printed
in red and black, engraved device on title-page,
contemporary Dutch vellum.
Lyons: [for] J. A. Huguetan & M.A. Ravaud, 1657 £500
This massive folio contains the Greek text of Athenaeus,
whose Deipnosophistae or The wise men at dinner, is provided
with the Latin version of Jacques Dalechamps of Caen, to
which has been added the Animadversiones of Casaubon
first published in 1600 and reprinted eight times
before 1840.
14 AULISIO, Domenico. Delle scuole
sacre libri due postumi… pubblicati dal
suo erede, e nipote Nicolo Ferrara-Aulisio. 2 parts 4to (235 x 165mm.) [24], 236. [6]; [2], 149,
[3]p., 2 engraved portraits, 3 engraved plates (one
folding) plus a fourth (Tavola IV) in letterpress
(Hebrew alphabet) at part 1 p. 129, 3 printed tavole
in part 2 at pp. 89, 91 & 92, contemporary calf,
rubbed, joints splitting, green silk marker.
Naples: F. Ricciardo, 1723 £600
Known as a jurist, the Neapolitan Aulisio (1649-1717)
was praised for the breadth of his knowledge by none
other than Vico, and if the list of his works in manuscript
appended to the brief life in part 1 is anything to go
by, he was indeed wide-ranging. The book makes use
of Hebrew type, and in part 1, and in particular in the
chapters on Hebrew poetry, we find the Hebrew text of
various Psalms and passages from the canticles and from
Jeremiah, with vocalisation and transliteration plus the
Vulgate text. In chapter xxviii in particular he gives the
text of the canticle sung by Moses at Deut xxxii, 1-43, the
poetical qualities of which he greatly admires (pp. 163-171).
In this he resembles Robert Lowth in his De sacra poesi
Hebraeorum (Oxford, 1753), Herder, and more obviously
relevant, his own contemporary, Giovanni Battista Vico.
15 BALDAEUS, Philip. Naauwkeurige
beschryvinge van Malabar en
Choromandel, der zelver aangrenzende
ryken, En het machtige eyland Ceylon. Nevens
een omstandige en grondigh doorzochte
ontdek-ing en wederlegginge van de
afgoderye der Oost-Indische Heydenen…
Folio (317 x 195 mm.) [10], 198, [2]240,[2] 188, [11]
pp., engraved half title, portrait, 17 double page
engravings, 14 double page maps and plans, 4
other engravings, 3 double page plates containing
engraved vocabularies with numerous engravings
in the text, Dutch blind stamp panelled vellum,
lettered in gilt on the spine.. upper joint with 3
inch split, unfortunately lacking (G2) in the final
section on India.
Amsterdam: Johannes Van Wassberge & Van Someren,
1672 £5000
Baldaeus (1632-72), who had been educated at Groningen
and Leiden, and was a pastor in the Dutch reformed
Church, was sent by the Dutch East India Company to
the East, and arrived in Molucca in 1655, went to Batavia
(Jakarta) in 1656 (-1657) and in 1658 went to Jaffnapatnam
in Sri Lanka, where he remained until 1665, when he
returned to Holland. He established himself in the North
of the island, learned Tamil and attempted to surplant
the earlier work of the Catholic missionaries. The book
is divided into three sections describing Southern India,
Ceylon, and thirdly an account of the varying cultures
and religions of the area. It remains the fullest account
of the early Dutch regime in Ceylon, and has many fine
illustrations and maps, here in very clean crisp impressions.
A German edition appeared in parallel from the same
publisher, and on this was based the version used for the
anonymous English translation which appeared as part
of Churchill’s Voyages.
For Baldaeus see Biografisch lexicon voor de geschiedenis van
het Nederlands protestantisme v (2001) p. 34.
7
17 BARROW, John, teacher of mathematics.
A new and impartial history of England.
10 volumes 12mo (165 x 95mm.), engraved plates
by Hall after Gwyn, contemporary calf.
London: J. Coote, 1763 £550
John Barrow, who flourished in the middle of the
eighteenth century, at one point taught mathematics to
Navy midshipmen, but seems to have retired from this
in 1750. Thereafter he concentrated on writing books on
navigation, naval history and other more general works.
He seems to have flourished until 1774. There is a brief
notice of him in ODNB.
ESTC lists 6 copies: Bodley, NT, Trinity Cambridge;
Ireland NLI; 2 copies in USA.
First edition, and an handsome copy. The book, which was
enlarged and reprinted in Rouen in 1727, discusses the
desirability of travel and of the many classical antiquities
which may be seen and studied, including statues, ancient
paintings, talismans and charms, manuscripts and medals.
In volume 1 there is a lengthy discussion of household
gods (Lares). It is replete with engraved illustrations. The
author (1642-1722) was a Parisian lawyer, who abandoned
the bar for the study of antiquities, of which he himself
had a good collection. He was the author of other works,
mostly on engraved stones, but including one on Ptolemy
Auletes (the flute-player). He was elected member of the
Académie des Inscriptions in 1705, and to the Académie
he bequeathed part of his collections.
Dekesel B45; Cioranescu 10317.
19 BAXTER William. Glossarium
antiquitatum britannicarum, sive syllabus
etymologicus antiquitatum veteris Britannae
atque Iberniae temporibus Romanorum, etc.
Royal 8vo (230 x 135mm.) [6], xiv, [4], 277, [19]pp.,
engraved portrait of Baxter, contemporary russia
binding, gilt border on covers, spine gilt, red edges,
spine somewhat faded, without list of subscribers.
London: W. Bowyer, 1719 £600
16 [BARLOW, William]. Magneticall
Advertisements: or divers pertinent
observations, and approved experiments
concerning the nature and properties
of the load-stone: very pleasant for
knowledge, and most needfull for practise,
of travelling, or framing of Instruments
fit for Travellers both by Sea and Land.
Small 4to (180 x 125mm.) [16], 86, [2 (of 4: lacks
the errata leaf)]pp., woodcut illustrations in the
text, disbound, short tear at the head of A4, title
and final page dust-soiled, small dampstain in the
upper fore-corner and fore-margin at the beginning
and end.
London: by Edward Griffin for Timothy Barlow, 1616 £4500
Without the final leaf of “Faults escaped”. With the
penultimate leaf containing a letter from William Gilbert
to the author.
Barlow’s interest in magnetism involved him in relations
with William Gilbert (1540-1603). Gilbert’s De magnete
(1600) which was written in Latin discussed magnetism
MAGGS
at length, but he took the Copernican heliocentric
view whereas Barlow as a good churchman, stuck to
the geocentric view. Barlow writes in English, and he
acknowledges (on A2verso) the influence of Gilbert:
‘before, and also after the setting forth of D. Gilberts booke:
And none more earnest herein that D. Gilbert himselfe,
vnto whom I communicated what I had obserued of my
selfe, and what I had built vpon his foundation of the
Magnetisme of the earth’ (the first use of the word, see
OED; ‘magneticall’ is also used for the first time). We
learn also that he had in 1609 (‘about seauen yeeres since’)
given a copy of the manuscript for Prince Henry (whose
chaplain he was) to Sir Thomas Challenor, chamberlain
to the prince. Challenor lost or mislaid the manuscript, as
he did a second copy, so that although he had undertaken
to see the book into print, it was left to Barlow himself,
after Challenor’s death in 1615, to make sure it saw the
light of day, and to dedicate it to another scientific figure
interested in magnetism, Dudley Digges.
STC 1442 (copies in USA at Boston Public, Folger,
Huntington, Pennsylvania, U.S. Naval Academy Nimitz,
Wisconsin-Madison, Yale).
A handsome copy, and one of 110 copies printed on royal
paper; the edition comprised 350 copies of which 240 were
on ordinary paper.
The work is dedicated to Richard Mead, physician and
collector, but this special copy has a manuscript leaf
inserted after the printed dedication in which Mead
is again addressed and it is suggested that the earliest
inhabitants were ‘cave-dwellers (‘antricolae’) leading the
lives of Hottentots or Troglodytes like the Cyclops and
giants of the Greeks and not speaking an articulated
language of any kind, but like animals uttering sounds
(e kf wnh mata)’
According to the Bowyer Ledgers (577) sheet B and some
other half sheets were reprinted.
A ROYAL PRESENTATION COPY
18 BAUDELOT DE DAIRVAL, Charles César. De l’utilité des voyages, et de l’avantage que
la recherche des antiquitez procure aux sçavans.
2 volumes 12mo (178 x 92mm.) [2], xix (=20), 361 [1],
[6], 361-732, [18]pp., last leaf with errata, engravings
in text, some full-page, Dutch calf c. 1700, gilt spines.
Paris: P. Aubouin & P. Emery, 1686 £1000
20 BECKMANN, Johann. A history
of inventions and discoveries. By John
Beckmann, Public Professor of Economy
in the University of Gottingen. Translated
from the German, by William Johnston.
3 volumes 8vo (215 x 120mm.) Contemporary diced
calf, covers panelled in gilt, spine with five raised
9
bands, tooled in gilt and with two red morocco labels;
light-blue endleaves; marbled edges, very light foxing
to the title-page and final leaf of each volume, some
occasional browning to a few leaves of volume one
(P1, R1, N1) upper for-corners of the first volume
slightly crumpled.
London: for J. Bell 1797 £1200
The first English translation of Beckmann’s great compendium of scientific and technological essays. Beckmann
(1739-1811) at one time a pupil of Linnaeus, was the first
historian of technology, a word he coined in 1772.
Beckmann includes short chapters on street lighting,
pineapples, soap, canaries, artificial flowers, chimneys,
butter and clocks. He also discusses subjects such as
Italian book keeping methods, the adulteration of wine
(‘No adulteration of any article has ever been invented so
pernicious to the health, and at the same time so much
practised’) and exclusive privileges for printing books.
Johnston explains the works genesis in English in his
‘Translator’s Preface’: “the German original made its
appearance in separate parts at various times; and the
whole as yet published, a few small articles excepted, is now
presented to the public in an English dress. The different
articles in the translation are not placed exactly in the same
order as in the original; but they are arranged by the author
neither alphabetically nor chronologically” (translator’s
preface, p. xi). Johnston goes on to praise Germany as the
country which has ‘beyond all dispute […] given birth to
more important discoveries and inventions than any other
part of Europe; and gun-powder, printing, and a variety
of useful machines, will remain lasting monuments of the
inventive genius of the Germans’ (ibid p. x.)
A second edition of Johnston’s translation appeared in
1814 and included the remaining “few small articles” in a
fourth volume. This fourth volume was presumably made
available to those who had bought the first edition and
sets of A History of Invention are occasionally seen with four,
rather than the present three, volumes. The “Translator’s
Preface” has been misbound in the first volume in the
middle of the index; presumably as it was printed as part
of the final sheet of index (Ii).
Provenance: Presented by Queen Charlotte to her Lady
of the bedchamber, the Countess of Macclesfield. Mary
Frances Drake (1761-1823), married George Parker,
Viscount Parker and from 1795 4th Earl of Macclesfield
(1755-1842) in 1780 and served as Lady of the Bedchamber
to Queen Charlotte 1811-18; her husband was Lord of the
Bedchamber to the King George III 1797-1804. Inscribed
in the blank upper margin of the title-page of the first
volume reading: ‘M F Macclesfield / given me / by The
Queen’.
George III married Princess Charlotte of Mecklenburg-
MAGGS
Strelitz on 8th September 1761 and despite having only met
a few hours earlier that day they had a long and apparently
happy marriage. It has been suggested that this harmony
may have been the result of a shared interest in science and
the arts. Beckmann is described on the title-page as the
“Public Professor of Economy at the University of Göttingen”
- the University had strong ties to the Hanoverian royal
family, and three of George III’s sons were educated there.
His copy of the Mainz Psalter, the first dated book, was
presented to him by the University of Göttingen, and is
still at Windsor.
21 BERGIER, Nicolas. Le dessein de
l’histoire de Reims. Avec diverses
curieuses remarques, etc. [ed. J. Bergier].
4to (200 x 150mm.) [16], 18, [2], 468 [=472]pp., 6
numbered engraved plates, one folding, engraved
portrait on p. [xv] and device on title, both by
Moreau, contemporary French calf.
Reims: N. Constant, 1635 £800
The work, published posthumously, was intended to
comprise 16 books, but only books 1 & 2 were completed
although the intended contents of the rest are given. It was
an ‘édition partagée’ and the names of various publishers
appear in the imprint.
The book is not common. There are copies at Harvard
and Yale, but the Harvard copy has (from the catalogue
entry) only 4 plates out of the 6.
Provenance: N.J. Foucault with engraved bookplate.
22 BERNARD, Edward. De mensuris et
ponderibus antiquis libri tres. Editio
altera, purior & duplo locupletior. (Epistola
N.F. D. De mari aeneo Salomonis.- Thomae
Hyde De mensuris & ponderibus Sinensium).
8vo (192 x 110mm.) [16], 261, [83]p., 4 engraved
plates (3 folding), early 18th-century calf, gilt spine,
gilt turn-ins, marbled & gilt edges.
Oxford: e theatro Seldoniano [sic], 1688 £800
An extremely handsome copy of this work, which based
on a wide use of ancient, Jewish, Arab and other sources,
surveys not only the equivalency of systems of measurement
of length and weight, but also gives something of their
history, even in the seventeenth century. The letter
addressed to Bernard by Nicolas Fatio of Duillier (16641753), mathematician and scientist is about a passage
in Kings I (vii, 23-26; also described in Josephus and
Eusebius) where the bronze (or cast metal) sea located in
the Temple of Solomon is described. There is a folding
engraved plate of this. The essay by Thomas Hyde on the
measures of the Chinese is based partly on manuscript
and published sources, and partly on information from
English China merchants, who are mentioned by name.
Wing B1987; Dekesel B92.
23 BEUGHEM, Cornelis van. Bibliographia
mathematica et artificiosa novissima, etc.
12mo (130 x 73mm.) [12], 526, [2(blank)]pp., contemporary calf, rubbed.
Amsterdam: apud Janssonio-Waesbergios, 1688£750
Second edition of a useful little book, and one which may
well have served as a vade mecum for the creation of the
mathematical section of the Macclesfield Library.
Provenance: A few notes by William Jones on final blank.
24 BEZE, Theodore de. Poematum editio
secunda… Item ex Georgio Buchanano
aliisque… poetis excerpta carmina.
8vo (168 x 102mm.) 174, [(blank)]; 248, [8]pp.,
Oxford binding c. 1600 of brown calf stamped in
blind, binding a little loose.
[Geneva]; H. Estienne, 1569 £550
Poems in Latin, Greek and Hebrew, with a couple of sonnets in French. The poems of Buchanan form part 2.
Renouard 132: 4; not in Schreiber. Durkan no. 187.
Provenance: Henry Wentworth ‘testis Magister Fite’.
25 BIBLE. Figurae et imagines Bibliorum.
Obl. folio (263 x 340mm.) 35 engraved plates
numbered [unnumbered] 1-27, [unnumbered],
29, 31, 32, [4], seventeenth-century calf, worn and
rubbed, some plates soiled at edges, one mounted,
consecutive ink numbers 2-34 written in the plate.
Cologne: Johann Bussemacher, [c. 1600] £3000
The plates are unsigned, but all, except the title, have
biblical quotations in Latin engraved beneath the image,
beginning with Genesis 1. The chapter numbers but not
the verse numbers are given. The penultimate plate of
the four unnumbered plates illustrates Jacob (Gen. 32-33)
and the last is of the Golden Calf (Exodus 32).
Bussemacher was active from about 1577 until the
1620s, being dead by 1627. He is known as a publisher
of architectural, and religious plates, and of an edition
of the Epitome of Vesalius published in 1601. He was a
active in Cologne and Antwerp (see Josef Benzing ‘Der
Kupferstecher, Kunstrdrucker und Verleger Johann
Bussemacher zu Köln’ in Aus der Welt des Bibliothekars:
Festschrift für Rudolf Juchhoff zum 65. Geburtstag /
herausgegeben von Kurt Ohly und Werner Krieg, Cologne
1961, pp.129-46). A number of his publications are listed
in VD16. However Benzing in a long list of his separate
publications does not mention this one, and he only record
we have been able to find is of a copy at the University
Library, Augsburg (02/XIII.1.4.125), the make-up of which
is as follows: [1], 39, [1], 20, 24 Bl, which would indicate
that in its complete (?) form it may have 85 plates.
26 BIBLE. O.T. Psalms. Latvian. Dahwida dseesmu-grahmata
no deewa swehta wahrda grahmatas
pa wahrdu wahrdeem isnemta.
ff. [136], Black Letter.
Riga: G.M. Nöller, 1704
£500
Bound with:
Bible. O.T. Proverbs. Latvian. Salamana
sakkami-wahrdi no deewa swehta wahrda
grahmatas… 88pp., Riga: G.M. Nöller, 1707.
2 works in 1 volume 8vo (155 x 90mm.), later
eighteenth-century English polished calf, gilt
spine, red morocco lettering-piece, red edges, a few
headlines slightly shaved Both these versions are
made from the German, but we have not located
any copy.
27 BIBLIANDER, Theodore. De ratione
temporum, christianis rebus & cognoscendis
& explicandis accommodata, liber unus
(Demonstrationum chronologicarum liber unus).
8vo (147 x 85mm.) [24], 277 (=275, pp. 145-146
omitted), [37]pp., printed in italic type with Greek
and Hebrew, pp. 141-144 errata to ‘De ratione
temporum’, eighteenth-century smooth calf, red
morocco lettering-piece, red edges, a few leaves at
beginning and end slightly damp-stained.
Basel: (J. Oporinus, March 1551) £750
First edition of an important early work on historical
periodisation. In the first work (De ratione temporum)
addressed to the churches of Germany, France, England
and Denmark, Bibliander draws attention to the interaction
of sacred and profane history and the discrepancies even
within one of them. He sets out to five accounts of such
things as time, the months, the year etc. The second work
(Demonstrationum chronologicarum liber unus beginning at
11
p. 157) has a preface which is addressed to the printer
Oporinus, dated 9 November 1550 from Zurich, in which he
criticises Johann Carion’s views, and praises the preacher
Christoph Schappeler (1472-1551). He then begins by
telling us about Adam and Noah etc. before proceeding
to a chronological table which takes us up to 1400. This
is followed by a foretelling of the consummation of all
things on the last page.
Bibliander (1504-1564) best known as editor of the
Latin text of the Qur’an (1543) is an important figure in
the history of Swiss protestantism and a founder father
of philological and comparative study of the Bible, and of
language. He with his family died of the plague in Zurich.
VD16 B 5331.
8vo (190 x 115mm.) [8], 262, [42]pp., large folding
map, 6 smaller maps and one plate at the end of the
astronomical tables, lacking the portrait of Blome,
small tear in n3, contemporary calf.
London: H. Clark for Dorman Newman, 1687£2000
On U5verso at the end of the text is the word FINIS. There
is a variant with a horizontal line and a catchword ‘Books’
pointing to the 6 page catalogue of Newman’s publications
which follows on U6-8 (and is here present).
Sabin 5972. The work was originally published as A
description of the island of Jamaica in 1672 (and 1678).
Provenance: ms. notes on title-page referring to various
contemporary reviews.
Provenance: Matthew Sutton (16th century).
SILK AND SILK WORMS
28 BIRCH, Thomas. The life of
the honourable Robert Boyle.
8vo (200 x 130mm.); [4], 458, [14]pp. Contemporary
light calf, rule gilt ornament on boards, spine gilt
in compartments, morocco lettering-piece.
London: for A. Millar, MDCDXLIV [i.e. 1744]£500
[See inside back cover for photo of binding].
29 BIRCH, Thomas. Memoirs of the Reign
of Queen Elizabeth, from the year 1581
till her death. In which the secret intrigues
of her court, and the conduct of her favourite,
Robert Earl of Essex, both home and abroad, are
particularly illustrated. From the original papers
of his intimate friend, Anthony Bacon, Esquire,
and other manuscripts never before published.
2 volumes, 4to (260 x 200mm.) Contemporary
calf, covers with a double gilt fillet containing a
blind-rolled border, spines tooled in gilt with a red
morocco label and small contemporary paper shelf
labels at the head and foot of the spine, marbled
end papers, original green ribbon marker in each
volume (a couple of very small scuffs to the covers),
some leaves very slightly discoloured.
London: A. Millar, 1754 £900
A very handsome set of Birch’s fascinating account of the
“secret intrigues” of the court of Elizabeth I based on the
papers of Anthony Bacon (1558-1601) which are now in
Lambeth Palace Library.
30 BLOME, Richard. The present state
of his Majesties isles and territories
in America… with new maps… together
with astronomical tables, etc.
31 BLUTEAU, Rafael. Prosas portuguezas,
recitadas em differentes congressos
academicos… Parte segunda [only], que
conte’m prosa censoria… prosa economica.
Folio (297 x 200 mm.) 383, [1 (blank)] pp. Mid18th-century English mottled calf, gilt spine (lower
head-cap torn). North Library bookplate.
Lisbon: Joseph Antonio da Silva, 1728 £500
Although mostly in prose, this, the second part only of
Bluteau contains some contributions in verse (including
Latin verse). The first part is dated “MDCCVIX”, i.e. 1729.
There is a section devoted to emblems and their
interpretation with verses in Portuguese (pp. 11-106), a
funeral sermon on the death of Louis XIV, a section on
Portuguese grammar (pp. 186- 228), more sermons, and
a series of congratulatory verses offered to Bluteau. Pages
307 to the end are devoted to a work on the cultivation
of silk worms ‘Intrucçao sobre a cultura das amoreiras, e
criaçao dos bichos da seda…’. This section includes a Latin
dedication to Ferdinando Mascarenhas full of praise for
the ‘bombyx’ and the Mulberry.
We learn here en passant that Bluteau was educated by
the Jesuits in Paris at the college of La Flèche. Actually he
was born in London on 4 December 1638 and his mother
fled with him to France in 1644. Brought up in France, but
educated also in Italy, he became a priest in 1661 and was
established in Portugal in 1668, where he quickly learned
Portuguese and rapidly became a well-known preacher.
His Vocabulario Portuguez e Latina appeared over several
years. His work on silk was reprinted (and enlarged) in
1769. Some of his funeral sermons were translated into
Italian and published in Venice in 1683.
Innocencio. Diccionario bibliographico Portueguez vol. VII
(1862) pp. 42-45.
32 BOCCHI, Achille. Symbolicarum
quaestionum… libri quinque.
ff. [48], CCCLVII, [3], p. VII blank, lacking A1.
Bologna: Societa tipografica, 1574£3500
Bound with:
SAMBIGUCCI, Gavino. In Hermathenam
Bocchiam interpretatio. 141 (=161), [3]pp.,
large device on title-page, woodcut initials.
Bologna: Antonio Manuzio, (14 December) 1556.
2 works in 1 volume 4to (195 x 135mm.) ruled in red
throughout, seventeenth-century smooth calf, gilt
fillets on covers, one corner a little rubbed.
A fine copy of Bocchi, with beautiful impressions of the
copper plates and on thick paper, but lacking A1 with text
on recto and portrait on verso.
Sambigucci (1502-1567), whose sole work this is, was a
doctor from Sassari in Sardinia. It is addressed to Salvatore
Salapussi, Archbishop of Sassari, and is mostly concerned
with the subject of Love.
Bocchi Mortimer Harvard 77; CNCE 6484; Sambigucci
Renouard 169: 12; UCLA 509; CNCE 27752.
In the UK there are 2 copies of Sambigucci (BL and
Rylands); OCLC records 4 copies in USA, one in NZ and
4 in Germany. Censimento records several copies in Italian
libraries.
Provenance: signature of J [?ulien] Brodeau 1649.
33 BOILEAUX DESPREAUX, Nicolas.
Oeuvres… avec des eclaircissemens
historiques… Nouvelle édition, etc.
4 volumes 12mo (162 x 93mm.) [4], XLVI, [2], 436;
VIII, 407, [1]; [4], 407; [4], 308p., titles printed in
red and black, 6 engraved plates in vol. ii (le Lutrin)
folding engraved plate vol. iv p. 222, engraved tailpieces by Picart, contemporary sprinked calf, spines
gilt, spine label of vol. 1 lacking.
The Hague: chez I. Vaillant, P. Gosse & Pierre de Hondt,
1722 £850
A very pretty copy of this edition, which is not in Cioranescu.
34 BONAVENTURE, St. Meditationes
to yest bogosliubna razmiscglianya od
otaystva odkupplienya coviçanskogo… V yezik
slovinski, trudom P.O. F. Petra Bogdana
Baksichia, [etc.] (Od dvostruke smarti
covieka sloga. O. Fra P[etra Bogdana, etc.)
12mo (142 x 70mm.)[12], 226, [2(blank)]pp., eighteenth century sprinkled calf, gilt fillet on covers,
red morocco lettering-pieces, red edges.
Rome: typis sacr. congreg. de progag. fide, 1638 £700
13
The Meditationes is a work attributed to Saint Bonaventure,
printed first in the fifteenth century and very popular
as a work of piety. The translator into Bulgarian was the
Franciscan Petar, Archbishop of Sofia, author of the Cuneus
prophetarum de Christo, published in 1685 (modern edition
1977). There is a copy of the book in Munich (KVK) and
in the BL (856.a.9.), but we have found no copies in USA.
The imprimatur is subscribed by Father Raphael
Levacovich a Croat Franciscan who is described as ‘sac.
librorum illyricanae ecclesiae, auctoritate sedis apostolicae
in Urbe corrector’. Born in 1600, he became in 1647 Bishop
of Achrida in Bulgaria and died there in 1650.
See Alexandru Ciociltan. ‘Catolicismul in Tara Româneasca
in relatari edite si inedite alearhiepiscopului de Sofia
Petru Bogdan Baksic((1663, 1668, 1670)’ in Revista istorica
(Bucharest 2004) 18, pp.61sqq.
35 BORCH, Ole. Cogitationes de variis
latinae linguae aetatibus, & scripto…
Ger. Joann. Vossii de vitiis sermonis. Accedit
eiusdem defensio nomine Vossii & Stradae,
adversus Gasp. Scioppium. [16], 314, [6]pp.
Copenhagen: G. Gödianus for P. Haubold, 1675£500
Bound with:
IBID. Analecta ad cogitationes de lingua
latina, etc.[4], 63, [1], [4], 68pp., Copenhagen:
widow of C. Luft for P. Haubold, 1682.
2 works in 1 volume 4to (195 x 150mm.), contemporary calf, gilt spine, marbled edges, 1675.
First edition. A second edition with the life of the author
was published at Köthen in Germany in 1691 (VD17
1:042900C). The work is an alphabetically arranged
discussion of various words, preceded by a list of words
considered to be ‘vitiosa’ or bad Latin as opposed to those
which may be considered to be good Latin. The division
into gold, silver and iron Latin is touched upon right at the
very beginning. Ole (Olaus) Borch was born at Noerre Bork
in Ribe Denmark in 1626 and died in 1690 in Copenhagen,
where he was a highly successful physician, widely regarded
both as doctor and scholar. The attack on Kaspar Schoppe
(1576-1649) in defence of Vossius occupies pages 268-314
of the first work.
Gerard Vossius had published his four books De vitiis
sermonis in 1645 (revised end enlarged edition 1666).
Schoppe, a tremendously active controversialist, who had
been an eye-witness at the burning of Giordano Bruno in
February 1600, had attacked Vossius in a volume published
first in Ravenna in 1647. He died in Padua in 1649.
MAGGS
36 BORGSDORFF, Ernst Friedrich,
Baron von. New-triumphirende
Fortification auff allerley Situationen defensive
und offensive zu gebrauchen. Erstes opus,
handlet wie man die Royal-Festungen und
Citadelle… Retrechementer und feld=Schantzen
auff alten und neuen Platzen… dergestalten
disponiren erbauen und verthaidigen möge, usw.
Obl. 4to (150 x 200mm.) [12], 398, [10]pp., additional
engraved title, 116 engraved plates (see below),
eighteenth-century calf, spine defective, small repair
to engr. Title.
Vienna: J. G. Schlegel, 1703 £750
Borgsdorff was an Austrian engineer who for two years
(1696-98) was seconded to the service of Peter the Great
of Russia, who had copies of his books, some of which
appeared in Russian. Borgsdorff designed the fort at
Taganrog in the Black Sea, the first Russian naval base
(1698). The work is divided into six parts (Haupt=Theilen)
plus a final section ‘Von der defensiv-irregular Fortification’
(beginning at p. 345) each of which is subdivided into
several books. The plates are equally divided having (for
parts 1-6) a Roman numeral in top l.h. corner and the
number of the plate in top r.h. corner in arabic figures
(1-15; 1-12; 1-8; 1-15; 1-31;1- 20). The final section has the
letters Ir[regular] F[ortification] in the top r.h. corner.,
and the arabic numeral as before (1-15).
Spaulding & Karpinski 223; not in Sloos. See Jähn,
Geschichte der Kriegswissenschaften (1891) ii, 1380, 1393 &
1711.
Copies in HAB (2), BL, Newberry, Michigan, Cincinatti,
Munich SB, Vienna ONB, and others in Germany and
Denmark (KB).
37 BRIDGES, John, Bishop of Oxford.
Sacro-sanctum novum testamentum…
servatoris nostri Iesu Christi, in hexametros
versus ad verbum & genuinum sensum
fidelitèr in Latinam linguam translatum,
per Iohannem Episcopum Oxoniensem.
8vo (145 x 90mm.) [48], 144, 149-308, [4], 309-596,
613-736, [20] p., title within an elaborate decorative
frame, no cancels, but T7 torn and catchword on
recto obscured by paper repair, without initial blank,
and with final blank misbound before last quire,
17th-century sheep, worn, title-leaf loose and slightly
damaged.
London: Valentine Sims, 1604 £1000
The title makes it quite clear what the volume is, a version
in Latin hexameters of the New Testament, a sort of
Elizabthan Juvencus. John Bridges (1535/6-1612), who
was from Devon and had been educated in Cambridge,
was for many years Dean of Salisbury, and a great defender
of the Anglican church settlement. He was the author of a
number of works such as Supremacie of Christian Princes
(1573) directed against the two catholic Wykehamist
controversialists Stapleton and Sander, and his massive
Defence of the Government Established in the Church of
England (1587).
Bridges tells us that his version, which makes use of
the latest biblical scholarship (he refers amongst others to
Beza and Benito Arias Montano) is more concerned with
truth than with poetic polish - ‘Maior at immo fuit veri,
quam cura nitoris’- and that ‘these are the oracles of God
not words dictated by a poet’. STC 3735.
Provenance: Thom[as] Axton 1730/BI and note of price
1s.6d. This must be Thomas Axton educated St. Paul’s
and Trinity, Cambridge (see Venn).
38 BRIQUET, Pierre de. Code militaire ou compilation des
ordinances des rois de France concernant
les gens de guerre… Nouvelle édition.
8 volumes 12mo (165 x 95mm.) contemporary English sprinkled calf, gilt border on covers, gilt spines,
red and green lettering-pieces, last volume with
slight worming in gutters at end.
Paris: chez Durand, 1761 £500
Originally published in three volumes in 1728, in four in
1735, and in five in 1741 this much enlarged edition takes
account of changes made subsequently. The ‘Avertissement
sur cette nouvelle édition’ tells us that works become
superseded, and that only the most recent ordonnance
has to be followed (‘la dernière ordonnance étant celle sur
laquelle on doive uniquement se régler’). The last edition
was 1740 (1741), and a new revision has become necessary.
‘Nothing has been neglected to make the work completely
useful, without however moving away from the author’s
plan, which has been scrupulously followed’ (ibid ad fin).
See also item 79 Feuquieres.
39 BRISSON, Barnabé. De regio
Persarum principatu libri tres: ex
adversariis… editio altera (ed. H. Sylburg).
An uncommon edition. The book was first published by
Prevosteau in Paris in 1590 from the author’s notes (‘ex
adversariis’). The ‘Typographus lectori’ makes it very clear
how difficult were the circumstances in which Brisson
then found himself, the very walls of the city being shaken
by bombardment, and the shadow of death being seen
everywhere, and the very opening paragraph of the text,
in which Brisson speaks of ‘Regii nominis decus, imperii
maiestatem, totumque regni statum’, has contemporary
resonance. Brisson (1531-1591) was a distinguished jurist
and author of important works, notably the legal code of
Henri III, but no traveller. He was hanged by the Ligueurs
on 15 November 1591.
Essentially the sources drawn on are purely those of
ancient writers, both Greek and Latin, from whom there is
extensive quotation. Book I is concerned with the Persian
rulers and their history, book II with religious and social
life, and book III with military organisation and prowess,
both ancient and modern.
Friedrich Sylburg, who acted as editor and proof-reader
for the Commelin atelier, has added just a few notes at the
end, the preface to these claiming that the original Paris
edition of 1590 had been full of errors of transcription
and editing.
VD 16 B8335.
40 BROWNE, Sir Thomas, Kt. A true and full
copy of that which was most imperfectly and
surreptitously printed before under the name of:
Religio medici.
8vo (142 x 85mm.) [16], 174p., first leaf blank,
engraved title, contemporary calf, slight worming
in gutter, lower cover cracked etc.
London: A. Crooke, 1645 £750
The early printing history of Religio medici (written first
in Ireland in the mid-1630s) is complex, the work having
been put into print without Browne’s consent ‘in a most
depraved copy’. This led to his (in part) rewriting of the
work, and this revision was published in 1643 but not
before Sir Kenelm Digby, a Catholic, had published his
Observations (1643) which were of course based on the first
unauthorised text some passages of which were definitely
of a Romish cast. The book, which was widely translated
and imitated, was very successful (for an account of the
early editions (including this) and manuscripts see the
preface to the edition of J.J. Denonain, Cambridge, 1952).
Wing B5171; Keynes 5.
8vo (160 x 94mm.) [12],378pp., eighteenth-century
smooth calf, spine gilt in compartments, green
morocco label, red edges.
[Heidelberg?] H. Commelinus 1595 £750
15
41 BRY, Gilles, sieur de la Clergerie. Histoire des pays et comté du
Perche et duché d’Alençon, etc.
4to (222 x 160mm.) [16], 382, [14]pp., title printed
in red & black, eighteenth century English calf, gilt
fillets on covers, gilt spine.
Paris: Pierre Le-Mur, 1620 £650
First edition and a very handsome copy. The ancient county
of Perche, an area abutting Normandy, is rich is rivers,
and it may be that a (probably) celtic water goddess Perta,
whose name is found in an inscription found at Nîmes, lies
at its heart, although other etymologies may be advanced.
In 1227 the area was included in the royal demesne, and
later a small section was cut off to constitute the county
of Alençon, and for Pierre I of Alençon, one of the royal
sons. This lapsed in 1283, but at a later date (1326) it again
was separated for Charles II, Duke of Alençon, but the
house died out in 1525 and the land returned to their king.
A short pamphlet of Additions was published in 1621.
There is a modern edition, revised by Siguret, published
in 1970.
42 BUCOLICI GRAECI. Theocriti aliorumque poetarum idyllia…
Omnia cum interpretatione latina, etc.
16mo (118 x 73mm.) [16], 447, [1]; 63, [1]; 128pp.,
eighteenth-century calf, gilt border on covers, titlepage slightly restored.
[Geneva]: H. Estienne, 1579 £500
The Greek bucolic poets, as they are generally called were
included by Estienne in his 1566 Poetae Graeci, but here he
has revised the text, and made certain additions, notably
part 3, which is his own discussion of the Virgilian &
Ovidian imitations of Theocritus and others. There are
a number of different versions in Latin of Theocritus, by
Poliziano and others, and two short Greek versions of
poems by Ausonius and Propertius by Estienne himself.
This little 16mo is the only book published by Estienne
in 1579, as he had spent most of the year in Paris and
not Geneva.
Renouard 147, 1; Schreiber 206.
43 BUDÉ, Guillaume. Epistola i
ellhnika i… per Ant. Pichonium
Chartensem latinae factae.
4to [8], 206 (=216; 127-136 bis), device on title-page,
seventeenth-century English calf, ms. notes on flyleaves (waste not relating to text).
Paris: J. Bienné, 1574 £650
MAGGS
Budé (1467-1540) was one of the greatest of the sixteenthcentury French humanists and a prolific writer. The letters
are to and from various contemporary scholars such as
Erasmus, Janus Lascaris, Germain de Brie, Guillaume Du
Maine (tutor to Budé’s children) to whom many letters,
the Englishman Croke, and others, and are written more
as epistolary exercises than as vehicles of information. On
pp. 140 -146 is a letter addressed to Rabelais written at
the end of January [1523], partly about then confiscation
of Greek books. Rabelais and Budé were well acquainted.
Antoine Pichon, who came from Chartres, has provided
the Latin translations of the letters.
44 BURATTINI, Tito Livio. Misura universale overo trattato nel qual’ si
mostra come in tutti li luoghi del’ mondo si può
trovare una misura, & un peso universale senza
che habbiano relazione con niun’ altra misura, e
niun altro peso, & ad ogni modo in tutti li luoghi
saranno li medesimi, e saranno inalterabili,
e perpetui sin tanto che durerà il mondo.
Folio (270 x 175mm.) [4], 44 ff., additional engraved
title, four folding engraved plates pasted to the edges
of A2v (pendulums), B1 (pendulums), H1r (cubes),
I2r (scales). Very lightly browned and spotted in
places. Contemporary half calf (new calf spine, edges
rubbed, corners bumped); formerly part of a tract
volume; North Library bookplate.
Vilna: nella stamperia de Padri Francescani, 1675 £5000
Tito Livio Burattini was a native of the Belluno region of
Italy, but spent the greater part of his life in Poland. An
extraordinary and much travelled man, he spent some
four years (1637-41) in Egypt, where, as he records in
the preface to this book, he visited the pyramids several
times, the third time with John Greaves (1602-52), the
astronomer and orientalist, author of the first book on the
pyramids, and the owner and annotator of the Macclesfield
Copernicus, who mentions him in Pyramidographia, (1646),
p. 8. He also was a correspondent of Athanasius Kircher
(although none of Kircher’s letters to him are known), with
some five letters or drawings surviving in manuscript in
the Gregorian University, the earliest dated 3 June 1652.
Kircher in Sphinx mystagoga (part 2 of Oedipus aegyptiacus)
reproduces a drawing made by Burattini of the pyramid
at Dahschur. Burattini made a whole group of drawings
during his Egyptian travels, but these seem to have been
utterly lost in 1645. His drawings which survive in Rome
are remarkably precise, and the drawing of the pyramid
at Dahschur (signed ‘Quae omnia lustravit et delineavit
in Aegypt. Titus Livius Burattinus Regis Poloniae
Architectus’) influenced other illustrators.
Burratini tells us in his preface how the Egyptians, and
older people than the Greeks, Romans and Jews, were
fascinated by measures and weights particularly because
of their importance of determining the flooding of the
Nile and the abundance or shortages consequent upon
this. “I was,” he says, “four times at the pyramids which are
nearest to Cairo, i.e. the pyramids of Gizah,” and goes on
to describe in detail what he saw there, and how he went
back with Greaves, to whose writings he refers, in 1639
and took detailed measurements. He tells us how Greaves
exclaimed, “Oh, what a loss it is for the world not to know
the details of how the ancient Egyptians measured the
length and breadth of this room [in the great pyramid]”.
Burattini went to Cracow in 1641 and there got to know
Stanislaw Pudlowski (d.1645), a friend of Galileo to whom
Galileo was introduced by B. Castelli. Burattini tells us
that “he had all his works, whether in print or manuscript”,
amongst them Trattato della bilancetta, of which he gave me
a copy”. Burattini made a similar but different bilancetta,
and then wrote a commentary on Galileo’s work, La
bilancia sincera, which was not published, but survives
in manuscript in Paris (BnF Fonds italiens, 448, suppl.
496). In Cracow, along with his brother Filippo, he made
a new life there and in 1648 became royal architect, and
was as well involved in matters of mining and coinage. In
1659 he designed a calculating machine for Ferdinand II
Medici, which today may be seen in the Museo di storia
scienza in Florence.
A man of many parts, Burattini was variously: soldier,
monetary specialist charged with the establishment of a
new Polish coinage, traveller, scientist, and a devotee of
flying machines (a manuscript connected with this is in
the papers of the French mathematician Roberval in Paris
[BnF fonds latins 11195 ff. 55-61]), as well as a skilled lensgrinder and correspondent of Hevelius, for whom he built
an observatory, and others. In this work he proposes (as
others, such as Hooke and Huygens, were to do) a unit of
measurement based on the swing of a pendulum.
The engraved frontispiece has a seated of Time in
a ruined classical setting with a motto in a cartouche at
the top and the title on a drapery below Time (both of
these, notably, are added in manuscript). The motto reads:
“Pendula dant tempus; mensuram tempus; et illa / Dat
pondus: Tribus his condimur, et regimur”.
We have located 4 (3 actually confirmed) copies of the book:
BnF Paris (Res R 684), Russian State Library, Moscow
(described in their on-line catalogue), Rome Bibl. naz.
‘Vittorio Emmanuele’ (71.7.C.20) bound in contemporary
vellum (described in their on-line catalogue), and (as
reported by Tancon, but unconfirmed) at the Polish
Academy of Sciences in Cracow (Scientific Library of the
Polish Academy of Arts and Sciences and of the Polish
Academy of Sciences in Kraków).
For Burattini and Egypt, see Horst Beinlich, ‘Kircher
und Aegypten Information aus zweiter Hand: Tito
Livio Burattini’ in Spurensuche Wege zu Athanasius Kircher,
Dettelbach: Verlag J.H. Röll, 2002, pp. 57-71. See also the
short work Tito Livio Burattini, scienziato agordino del ‘600
by Gianfranco Cisilino and others, Vicenza & Belluno,
Cassa di risparmio di Verona, [1983] and the more recent
study by Ilario Tancon, Lo scienziato Tito Livio Burattini
(1617-1681) al servizio dei re di Polonia, Trento, 2005 (2nd
ed. 2006).
45 CANINI, Angelo. EllhnismoV… per
Carolum Hauboesium locupletatus, etc.
8vo (167 x 110mm.) [16], 334pp., blank ff. a7-8
cancelled (stubs visible), contemporary English limp
vellum, lettered in ms on spine.
Paris: J. Bienné, 1578 £700
A most interesting copy, not least inasmuch as part of
the title-page of 4438 the Vautrollier 1584 edition of
Calvin’s Institutio (STC 4428) is used as a strengthener
in the binding.
Canini, who came from Anghiera on lake Maggiore,
dedicated this book, first published by Morel in Paris in
1555, to a young Venetian patrician Matteo Priuli, who
had been with Canini in Paris along with the Hungarian
Andreas Dudith, and Fabrizio Brancucci (Brancutius), both
of whom provided liminary verses. The work is not just a
grammar, although nominal and verbal paradigms are
provided, but a discussion of Greek and its dialects, of the
individual letters and their pronunciation, and draws on
a number of Greek rhetorical and linguistic writers such
as Hermogenes, Eustathius and others. The book had a
long life, and is not uncommon: copies were fairly widely
acquired in the 16th century (that at Eton for example,
acquired later in the century, is in a binding stamped
with the college’s arms), and Michael Maittaire in his own
work on Greek dialects published in the early eighteenth
century, cites the book.
Provenance: Robert Addams (c. 1600?) with Greek motto
from Mark ix, 24 ‘Then immediately the father of the boy
cried and said ‘I believe, help me in my unbelief’. Some
underlining.
46 CAPPEL, Jacques. De ponderibus,
nummis et mensuris libri V. I. De
ponderibus… V. Miscellanea… cum… tabulis.
2 parts 4to (198 x 143mm.) [4], 101 [3 (last leaf a
blank)];191 [1]pp., engraved general title-page,
folding engraved plate, eighteenth-century mottled
17
calf over wooden boards, spine gilt, slightly rubbed,
lacking the leaf of preface in part 1 (but see below).
Frankfurt: L. Hulsius (part 2 W. Richter f. widow of L.
Hulsius), 1606-1607 £450
The preface to the reader in part 2 (written from Sedan,
where Cappel (1570-1624) taught Hebrew and theology)
mentions the publication of Books I-III in the previous
year, but equally makes it quite clear that the two parts
belong together as parts not separate works. It is possible
that the leaf of preface in part 1 which is dated 13 March
1606 from Sedan is lacking because it explains why only
two books out of the intended five are being published. As
in this copy all five are present, perhaps the first preface
‘lectori’ was suppressed. The folding plate (here present)
is often lacking. On it is engraved ‘Tabula haec collocanda
est ad calcem praefationis libri de mensuris inttervallorum’,
ie. book III.
VD17 23:237798K; Dekesel C35-36.
47 CARDOSO, Jeronimo. Dictionarium
latino lusitanicum et lusitanico latinum.
Cum aliquorum adagiorum… expositione.
Item de vocibus ecclesiasticis: de ponderibus, &
mensuris, & aliquibus loquendi moodis pueris
accommodatis [ed. Sebastian Stokhamer.]
4to (212 x 146mm.) ff. [2], 422 [=426], 18th-century
vellum-backed boards, occasional light marginal
worming.
Lisbon: Lourenço of Antwerp a custa de Domingos
Carneiro, 1643 £750
An uncommon reprint of a work published originally
in 1570, and reprinted. ‘The work is divided into four
sections, all of them clearly indicated in this copy by the
colouring of the edges. ff 1-254 is Latin-Portuguese, ff.
255-342 Portuguese-Latin, ff 343-403 ‘Breve dictionarium
vocum ecclesiasticarum’, ‘De propriis nominibus’ etc.,
and finally ‘Varii loquendi modi… ex lingua materna in
latinam redactae’, etc.
BL only in UK; National Library Portugal; OCLC lists
Indiana only in USA.
48 CATO, Marcus Porcius. [WORKS
ATTRIBUTED TO.] Disticha moralia…
Cum gallica interpretatione, &, ubi opus
fuit, declaratione latina. Haec editio praeter
praecedentes non solum authoris Maturini
Corderij recognitionem, sed & graecam maximi
planudaae interprettaionem habet. Dicta
septem Sapientum Graeciae ad finem adiecta
sunt, cum sua quoque interpretatiuncula.
128p., Paris: R. Estienne, 1585.£3500
Bound with:
ASCONIUS PEDIANUS, Q. Commentationes
in aliquot orationes M. Tullij Ciceronis…
F. Hotomani studio… emendatissimae.
Index rerum & verborum, etc.[24], 171, [1],
Lyon: J. de Tournes & G. Gazeau, 1551.
2 works in 1 volume 8vo (170 x 100mm.), calf c. 1700,
gilt spine, red edges 1551-1585.
Maturin Cordier’s edition of Cato’s Distichs, a schoolbook
throughout the whole of the Middle Ages and well into
the Renaissance and after, was first printed by Estienne
in 1533 in Paris.
Renouard, Estienne 176-177 no. 6; not in Schreiber;
Cartier, De Tournes i, no. 185.
49 CATTANEO, Girolamo. Opera nuova
di fortificare, offendere et difendere…
Aggiontovi nel fine, un trattato de gl’ essamini
de’ bombardieri, & di far fuochi artificiali.
ff. [6], 93, []1 (blank)] 22 woodcut plans, of which
20 double-page and 2 folding, plus 1 folding handcoloured plan at end, f. 17recto blank.
Brescia: G.B. Bozola (L. de Sabbio), 1564 £3500
[CNCE 10297; cf. Sloos 08003 (1567 ed.)]
Bound with:
THETI, Carlo. Discorsi de fortificationi. ff. 30,
device on verso of f. 30, woodcut illustrations,
Rome: G. Accolto, 1569 [CNCE 23118; Cockle 776].
Bound with:
LUPICINI, Antonio. Architettura
militare, [1]-32, 40-88 [=80]pp., woodcut
plate with items numbered 1-6, 4 fullpage woodcut illustrations in text, Florence:
G. Marescotti, 1582, [CNCE 28998; Cockle
783; Breman pp. 212-213; Sloos 08004].
Bound with:
IBID. Discorsi militari… sopra l’ espugnazione
d’ alcuni siti. 84pp., Florence: B. Sermartelli, 1587
[CNCE 33880; Cockle 787; Sloos 03008] 1705.
A fine Sammelband of sixteenth century Italian works
on fortification.
The work by Theti (Tetti, Teti 1529-1589) was published
thus in its incomplete state without the author’s consent:
in the dedication to the 1575 revision he speaks of it as
being ‘già senza mia volonta… per de no no so s’io li chiami
amici, sotto mio nome fatti stampare’, quoted Breman
p. 343. This first edition and the 1575 revision (almost a
new work) are both dedicated to the emperor Maximilian.
This 1569 edition is extremely uncommon. There are
copies in the BL, Bodleian, Harvard, Johns Hopkins, U
of Michigan, one in Germany and Censimento 16 lists
8 copies in Italy, a total of some 14 copies, a remarkably
low figure for a 16th-century Italian book, which we may
assume was printed in a small edition.
Lupicini 1582: prima facie pp. 33-40 (quire E) seem
to be missing. However the details given on p. 32 refer
to the individual figures as being on the folding plate
bound at that point, which are numbered 1-16. In some
copies this folding plate is signed E (not in the present
example which has been very slightly trimmed but with no
loss of image), Other copies described are the same: that
described by Sloos, that in the Getty Center library(UG400
L87 1582), that at Yale (BEIN 2000 1472), and that in the
BL (534.f.12(6).
SIR RICHARD STEELE
50 CERRI, Urbano. An account of
the state of the Roman-Catholick religion
throughout the world… with a large dedication
to the present pope, etc, Written for the use
of Pope Innocent XI. by Monsignor Cerri,
Secretary of the Congregation de propaganda
fide. Now first translated from an authentick
Italian MS. never publish’d. To which is added,
a discourse concerning the state of religion
in England. Written in French, in the Time
of K. Charles I. and now first translated.
With a large dedication to the present pope;
giving him a very particular account of the
state of religion amongst protestants; and of
several other matters of importance relating
to Great-Britain. By Sir Richard Steele.
[2],lxxviii,viii,197,[1],x p. First edition.
London: printed for J. Roberts, 1715 £1500
Bound with:
MAR, John Erskine, Earl of. A letter from
the Earl of Mar to the King, etc.[2], 19, [1]
p lacking half-title, London: J. Tonson, 1715.
Bound with:
A letter to the Earl of O-d [Oxford] concerning
the bill of peerage. By Sir R-d S-le. The second
edition. 32p., London: J. Roberts, 1719.
Bound with:
STEELE, Sir Richard. The crisis of property:
an argument proving that the annuitants
for ninety-nine years, as such, are not in the
condition of other subjects of Great Britain,
but by compact with the legislature are exempt
from any new direction relating to the said
estates. 30, [2]p., last leaf with advertisements,
London: printed for W. Chetwood; J. Roberts;
J. Brotherton; and Charles Lillie, 1720
Bound with:
IBID. A nation a family. Being the sequel of the
crisis of property: or, a plan for the Improvement
of the South-Sea proposal. 32p., London:
printed for W. Chetwood; J. Roberts; J. Brotherton;
and Charles Lillie, 1720. [Goldsmiths 5875].
Bound with:
[IBID.] The Spinster: in defence of the woollen
manufactures. To be continued occasionally.
Numb. I. 16, [2]p., last leaf with adverts on recto,
London: J. Roberts, 1719. [Goldsmiths 5538].
Bound with:
IBID. The state of the case between the Lord
-Chamberlain of His Majesty’s household,
and the governor of the Royal Company of
Comedians. With the opinions of Pemberton,
Northey, and Parker, concerning the theatre.
31, [1]p., London: Printed for W. Chetwood,
J.Roberts, J. Graves, and Charles Lillie, 1720.
Bound with:
IBID. An account of the fish-pool: consisting
of a description of the vessel so call’d, lately
invented and built for the importation of fish
alive, and in good health, from parts however
distant. A proof of the imperfection of the wellboat hitherto used in the fishing trade. The
true reasons why ships become stiff or crank in
sailing; with other improvements, very useful to
all Persons concern’d in trade and navigation.
Likewise, a description of the carriage intended
for the conveyance of fish by land, in the same
good condition… By Sir Richard Steele, and Mr.
Joseph Gillmore, Mathematician. vii, [21], 60p.,
woodcut illustrations in text, London: printed and
sold by H. Meere, J. Pemberton and J. Roberts,
1718. [Kress 3076]. In some copies the price
of 1 shilling is printed on the title-page.
8 works in one volume 8vo (102 x 150mm.) contemporary vellum 1715.
19
A fine collection of pamphlets by, and relating to, Sir
Richard Steele (1672-1729) one of the best known
journalists of his day.
That as usual the preface was printed last is clear from a
note on p. 58 (the last) of the preface where corrections
to part 3 are brought to the reader’s attention.
Provenance: Sir Thomas Clarke with his signature and
a few notes.
The book is very uncommon. There is a copy in Christ
Church, Oxford (wrongly dated in COPAC), and one at
Jesus College, Cambridge (dated 1596 by Adams). There
is also a copy at St. Paul’s Cathedral, London, which is
dated 1680 in the Cathedral Libraries Catalogue. Such
a date would be consistent with the binding of this copy.
51 CHARLEMAGNE. Caroli M. imp. et
Synodi parisiensis sub Ludovico pio Caroli
M. filii scripta; de imaginibus. Edita ad fidem…
exemplarium Ioannis Tilii… & P. Pithoei.
3 parts 8vo (130 x 90mm.) 58, ([6 blank, all cancelled)]; [564]; 130p., late 17th-century calf, gilt
spine, red edges.
[Frankfurt? c.1660] £700
An interesting and slightly perplexing volume enclosing
two elements, both previously published, preceded by an
anonymous preface. The two synods the proceedings of
which are documented are that called by Charlemagne at
Frankfurt in 794, and the Synod of Paris summoned by his
son Louis the pious (778-840) in November 825, both of
them concerned with the use of images, and reflecting a
response to the problems of the use (and abuse) of images
in the East and West. The same problem was, of course, a
vexed question in the mid-sixteenth century and beyond.
The writings of the Frankfurt Council were originally
edited by Jean Du Tillet, Archbishop of Meaux, and
published in 16mo in Paris in 1549 - hence the date here
printed. This has the title Opus contra Synodum quae in
partibus Graeciae pro adorandis imaginibus gesta est. Like the
present edition, that text also includes Paulinus against
Felix, Bishop of Urgel (d. 818) and Elipandus, Bishop of
Toulouse (717-808?), the begetter of the Adoptionist heresy,
condemned at the Councils of Regensburg in 792 and of
Frankfurt in 794, and against which Alcuin of York wrote
a treatise. This is preceded by an anonymous preface on
page 35 of which there is a brief biography of Du Tillet
taken from De Thou.
Pithou’s edition of the Synod of Paris was published
by the Wechel heirs in 1596 (VD16 S10427), the year of
his death. This edition which has the date 1596 on the
title-page is a reprint (although with different make-up)
and has somes notes by Melchior Goldast taken from his
book published in Frankfurt in 1608, reference to which is
directly made on p. 36 of the preface: Imperialia decreta de
cultu imaginum in utroq. imperio tam orientis quam occidentis
promulgata, a substantial 8vo of several hundred pages.
The unsigned preface clearly is written from a Protestant
point of view: there is, for example, much criticism of
Bellarmine. On pp. 34 and 54 there is a reference to the
edition of Concilia Paris 1636, and on p. 33 a reference to
the edition of Hincmar’s Opera published by Cramoisy in
Paris in 1645, which clearly gives us a terminus post quem.
MAGGS
52 CHEKE, Sir John. De pronuntiatione
wwgraecae potissimum linguae disputationes
cum Stephano Vuintoniensi episcopo, etc.
8vo (170 x 105mm.) [16] (last 2 leaves blank), 349
(=351, 175-176 bis), [1]p., contemporary English
blind-stamped calf, ms. paste-downs, lacking ties.
Basel: N. Bischoff the younger, 1555 £700
First edition. The argument is between Sir John Cheke
(1514-57), a Protestant humanist who had taught Edward
VI, and who advocated a new humanist pronunciation of
Greek, and the bishop of Winchester, Stephen Gardiner
(1495/8 -1555) who as chancellor of the university of
Cambridge had forbidden the use of the new pronunciation,
on the grounds that whilst it was academically valid, a
change would merely confuse people, antedates the
publication of Cheke’s book, as it took place early in the
1540s. The subject of Greek pronunciation was much
discussed in the sixteenth century, and may be studied
partly in Ingram Bywater’s The Erasmian prounciation of
Greek and its precursos, London: Frowde, 1908.
Provenance: ex-libris on title ‘Arth. Hilder sum’.
qui summa industria in ligno sculpsit & incidit, hoc, quos
cernitis Arabum characteres, sicut ego illi praescripseram’
(‘my friend and guest Conrad Marschall from Pruntrut*,
who with the greatest skill cut in wood these Arabic letters
which you see, in accordance with what I laid down for
him’). We are further told that Christmann held long
conversations with his master, Francis Junius (himself, of
course, very interested in exotic alphabets and types, and
who has penned a short letter addressed to Christmann),
and had access to the Arabic books in the Palatine Library.
He also gives a general account of a plan to publish further
works on Arabic. The Arabic words on the title-page mean
‘In the name of the Father & of the Son and of the Holy
Ghost and of the one God, Amen’
*Pruntrut or Porrentruy is a small town in Jura in Switzerland.
Bound with:
TOP, Alexander. The oliue leafe: or, uniuersall
Abce. Wherein is set foorth the creation, descent,
and authoritie of letters, etc. sm. 4to (180 x
110mm.)ff. [16], London: W. White for G. Vincent,
1603 STC 24121 (BL, Oxford & Chatsworth),
lacking the folding table, and A1 and D4 blank.
Top’s book, no copy of which is to be found outside the
UK, and which has been reprinted in facsimile by the
Scolar Press in 1971, proposes that the twenty-two letters
of the Hebrew alphabet correspond to the number of acts
carried out by God in the seven days of Creation, and
that the Hebrew alphabet is divinely inspired. Top also
published St. Peters rocke in 1597 (known in 3 copies) and a
version of the Psalms in Amsterdam in 1629, which again
is known in few copies.
Bound with:
53 CHRISTMANN, Jakob. Bismi al Ab wa al-ibn… Alphabetum arabicum
cum isagoge scribendi legendique arabice.
[12], 20pp., woodcut arabic.
Neustadt: M. Harnisch, 1582 RHENFERD, Jacobus. Periculum palmyrenum.
Sive literaturae veteris palmyrenae indagandae
& eruendae ratio & specimen.[20], 56pp., 3
folding tables, Franeker: F. Halma, 1704.
£2000
Jakob Christmann (1554-1613) was born in the Rheingau
at Johannisberg, and may have been a Jew who became
a Christian. The author of a number of works, and an
early Arabist, he was also interested in scientific matters,
partly because he had inherited the library of Rheticus, in
which was the manuscript of Copernicus De revolutionibus,
which was sold by his widow at his death, and is today in
Poland. In the preface to this elementary introduction to
Arabic, Christmann gives an interesting brief account of
the progress of Arabic studies in Europe, mentioning the
work of Postel and Clenardus, and gives us the name of
the man who has cut for him the woodcut Arabic: ‘amicus
et hospes meus Conradus Mareschallus Bruntrutanus,
Bound with:
DRUSIUS, J. Alphabetum ebraicum etc.
(Veterum sapientum gnw ma i triplici charactere
ad antiquam legendi consuetudinem).
59pp., Franeker: A. Rade, 1587.
The collection of ‘gnomai’ or sayings are in Hebrew
transliterated into Greek letter and with a Latin translation.
These are taken from Proverb, Ben Sira and Pirqe Avoth,
or Sayings of the Fathers.
Steinschneider col. 895.2; Fuks & Fuks-Mansfeld.
4 works in 1 volume 4to (190 x 135mm.), eighteenth
century half calf, lacking spine label.
RHODE ISLAND RELIGION
54 COBBET, Thomas. The Civil
magistrates power in matters of religion
modestly debated, Impartially stated according
to the bounds and grounds of Scripture, and
answer returned to those objections against
the same which seem to have any weight
in them. Together with a brief answer to a
certain slanderous pamphlet called Ill News
from New-England; or, A Narrative of NewEnglands Persecution. By John Clark, of RoadIsland, Physician. By Thomas Cobbet teacher
of the Church at Lynne in New-England.
2 parts [16], 108; 52pp. Contemporary calf, panelled
in blind (front cover detached).
London: by W. Wilson, 1653 £4500
Thomas Cobbet (1608- 1690) published three works in
London in the 1650s, one of which, a substantial volume,
A practical discourse of prayer went through three editions.
21
In this work, as may be seen from the title, he defends state
interference in religious matters and the established church.
John Clarke, who is well known as a Baptist clergyman
and physician (see AMB), came to Boston in 1637 from
England, and in 1650 became a missionary. Ill Newes from
New-England; or, A Narrative of New-Englands Persecution.
Wherein Is declared That While Old England Is Becoming
New, New-England Is Become Old Ill news from England was
published in 1652, gives an account of his imprisonment
in Massachusetts in 1651, and pleads the cause of religious
toleration. He returned to England and remained for
some years, before returning to Massachusetts. It is this
work, here called ‘a certain slanderous pamphlet’ which
Cobbet attacks. Of Cobbet nothing seems to be known.
Wing C4776. Some copies have the imprint: W. Wilson
for Philemon Stephens.
Bound with:
PRYNNE, W. Truth triumphing over falshood,
antiquity over novelty. [12], 156p., London:
J. Dawson, and are to be sold by M. Sparke, 1645,
many side-notes cropped [Wing P4115].
Bound with:
IBID. The sword of christian magistracy
supported, etc. [18(first leaf blank)], 174,
[2(errata on recto)]p. London:J. Macock
for J. Bellamie, 1647 [Wing P4098].
3 works in 1 volume 4to (205 x 145mm.), contemporary calf.
Provenance: On front free endpaper is a list of contents
(Syllabus M1-M4, classing the first item as having 2 nos.))
written in a contemporary hand, and on the fore-edge is
written M1/ Pars 2. and the numbers 1,2,3,4 written one
under the other and diagonally. The numbers are written
on the title-pages of the individual works.
55 COLE, Benjamin. The description
and use, of a new quadrant, for finding
the latitude at sea… To which are added, short
and plain instructions, for the use of that…
instrument, invented by John Hadley, Esq; with
the improvement of an artificial horizon.
8vo (180 x 106mm.) 32pp., folding engr. plate dated
June 9 1748.
London: printed in the year 1748 £800
There were two editions, this of 1748, of ESTC records 2
copies only, both in N. America, and one with the imprint
of J. Hart, 1749. Benjamin Cole (1695-1766) was a London
instrument maker.
MAGGS
56 CURTIUS RUFUS, Quintus.
De rebus gestis Alexandri Magni
regis Macedonum. Cum annotationibus
Desiderii Erasmi Roterodami.
8vo (170 x 100mm.); 317, [3]pp., woodcut printer’s
device on title-page and verso of last leaf, early
eighteenth-century speckled calf, spine gilt in
compartments, morocco lettering-piece, gilt
lettering “Griffus”, binding rubbed.
Lyons: Sebastien Gryphe 1541 £700
The presence of the name of the printer on the spine points
to a bibliophilic interest in the printer, and is something
found on books bound for later eighteenth century
collectors, particularly on incunabula and on books printed
by Aldus and Stephanus. The extremely washed nature of
the considerable and extensive annotations (particularly
in book IV pp. 72-85) on many pages (beginning with
the title-page) points to a collector who, like others much
later in the eighteenth century, wanted a clean copy from
which all such evidence had been eradicated.
Baudrier viii, 155.
57 C[OLDING] [Paulus] [Jani] (Poul
Jensen). Dictionarium herlovianum,
desumptum ex Etymologico latino P.J.C.
8vo (145 x 85mm.) ff. [4], [364], (A-Z, Aa-YY8- Zz4)
Zz2-3 with errata, Zz4 presumed blank (not present),
English panelled calf, lacking title-label on spine,
slight paper restoration to title-leaf, upper joint
splitting.
Copenhagen: S. Sartorius, 1626 £1500
Herlufsholm school, which still flourishes, was founded
in 1565 by Admiral Herluf Trolle and his wife Birgitta
Goye on the site of a Benedictine monastery Skovkloster
not far from Copenhagen. This is clearly mentioned at
the end of the preface.
Colding (or Kolding) was born in 1581 and died in
1640. At one time he was a pupil of Hans Poulsen Resen
(1561-1638) the Danish Protestant theologian published his
Etymologicum latinum… addita etiam danica interpretation at
Rostock in 1622, and this work is based on that. The Danish
words precede the Latin so that the pedagogic nature of
the book is apparent. It is intended for Latin composition,
but it is, as the preface makes clear, also meant to shew the
riches of the Danish language. Colding writes as follows:
‘Quid enim est in lingua latina aut alia, quod non aeque
commode exprimi potest Danica? Nunquid res familiares
& domesticae suis carent notis, aut nos mutos creavit
natura pisces?’ Et in exoticis, ubi earundem proprietas &
elegantia major quam in domestica? (What can be said
in Latin or any other language, which cannot be equally
well expressed in Danish? Do familiar and domestic items
lack their own names, or has nature created us so many
dumb fish? Is there any greater propriety and elegance
of expression in strange tongues, as opposed to our own?).
A note on the fly-leaf reads ‘Dictionarium danicum’, and
probably relates to the missing spine label.
The only copy of this book in the UK is in Edinburgh
(NLS; which has also the Etymologicum), and KVK equally
records one copy in Germany. There is also a copy at BNF
Paris (X-16399), and it is recorded as in the Royal Library,
Copenhagen, and in the Danish Union Catalogue. There is
no copy at Harvard or Yale, or any other library in the USA.
58 CRINESIUS, Christoph. Babel
sive, discursus de confusione linguarum,
tum orientalium…tum occidentalium…
statuens hebraicam omnium esse
primam, & ipsissimam matricem, etc.
4to (190 x 145mm.) [16], 144, [4]pp., engraved text
in Samaritan and Arabic on [2nd])(2verso, engraved
text of Deut. XII on p. 30, small paper repair to recto
of last leaf, ff. T1-2 (contents and errata) bound in
prelims, eighteenth-century English mottled calf,
gilt, some leaves browned, binding slightly rubbed.
Nürnberg: S. Halbmayer, 1629 £1000
Crinesius (1584-1629) whose biography is rehearsed
in the preface, was born in 1584 in Bohemia, the son
of a cleric and schoolmaster of the same name and his
mother Anna Günther. Educated first in his father’s
school, in 1603 he went to Jena and then Wittemberg,
and graduated in philosophy in 1607. He then devoted
himself to theology and linguistic studies. He married in
1615 Regina Dörffliner, a widow with children. In 1624
he was forced to migrate to Nuremberg, where he taught
and ministered. He died around five in the morning on
28 August 1629.
In this work Crinesius, who was the author of several
works on Syriac grammar and texts, treats Hebrew as the
first or origin of all languages, a not uncommon belief, and
then goes on to discuss the languages which are cognate
with Hebrew or have some validity in the establishment
of the scriptural text. He passes on to Samaritan (with
an engraved plate on p. 30 of the text of Deuteronomy
XII. 13-18 in Samaritan script facing its Hebrew/Latin
translation), a chapter on Hebrew vocalisation, and from
this we pass to the other languages stemming from Hebrew
–Chaldaean, Syriac (the alphabet is given, but the text of
the Lord’s Prayer is printed (with a transliteration) in
Hebrew characters, Arabic, and Ethiopic, with Persian
also discussed. Crinesius tells us he is still a novice in
Arabic (as he is in Persian and Ethiopic), but is studying
the grammars of Petrus Kirsten of Breslau and Erpenius,
and further has been using the Arabic Psalter printed at
Rome in 1619 and other sources as the basis for compiling
a little dictionary. He also says he has learned much from
Johann Zechendorff, rector of the school at Zwickau.
Johann Zechendorff is known as an Arabist (there is
a good collection of his various writings in the Bodleian
Library, Oxford and at the HAB in Wolfenbuttel): he
published a grammatical analysis of the Lord’s Prayer in
Arabic, various other works on Arabic language including
Literae exoticae scriptae Arabice ad Joannem Zechendorff., ab
eodem in literas Hebræas conversæ punctatae, & <kata po da
> ferme ad verbum in lat. versæ, [VD17 1:071343Z], and
Fabulae muhammedicae sive nugae Alcorani [an edition of
Sura 114]. Altenburg, 1628 [VD17 14:062544U].
From Crinesius we learn also of a complete interlinear
Latin translation of the Qur’an together with marginal
refutations of Muhammadan doctrine, which now ‘needs
nothing except a printer, properly trained in the setting
of Arabic’. In the event Zechendorff published at Zwickau
one sura of the Qur’an (printed by Melchior Göppner)
where the Arabic text is woodcut and not printed. For all
languages discussed the Lord’s Prayer is given, sometimes
in transliterated form, e.g. when discussing Ethiopic the
text of both the Lord’s Prayer and Nunc Dimittis are
given thus. The section on Greek and Latin includes some
ludicrous Hebrew/Latin etymologies. Unexpectedly there
is an interesting account of the pronunciation of French
(‘Regulae generales pronunciatonis gallicanae’ where each
letter is discussed) pp. 88-101) with shorter paragraphs on
Italian and Spanish, and again the Lord’s Prayer is given
(two versions in French, that of Theodore de Bèze and
another version ‘in lingua communi’). The penultimate
chapter is a discussion of the divine name and its forms,
and the last chapter is a series of eight scriptural linguistic
‘praxeis’, each one devoted to a different language, the
last being a discussion of Luther’s insertion of the word
‘allein’ into II Rom v. 28, and how this mirrors German
usage (Germanismus).
The work includes several sets of liminary verses,
including one in Hebrew by Daniel Schwenter, Syriac
(in Hebrew characters), Greek and one in Arabic by
Zechendorff. This is engraved (not printed) together with
some in Samaritan characters by the engraver Herreman,
and dated 3 October 1628.
This work, like all the various works on Syriac etc. of
Crinesius, is not common. VD 17 locates a few copies.
There are two in the BL, and possibly a copy in Oxford.
The work was also included by Thomas Crenius in his
Analecta philologico-critico-historica (Amsterdam: Myls, 1699).
VD17 14 053983L.
23
59 D’ACRES, R. ?pseudonym. The elements
of water-drawing, or a compendious
abstract of all sorts and kinds of water-machins
or gins, used or practised in the World, with
their natural grounds and reasons, and what
service may be expected from them. As also new
and exquisite ways and machins never before
published. With a philosophical discourse, and
new discovery of drawing water out of great
deeps by fier. Where is also dispproved the
perpetual motion, the water-poise, the syphon
or philosophers engine, the horizontal sails,
with divers other experiments. Published for
the improving the service of the mineral world,
for supplying our most necessary wants of
firing, for raising of water for cities and towns,
and for watering and draining of grounds.
4to (175 x 125mm.) [8], 41, [1]pp. Mid-18th-century
sprinkled calf, gilt spine, red morocco label, red
edges, title shaved closely at the head (touching
“THE”) and at the foot with a small area of loss where
one might expect the date to be except that it was
undated (cf. the BL copy on EEBO), title-page and
last (blank) page lightly dust-soiled; lightly browned
throughout.
London: by Tho. Leach, for Henry Brome, [?1659/
1660] £12,000
“R. D’acres”, the signature to the preface is presumed to be
a pseudonym; “ascribed on insufficient evidence to Robert
Thornton [1618-79, of Warwickshire]” - ESTC.
“It was the earliest work exclusively on the subject [of vacuum steam-pumps] by an Englishman” - R.S.Kirby, etc.
Engineering in History (1990), p. 155.
Wing E494. 5 copies are recorded (British Library 2, one
with title mutilated), Cambridge, Bodley (ex Ashmole; last
leaf in facsimile) & Folger).
Bound with:
VAUGHAN, Rowland. Most approved and long
experienced water-workes. Containing, The
manner of winter and summer-drowning of
medow and pasture, by the advantage of the
least, river, brooke, fount, or water-prill adiacent;
there-by to make those grounds (especially if
they be drye) more fertile ten for one. As also a
demonstration of a proiect, for the great benefit
of the common-wealth generally, but of Herefordshire especially. 4to (175 x 125mm.) [140]pp
[-]1, B-S4. Without the first blank leaf. Lacking
the two folding plates, sidenotes to Davies’s’
MAGGS
“Panegyricke” shaved London: by George Eld, 1610.
With a 13-page verse “Paneyricke” by his “poore kinsman”
John Davies of Hereford, another poem by Davies and
others verses by Robert Corbet, John Hoskins, etc.
Vaughan’s idea of regularly flooding water-meadows to
boost crops was developed by Sir Richard Weston in the
mid-17th-century.
STC 24603. The following copies are located in USA:
Columbia, with plates, Harvard (not on HOLLIS), Yale
(Beinecke, no plates, & British Art Center, with plates)
and at Folger (2 copies, both lacking plates & one lacking
leaf K1), Huntington (ex Bridgewater, with plates handcoloured). S4v in this copy has a printed certificate by
Vaughan dated 1609 (in some copies the page is blank).
Bound with:
CASTELLI, Benedetto. [Della misura
dell’acque correnti]. Traicté de la mesure
des eaux courantes… traduit de’italien en
françois. Auec un discours de la ionction des
mers… Ensemble un traicté du mouuement
des eaux d’ Euangeliste Torricelli… Traduit
du latin en françois [by Pierre Saporta].
4to [10], 87pp., small woodcut diagrams
in text Castres: F. Barcouda, 1664.
WITH A CONTRIBUTION BY FERMAT.
The first work has a lengthy preface ‘a messeigneurs les
commissaires… pour la jonction des mers’ signed by
Saporta on the great scheme actually carried out under
Louis XIV to join the Mediterranean sea to the Atlantic by
means of a canal joining the Garonne river to the Etang
de Thau in the south, the famous Canal du Midi. The
second work by Torricelli has its own title-page, and a
preface by Saporta addressed to the great mathematician
Fermat, whom he terms ‘le souverain legislateur de tous les
scavans’. Fermat had prompted the translator to undertake
the work as a sequel to that of Castelli. Fermat, normally
associated with Toulouse, where he was conseiller du roi,
had for many years close links with Castres a strongly
Huguenot town on the banks of the river Agout. In fact
died and was buried there in 1665.
In 1648 was founded at Castres a protestant Academy
amongst whose members were Pierre Bayle, Pierre Borel,
the physician and writer on alchemy, de Ranchin and
Pierre Saporta. It was thus that Fermat and Saporta
became acquainted.
Pp. 84-7 contain the ‘Observation sur Synesius’ which
in translation begins as follows: The pages which remain
empty in this quire made me think of filling them with the
splendid observation which I learned some days ago from
the imcomparable M. Fermat, who does me the honour
of being my friend and of frequently talking with me. It
is in the fifteenth letter of Synesius, Bishop of Cyrene,
which deals with somethning not undertood by any of
his commentators, not even by the learned Father Petau,
as he himself avows in his notes on this author. I give this
observation even more willingly as it has much in common
with the treatises here printed.
The original French of this text is printed in P. Fermat
Oeuvres complètes ed. Paul Tannery & C. Henry, Paris,
1891-1912.
Of this work we have traced 9 copies. There are 3 copies
listed at Albi, Bordeaux and BnF by Rép. bibl. xviieme siècle
I, Castres, with 2 also in Paris in the library of the Museum
of Natural History. There is a copy at Harvard (Houghton
Library), the University of Oklahoma in the USA, and in
Germany at Göttingen (8 PHYS II 3659-a) with Fermat’s
autograph. There is also copy at Keio University in Japan.
It is not in the British Library, Bodley, Cambridge etc.
Bound with:
CEREDI, Giuseppe. Tre discorsi sopra il
modo d’alzar acque da’ luoghi bassi. ff. [10],
pp. 100 (=99), [1], lacking ff. E3-4, and E7
with woodcuts (described in text) Parma:
S. Viotti, 1567 (Adams C1280 describes
an imperfect copy. Quire E would seem
from the signing to consist of 12 leaves.)
4 works in 1 volume 4to (175 x 125mm.), eighteenthcentury calf.
60 DALE, Antonius van. Dissertationes
IX. Antiquitatibus, quin et marmoribus,
cum Romanis, tum potissimum Graecis,
illustrandis inservientes. Cum figuris aeneis.
4to (215 x 155mm.) [44], 804, [16], engraved
printer’s device on title-page, title printed in red
and black, woodcut tail-pieces, 9 engraved plates
of coins medals etc., contemporary calf, spine gilt
in compartments, some light tears.
Amsterdam: Hendrik & widow of Theodore Boom,
1702 £750
First edition, and a fine copy. Antonius Dale (1638-1708)
is chiefly known for his book on beliefs and superstitions,
which influenced Fontenelle, but in this extensive work he
addresses with great erudition similar subjects of ancient
practice and cult as manifested in the concrete remains
of the ancient world, marbles, sculptures, inscriptions
and coins.
61DALRYMPLE, Sir John. Memoirs of
Great Britain and Ireland. From the
last Parliament of Charles II. until the Seabattle of La Hogue. (Memoirs … Volume II.)
2 volumes 4to (267 x 200mm.) viii, 59, [1]; 155, [2],
154-186, [1], 186-232; 211, [1]; xiv, 325, [3]; 342, [2];
246, [2] pp., bound in contemporary tree calf, covers
tooled with a gilt border, spine elaborately tooled
in gilt with a red and green morocco labels, yellow
edges, original green ribbon marker (corners a
little bumped, some light foxing at the beginning
and end).
Edinburgh: for W. Strahan, and T. Caddell, London;
and A. Kincaid and J. Bell, and J. Balfour, Edinburgh,
1771 £1200
This work of Sir John Dalrymple’s, baronet of Cranstoun,
(the third volumes of which appeared 1782) created a
sensation when it first appeared for its revelations about
some of the more prominent figures of the time. Hume
thought it curious and that it added little to the sum of
knowledge to date, and Boswell records some of Johnson’s
remarks about the present work: the latter, on a visit
to Dalrymple at Cranstoun in 1773, for which he was
accidentally late. [See inside back cover for photo of binding].
62 DANEAU, Lambert. Geographiae
poeticae, id est universae terrae
descriptionis ex optimis …quibusque latinis
poeris libri quatuor: quorum, primus, Europam;
secundus, Africam: tertius, Asiam: quartus,
mare universum, & maris insulas continet, etc.
8vo (150 x 98mm.) [8], 322, [22]p., last leaf a blank,
eighteenth-century calf, gilt fillet on covers, spine
gilt in compartments, gilt edges.
[Geneva]: J. Stoer, 1580 £1000
First edition of this unoriginal (but cleverly contrived)
compilation of four books, each one devoted to a separate
continent (Europe, Africa, Asia (Middle East etc., the
Mediterranean sea and islands), but not including the
New World. It is in fact a Cento made up from extracts
from a wide variety of classical Latin poets, mostly writing
in hexameters, with a large admixture of lines from the
Descriptio orbis terrae (Perihg h siV) of Dionysius Periegetes,
a work in 1187 lines of Greek, which was widely, and for
centuries, used as a textbook of geography: (it was even
printed ‘in usum scholae Etonensis’, and more than
once). The Latin translation is ad verbum, and not in verse
and is that found in the Estienne edition of 1577. The
book is dedicated to Sir Philip Sidney by its ‘author’ the
25
French protestant pastor and writer, Lambert Daneau
(ca. 1530 -1595). The dedicatory verses contain several
lines of compliment to Elizabeth I, including words which
adumbrate the famous words uttered at Tilbury in 1588 ‘the body of a weak and feeble woman’ - in the line ‘Nympha
genus, sed vir pectore, mente dea’. The book also appears
with the variant imprint Lyons, Louis Cloquemin, 1580,
and some copies are recorded with the Stoer imprint but
the date 1579. They are all the same edition.
Provenance: signature on p. [vii] of Andrew Smallwood
(17th cent.), and on front free fly-leaf ‘ex bibliotheca fratris
1s.10d.’. There is some underlining.
63 DANTI, Egnazio, OP. Le scienze matematiche ridotte in tavole.
[4], 59, [1(blank)[p., device on title-page, G1 and H1
signed with small stuck-on pieces of paper cut to size.
Bologna: appresso la compagnia della stampa, 1577 £1100
Bound with:
STURM, Johann Christoph. Mathesis
compendiaria sive tyrocinia mathematica
tabulis… comprehensa quam sexta vice…
auxit autoris filius L.C. Sturm, 79, [1(blank)]
p., 25 engraved illustrations in text, mostly
full-page, Koburg: Moritz Hagen for Paul
Günther Pfotenhauer, 1714, slight browning.
2 works in 1 volume folio (350 x 220mm.) 18thcentury half calf, rebacked 1577-1714.
Egnazio Danti (1537-1586) was a Dominican whose original
secular name was Carlo Pellegrini from Perugia. The
intention of the work is to enable the interested reader to
see ‘at a glance’ (una occhiata) in a series of Ramist tables,
mostly set out across a double-page spread, a summary of
the various mathematical sciences, from astronomy- the
sphere, the planets - to architecture and even sculpture.
On p. 24 the printer draws attention to the necessity of
illustrations particularly for the astronomical sections, and
tells the interested reader to use those in the ‘Theoriche de’
Pianeti con le annotationi del Reinoldo stampate a Parigi’
and to excuse the printer for not having been able to adapt
them for this book, which is partly caused by ‘difficulties
with the engravers, which he attributes to a ‘pestilent
contagion’. On p. 35 where the measurements of the sun
etc. are discussed there is a reference to the calculations
of Copernicus (‘si come egregiamente è dimostrati dal
Copernico’). Tavola 40 ‘della hidrografia’ gives the names
of the winds in Italian, Latin, Dutch, French, and Spanish.
Tavola 42 deals with civil architecture, 43 with military
architecture (taken from Alberti, wrongly given the
forename ‘Antonio’ here), and 44 which deals with painting
MAGGS
and sculpture is taken from the book of a relation Vincenzo
Danti (Il primo libro del trattato delle perfette proporzioni di
tutte le cose che imitare, e ritrarre si possano con l’arte del disegno,
Florence, 1567). [Riccardi i, 392 9 ‘raro’). CNCE 15999].
The work by Sturm, as may be seen from the title, is here
reprinted for the sixth time, edited by his son. The plates
are divided into sections -geometry, architecture, military
and civil, etc. There is a copy in the Bodleian, which also
has another book from the press of Hagen, and in the BL,
but the book is not common outside Germany. The only
copy in the USA is at NYPL.
Provenance: Danti: Kenelme Digby’s signature on titlepage, with note of price ‘reals 3’. Sir Kenelm Digby’s (16031665) interest and involvement in science is well known,
and from the note of the price in ‘reals’, one would suggest
that this book was acquired during his sojourn in Spain
from the spring of 1623. ODNB states that during his
Spanish sojourn: ‘He also found time to collect books and
make some lifelong acquaintances’.
64 [DAVIES, Miles.] Athenae Britannicae:
or, a critical history of the Oxford
and Cambridge writers and writings…
Together with an occasional freedom of
thought… by M.D. Barrister at law, etc.
8vo [4], 88, 348(=347), [1]p., contemporary panelled
calf.
London: printed for the author, 1716 £800
A reissue of Eikon mikro biblike of 1715 with cancel title.
The author’s name is not given other than in the initials in
the title, and the imprint makes no mention of where the
book is to be sold. This forms part 1 of Athenae Britannicae.
65 [DEFOE, Daniel?]. The Duke of Anjou’s
succession considered, as to its
legality and consequences… The fourth
edition. (Part II… The second edition.)
2 parts 4to (202 x 150mm.) [4], 56; [4], 59, [1].,
contemporary panelled calf, rubbed.
London: printed, and sold by A. Baldwin, 1701 £500
The work is an element in the literature covering what
became the War of the Spanish Succession. This war was
precipitated by the choice by the king of Spain Carlos II
of Philippe, duc d’Anjou, grandson of Louis XIV, as his
successor, a succession which, had it taken place, would
have concentrated far too much power in one pair of
hands. The work is sometimes attributed to Daniel Defoe.
66 DICKINSON, Edmund, fellow of
Merton College. Delphi Phoenicizantes…
Appenditur diatriba de Noae in Italiam
adventu… nec non de origine Druidum, etc.
8vo (138 x 85mm.) [38], 42, 41-56, 59-142, [18], 40,
[10] p., contemporary sheep, upper cover detached.
Oxford: H Hall, impensis R. Davis, 1655 £600
Anthony Wood attributes the work to Henry Jacob (16081652). There is a preface by Zachary Bogan of Corpus, and
the book is dedicated to the Warden of Merton, Jonathan
Goddard. Various exotic types are used, including Hebrew
and Arabic.
Dijkman (Hedemora 1650 - Stockholm 1717) educated at
Uppsala university, was a noted antiquarian and archaeologist, and author of several books. This work on Swedish
Runic stones and their importance as illustrating Swedish
religious and civil history, was published posthumously.
The chronicle of Jordanes in sixty chapters here appears
in Swedish for the first time. The translator was the antiquarian and editor of Scandinavian texts Johan Fredrik
Peringskiöld (1789-1725), son of Johan Peringskiöld editor
of the Eddas.
The Swedish Royal Library and British library have both
works, but no other library in the UK, and the works are
not at Harvard or Yale.
Wing D1385; Madan 2275.
SWEDISH ANTIQUITIES
67 DIJKMAN, Petter. Historiske
Anmarckningar oefwar, och af en dehl
Runstenar, i Sverige, ungående dhe uhrgambla
Sviar- och Gioethers kirkie=och werdzliga
waesende, uthi åthskilliga måhl, hwar af man
har att finna något ey så förr kunnigt: om
deras religion och evangeliske lährans hijt uthi
Swerige inkomst, tungomåhls ahrt, runska
bokstäfwers nampn och tahl, krigz- vttogh,
commercier, och andra resor härifrån Sweaoch Giötaland til the uthi Africa, Asien och
i Europen belägne orter, med: hwad mehra,
man så wähl af rijtningarne, som ordesätten
och stafwelserne, förmedelst stenarnes
jämbförelse har kunnat inhempta / författat
uthaf Petter Dijkman den äldre åhr Christi
1708. Cum gratia & privilegio s:æ r:æ m:tis.
[8], 184p., title and dedication printed in red and
black.
Stockholm: H.C. Merckell, 1723 £600
Bound with:
JORDANES. [De Getarum sive Gothorum
origine]. Doctor Jordans Biskopens i Ravenna,
Beskrifning om göthernas uhrsprung och
bedrifter wid åhr Chr. 552 nu för 1167 åhr sedan
författad. Af latinen påsvensko öfwersatt af
Johann F. Peringskiöld. [8], 148, [24]p., colophon
on final page, Stockholm: J.H. Werner, 1719.
2 works in 1 volume 4to (192 x 140mm.), eighteenth
century English polished calf c. 1760, gilt spine, red
morocco lettering-piece.
A very handsome volume containing two rare Swedish
historical works.
68 DRALSÉ DE GRANDPIERRE, le Sieur.
Relation de divers voyages faits dans
l’Afrique, dans l’Amérique, & aux Indes
occidentales. La relation du royaume du Juda…
La relation d’une isle nouvellement habitée
dans le détrooit de Malaca en Asie, etc.
12mo (165 x 90mm.) [12], 352, [8]p., first and last 2
leaves blank, contemporary calf, gilt, silk marker,
lacking part of lettering-piece.
Paris: C. Jombert, 1718 £500
First edition and a beautiful copy. The sheets were
reissued in 1726, and the work was translated into German
(Magdeburg, 1746). The author sails from France to
Buenos Aires, then to the West Indies, where he has dealing
with the English by whom he is captured. and his third
voyage is to Africa (Benin) and then Mexico.
Sabin 28273; JCB 1718/; Cioranescu 35362. The book is
common in American libraries, but COPAC lists only two
in the UK.
69 DU VERDIER, Claude. In autores
pene omnes, antiquos potissimum,
censio: qua… grammaticorum, poetarum…
rhetorum… iurisconsultorum, philosophorum,
mathematicorum, medicorum & theologorum
errata quaedam deprehenduntur.
4to (222 x 140mm.) 187, [5]pp., errata on pp. [188189], [190-192] blank, device on title-page, English
binding of brown calf, gilt fillets on coves, gilt spine,
lettering-piece, red, green & white silk marker.
Lyons: B. Honoré, 1586 £850
First edition of this elegantly printed work of literary
history, mostly dealing with the ancients but amongst
contemporary writers and poets discussed are Ramus,
Ronsard, Muretus (names printed), Desportes, Du Bartas
27
(names added in ms.) and various Italian writers such
as Petrarch, Caelius Rhodiginus, Poliziano, as well as
Melanchthon, Thomas More, of whose Latin verses (first
published in 1520) written in his exchange with Germain
de Brice or de Brie (Brixius, c. 1490-1538) there are
substantial quotations (pp. 163-168).
Du Verdier (1566-1649), who was the son of Antoine Du
Verdier (1544-1600), was a lawyer at Lyons and published
in 1591 a work on literary games or ‘lusus’, included in a
volume of parodies of Catullus ‘Phaselus ille…’, in 1581 a
Peripatesis epigrammatum, and in 1583 a work against those
who pretended to foretell the end of the world (Discours
contre ceux qui par des grandes conjonctions des planètes…
ont voulu prédire la fin du monde…) which forms part of
Chappuy’s translation of Doni Mondes célestes, Lyons, 1583.
This book contains various sonnets in French from his
pen (pp. 35-38).
Baudrier iv, 154; copies in BL, Oxford (2 plus a reprint
?reissue of 1609), BNF(2 copies), Arsenal. KVK lists two
copies, and OCLC records copies at Folger and the Library
of Congress. There is also one at Yale, but not a copy at
Harvard.
Provenance: In addition to the ms. notes already mentioned there are several more substantial marginal notes
and on the title-page the remark hanging from the word
‘censio’ ‘docta quidem elaboriosa sed nec sine invidia nec
sine erroribus’. The originator of these notes seems to be
one Duval of Yverdon(?). The name Duprat is also found
on the title-page.
70 DUBOIS, Philippe. Bibliotheca
Telleriana, sive catalogus liborum
bibliothecae… Caroli Mauritii Le Tellier.
Folio (388 x 246mm.) [20], 447, [81]pp., engraved
portrait of le Tellier, engraved coat of arms on
title-page, 2 engraved initials and head-pieces,
contemporary Dutch vellum, light damp-stain
in lower outer margin towards end, occasional
browning.
Paris: typographia regia, 1693 £2500
The collection of printed books of Charles Maurice Le
Tellier, Archbishop of Rheims, who died in 1709, was
bequeathed in 1710 to the Ste Genevieve library in Paris,
and this catalogue, ascribed to the cardinal’s librarian,
Dubois, is one of the best of 17th-century catalogues. There
are some 16,000 volumes, many of them bound aux armes.
The catalogue divides them into 23 classes, each denoted
by a letter of the alphabet, and within that class they are
divided by format.
MAGGS
71 DUBOURDIEU, Jean Armand. Apologie de nos confesseurs qui étoient
aux galères, au mois de janvier 1714. Où l’l’on
fait voir que le Sr. R--l [Pierre Rival] a falsifié
l’extrait qu’il a publié de leur lettres, avec des
réflexions sur un libelle du même auteur,
intitulé le Coup de Grace, pour Mr. R-l. 1. Où
l’on fait une défence abregé de la Révolution…
Contre les dangéreuses hypoteheses [sic],
et les calomnies de cet auteur, etc.
4to (197 x 145mm.) [2], xv,[1], 198, 14 (Table des
matières)p., contemporary calf, gilt spine.
Londres. Et se vend chez le Sr. de Treval, notaire françois
vis-à-vis l’eglise des Grecs. Chez Moyse Chastel libraire
en Greek Street à la Bible d’or. Chez la veuve Bouquet
en Cecile-Court, & chez Charles King libraire dans
Westminster-Hall, 1717 £1500
This work is, amongst other things, a defence of the
Glorious Revolution of 1688 and of the right of George I
to the throne of England. Jean Armand Dubourdieu (16771727) was a member of a Huguenot family well established
in London (see ODNB for him, his father and grandfather),
where he was Minister at the Savoy, a French Protestant
church founded in the reign of Charles II. Apart from
his controversial works, J.A. Dubourdieu also edited the
1719 Tonson edition of Fénelon’s Télemaque. Pierre Rival
(d. 1730) was pastor of the French Church in St. James’s
Palace, and author of several works in French, including his
Apologie published in 1716 which this work (in part) attacks.
The work is dedicated to six men who, as Protestants,
and following the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes,
had been pressed into the service of the French King as
Galériens or Galley slaves. Details of their biographies are
available on line (Galériens. Musée du désert). Service as
a galérien is depicted as a form of christian martyrdom.
They are:
(1) David Serre (or Serres). Born c. 1649, son Paul et
Suzanne Fitray, from La Mure (or Lausanne). Condemned
at Souleure ‘sans motif’, 6 September 1701, freed 28
October 1711 to join the army. Although described as a
brother of the next two, he does not seem to have been
such. (2) Jean Serres called le jeune. Born in 1668 from
Montauban, a dyer by trade. Condemned at Grenoble pour
exil, 24 May 1686, and freed le 20 juin 1713, retired to
Winchester,and died 6 Feb. 1754. (3) Pierre Serres called
Fonblanche. Born 1660 from. De Montauban (82000), a
dyer by trade. Condemned at Grenoble ‘à 10 ans pour exil,
24 mai 1686’, and freed le 7 March when he retired to
London. Died 17 August 1741. (4) Jean Lardant. Born ca.
1660, framer from Dieppe, condemned in Artois 12 march
1687 and freed 7 mars 1714. (5) Clement Patonnier. Born
ca. 1669, stocking maker from Bourdeaux, condemned
at Grenoble 25 september 1686, freed 17 June 1713,
emigrated). (6) Marc Antoine Reboul. Born ca. 1665, son
of Pierre Reboul et Magdeleine Sarrazin; silk worker at
Nîmes, condemned at Grosmodan 12 october 1689. Freed
20 june 1713, emigrated.
The book throws an interesting light upon the Huguenots
in London in a number of ways, most importantly the
stance they adopted (or were urged to adopt) vis-a-vis the
change of ruler in Britain at this point. Another interesting
aspect is the presence of French publishers. The name of
Le sieur Treval appears only in this book and in a work
by himself on the bull Unigenitus published also in 1717.
Moise Chastel’s name appears in 11 imprints. The widow
Bouquet’s name appears in 3 books.
ESTC records 2 copies only at BL and Huntington. There
is a copy at Munich listed by KVK.
Provenance: The first Earl ardently embraced the accession of George I, which may well account for the presence
of this very rare book in the library.
72 DUNCAN, Daniel. [Avis salutaire
à tout le monde, contre l’abus des
choses chaudes]. Wholesome advice against
the abuse of hot liquors, particularly of coffee,
chocolate tea, brandy, and strong-waters.
With directions to know what constitutions
they suit, and when the use of them may be
profitable or hurtful. By Dr. Duncan of the
Faculty of Montpelier. Done out of French.
8vo (188 x 114mm.) [8], 280p., contemporary sprinkled calf, prelims slightly browned.
London: printed for H. Rhodes at the Star, the Corner of
Bride-Lane in Fleet street, and A. Bell at the Cross-Keys
and Bible in Cornhil, near the Royal-Exchange, 1706 £1000
A translation of the French original published by Acher
in Rotterdam in 1705.
Goldsmith’s 4367; Simon BG 534.
73 ENOCH, Louis. De puerili
Graecarum literarum doctrina liber.
ff. 208, device on title-page, errata on f. 206, f.
207recto with instructions as to placing cancellanda
for 45verso & 46recto printed on ff. [207] verso
and [208]recto.
[Geneva:] R. Estienne, 1555 £700
ESTIENNE, Henri. Paralipomena
grammaticarum gr. lingae inst.,
etc. [16], 167, [1]pp., device on titlepage [Geneva: H. Estienne], 1581.
2 works in 1 volume 8vo (174 x 100mm.) eighteenth
century smooth calf, spine gilt.
Louis Enoch, a Frenchman, was from the Berry and came
as a refugee to Geneva in 1549. He became master of
the Collège de Rive in 1550, and in 1551 Jean Crespin
published his Greek grammar (Gilmont, Bibl. De J.
Crespin 51/15). He was one of the witnesses of Calvin’s
will. Estienne’s Paralipomena i.e. those things which are
left out, is quite clearly a supplement to the edition of
Enoch printed, as he remarks in his preface, by his father.
1st work Renouard 86 no. 5; Schreiber 111; 2nd work
Renouard 148 no. 1.
74 EQUICOLA, Mario. Dell’ istoria
di Mantova libri cinque… Riformata
secondo l’uso moderne si scrivere
istorie, per Benedetto Osanna, etc.
4to (182 x 139mm.) [26], 307, [5], Rr with register
and imprint Rr2 with list of errata, English calf
c. 1700, gilt fillet on covers, spine gilt in compartments,
green & red silk market.
Mantua: F. Osanna, 1607 £750
The humanist Mario Equicola (1470-1525) was born in
Calabria, but spent much of his life at the court of Mantua,
where, after her husband’s death, he was secretary to
Isabella d’Este, to whom he had previously been tutor. He
was the author of a number of works, and in particular
his book on the nature of love has been very influential,
as was his interest in provençal poetry: on p.44 Dante’s
remarks on Sordello are quoted and on p. 45 is given in
both Provençal and Italian, one of his poems.
The Chronica was first published ‘probably soon after
10 July 1521, with old worn types, probably not in Mantua
itself’ (Rhodes, ‘Notes on the <Chronica di Mantua> of
Mario Equicola’ in GJ 1957 reprinted in Studies in early
Italian printing¸1982 pp. 153-1561), and is here republished
and dedicated by the publisher to the Gonzaga duke,
Vincenzo (1562-1612). The editor Benedetto Osanna has
tidied up the text, although some thirty years earlier
Sansovino had urged the publication of a new edition.
This 1607 edition was reprinted in 1608; said reprint in
turn being reissued with the date 1610.
Bound with:
29
75 ERASMUS, Desiderius. Apophthegmatum opus.
8vo (150 x 95mm.) ff. [8], 364, [20], device on titlepage, seventeenth-century English sheep.
Paris: S. de Colines, (mense Januario 1533) 1532£800
This Paris edition is a reprint of the 1532 4th Basel edition.
manuscrits et pars les éditeurs de son temps… ‘She goes
on (p. 303) to draw attention to Estienne’s attachement
to the importance of oratory and orators… ‘importance
des bonnes moeurs, de la culture philosophique, objectif
pédagogique de l’ orateur, de sont là des arguments que
partagent les gallicans. L’oeuvre de l’érudit veille, de loin,
aux tâches de ses amis’.
Renouard 193-194; Moreau 1533/668; Schreiber 99.
Provenance: Various 17th century Scottish names: Jacobus
Fale, William Denny (teste Pulland) and dates 1615, 1618,
and 1673/4.
76 ESTIENNE, Henri. Ad Senecae
lectionem prodopoeia. In qua &
no4nulii eius loci emendantur. Epistolae [ad
Jacobum Dalechampium] eiusdem partim
diorthotikae quorumdam Senecae locorum,
(aut saltem in eorum diorthoses stochastikae)
partim etiam in quosdam exetastikae.
[8], 296; 129 [=160]p., late 17th-century calf, spine
gilt.
[Geneva: H. Estienne,] anno 1586 £600
An important work in the intellectual development of
Henri Estienne, in the history of detailed linguistic analysis
of an author in his context, and an étape in the study of
stoicism, which was to have profound effects in France
and the Low Countries, particularly in the work of Justus
Lipsius (cf. Anthony Levi, French moralists: the theory of
the passions 1585-1649 Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1964).
The first part is an introduction to Seneca and his Stoic
philosophy. The second part is a series of letters addressed
to Jacques Dalechamps (1513-1588) surgeon, humanist and
botanist, as well as editor of Athenaeus, again all about
Seneca, the two adjectives (diorthotika and exetastika)
both derived from very specific Greek terms, referring,
the first to textual criticism, and the second to inquiring
into the meaning of specific words.
The work has recently been studied and analysed
by Denise Carabin in her Henri Estienne, érudit, novateur,
polémiste. Etude sur Ad Senecae lectionem proodopoeiae, Paris:
Champion, 2006. She writes ‘la contribution d’Estienne à
la lecture de Sénèque consiste à une série de confrontations
sur les signes linguistiques qui véhiculent une pensée…
Le travail du critique philologue est de s’immerger dans
la latinité, l’ancienne et celle de l’époque d’argent, puis
dans l’ univers verbal de l’auteur, pour capter… son
secret, son intention persuasive… Il fait apparaître que
la connaissance d’une philosophie antique repose sur
le langage [and, one might add, of any philosophy]: des
difficultés de la formulation viennent les limites de la
connaissance, et, aussi, les errerurs commises par les
MAGGS
77 FEIJÓO Y MONTENEGRO,
Benito Jeronimo, OSB. Theatro critico
universal, o discursos varios en todo genero de
materias para desengaño de errores comunes.
Tomo primero. Quarta impression (Suplemento…
o adiciones, y correcciones… Tomo nono.
Tercera impression. - Illustracion apologetical
primero, y segundo tomo… Septima impression.
10 volumes.
Madrid: [various printers],1731-1754
£2200
With:
IBID. Justa repulsa de iniquas acusaciones.
Carta, en que manifestando las imposturas
que contra el Theatro critico… dio… Francisco
Soto Marne… escrive… Don. Fr… Feyjoò.
[36], 115, [1(blank)]pp. Madrid: A. Perez
de Soto, 1749 (lettered 11 on spine).
With:
IBID. Cartas eruditas, y curiosas, en que….
se continua el designio del Theatro critico
universal, impugnando, o reduciendo
a dudosas, varias opiniones comunes.
4 volumes only. Madrid, 1753-54.
With:
SARMIENTO, Martin OSB. Demonstracion critico-apologetica de el
theatro critico universal… Quarta impression.
2 volumes [44], 480; [4], 525,, [1(blank)]pp.
Madrid: Domingo Fernandez de Arrojo, 1757.
Together 17 volumes 4to (192 x 135mm.) uniformly
bound in English half calf, red morocco letteringpieces, yellow edges.
The virtues, medicine and the limits of the physician,
astrology, comets, eclipses, music, language, women, Anne
Boleyn, duels, earthquakes, teaching the deaf, censorship
of books, the Masons, Gilles de Ménage, Ramón Llull,
vampires, and everything under the sun are discussed,
sometimes at length, in these highly popular volumes,
which as may be seen from this set, and from the pages
of Palau, went through many reprints.
‘Common Errors’ is an idea seen in the seventeenth
century in such writers as Sir Thomas Browne, but here
the Benedictine father Feijóo (1676-1764), Spain’s first
essayist and a member of the group known as “Illustracion
española” (which consisted largely of medical men), gives
an airing to many scientific ideas and explodes many
popular myths, although, like Browne, he sometimes
swallows strange stories. His work was attacked by many
conformist and theologically conservative writers, one
of whom (Soto Marne) is represented in this collection
by a refutation.
Benito Feijóo y Montenegro was from Oviedo, and
his writings and ideas played an important role in the
modernisation of Spanish university curriculum in the
18th century. ‘With skill, discretion, and great energy,
step by step, Feijóo promoted a particular version of the
Enlightenment first within limited circles, then more widely,
and finally beyond the confines of Spain… [his] volumes
had fundamentally transformed thinking not only in Spain
itself but in the vice royalties of New Spain and Peru and
even as far afield as the distant Philippines… In effect, by
the mid-1730s Feijóo had enthroned Newtonianismo as the
ruling philosophy in the most rigidly traditionalist ann
Catholic society in Europe…(see Jonathan Israel, Radical
Enlightenment, OUP, 2001 pp. 534-536)’.
An 8 volume Italian translation Teatro critico… Ragionamenti… was published in Genoa 1777-82, and a French
version of volumes 1-2 had been published in 1742-43 in
Paris. Some of his works including his Essay on woman (1765)
were translated into English, notably in a four volume set
translated by Captain John Brett of the Royal Navy. His
essay on agriculture (in vol 8 of the Theatro) was translated
into English by a Cheshire farmer and published in 1760.
A German translation of his work on physic, made via the
English of John Fothergill, was published in Leipzig in
1790 (Diatätik… Aus dem Spanischen ins Englische und aus
diesem nun ins Teutsche übersetzt nebst den aus vieljähriger
Erfahrung gezogenen Gesundheitsregeln Johann Fothergills und
dessen diätischen Bemerkungen über den idiopathischen fixen
Kopfschmerz. Verteutscht und mit Anmerkungen herausgegeben
von Christian Friedrich Michaelis.) A modern edition of his
works is in progress and there are many monographs
on him.
An additional fifth volume of Cartas eruditas with 30 essays
was also published in 1760. In 1774 Antonio de Sancha
published a general index.
See G. Delpy, L’Espagne et l’esprit européen, l’oeuvre de
Feijóo Paris, 1936 and R. Herr, The eighteenth-century
revolution in Spain, Princeton, 1958.
Provenance: in vol. 2 of Cartas (1753) is the inscription
‘Catalina Wilkie su libro 1760’.
78 FENELON, François de Salignac
de la Mothe. [Telémaque]. Die seltsame Begebenheiten des Telemach,
in einem auf die wahre Sitten= und
Staats=Lehre gegründeten… Mit nöthingen
Anmerckungen erläutert, un ins Teutsche
übersetzt von Ludwig Ernest von Faramond.
8vo (170 x 105mm.) [30], 872pp., title printed in
red and black, engraved frontispiece and plates,
folding map, contemporary English calf, later green
morocco lettering piece, red edges.
Frankfurt & Leipzig (Nürnberg printed by Michael
Arnold for): P.C. Monath, 1741 £500
A handsome copy. Fénelon’s Télemaque was enormously
influential, and constantly reprinted in French and in
many other European languages. The preface to this
translation makes it clear that it was very much intended
for princes and their tutors. Faramond is the pseudonym
of the journalist, pietist and follower of Francke, Philipp
Balthasar Sinold von Schütz (1657-1742), the author of
many books. His translation of Fénelon first appeared in
1733 (for a modern life etc., see H. Jaumann Handbuch
Gelehrtenkultur der frühen Neuzeit, Berlin & New York:
W. de Gruyter, 2004, I pp. 611-612).
79 FEUQUIERES, Antoine de PAS,
marquis de. Mémoires… contenant ses
maximes sur la guerre… Nouvelle edition…
augmentée. (Vie de M. le marquis de Feuquière).
4 volumes 12mo (166 x 90mm.) [2], ccviii, 226,
[2(blank)]; [2], 402, [2(blank)], 4 engraved maps;
[2], 387, [1], 7 engraved maps and plans, small tear
in f. A1; [2], 444, 2 engraved plans, all engraved
plans folding, contemporary English calf, spines
gilt in compartments.
London & Paris (Paris printed): Pierre Dunoyer, &
Rollin fils, 1750 £600
Antoine de Pas, marquis de Feuquière (1648-1711) was a
successful professional soldier in the reign of Louis XIV,
who fought in many campaigns. These Mémoires, viewed
by some as the first French work on the Art of War, which
went through many editions, were much admired and read:
Frederick the Great is said to have ordered them to be read
to his officers, and Voltaire used the book for his Siècle de
Louis XIV. Jähn quotes the Prince de Ligne as writing: ‘il
seroit à souhaiter que toutes les batailles fussent discutées
et commentées commes les siennes. Cela… étendroit bien
les lumières sur notre métier’. They are sometimes viewed
as an adjunct to Briquet’s Code militaire (no. 38).
Jähn, M. Geschichte der Kriegswissenschaften (1891) ii, 1467sqq.
31
80 FLUDD, Robert. [Opera]. A collection of works bound in 4 volumes.
Folio (300 x 192mm.) late 17th-century English
mottled calf, spines gilt in compartments, speckled
and red edges (different colours for each work)
rubbed, one tail-band missing.
Oppenheim, Frankfurt, & Gouda 1617 [1624] -38 £30,000
In spite of certain imperfections (see detailed descriptions)
this is a splendid opportunity to acquire a major group
of Fludd’s Latin works, handsomely bound and with a
distinguished provenance, all published during his lifetime, or just posthumously.
Robert Fludd (Bearsted Kent,1574- 8 September 1637,
unmarried) was the son of Sir Thomas Fludd (d. 1607)
and his wife Elizabeth, née Andrews (d. 1592). From 1592
he was at St. John’s College, Oxford (BA 1596, MA 1598),
proceeding from there to study medicine abroad. In
1605 back in Oxford he took his medical degrees of M.B
MAGGS
and M.D. and became a member of Christ Church. In
September 1609 he became FRCP, having initially been
rejected by the College. His fellowship is proclaimed on the
striking monument erected to his memory in Holy Cross
Church Bearsted in 1638, where his mother is also buried.
It is clear from some of the dedications to some of
these works, that it was at St. John’s that Fludd made many
acquaintances, who were to prove of importance later in
life, like Sir William Paddy, and George Abbot, later to
become archbishop of Canterbury. He seems, and this is
apparent from the way in which much of the material in
his works is presented, to have been trained in Ramist
techniques. Whilst these were particularly powerful in
certain cities in Germany and elsewhere as Hotson has
recently shewn, they were also well known in England.
Fludd was well-known in English scholarly and court
circles: his portrait which appears in volume II (Philosophia
sacra) shews him more as an armigerous gentleman
than as a learned doctor in cap and gown. His learned
circle included men such as Camden and Selden and his
colleague William Harvey, whose empirical establishment
of the manner of the circulation of the blood in his De motu
cordis of 1628, Fludd in his Anatomiae amphitheatrum (1623)
in a general sense prefigured. Indeed in his Pulsus (III.3)
he dilates upon Harvey’s doctrine. In Pulsus (p. 11), he
mentions Harvey by name as a distinguished doctor and
anatomist and a dear colleague ‘who in his little book of
which the title is Exercitatio anatomica, De cordis sanguinisque
in anmalibus motu shews by ocular demonstration that the
motion of the blood itself is circular’.
William Fitzer, who published Harvey’s book, is also
the publisher of several of Fludd’s works. William Fitzer
(?1600-1671) learnt his trade in London and was active
in Frankfurt 1625-38, where he published nearly one
hundred items, and in Heidelberg from 1649 (His name
appears in a book by another Englishman John Hawkins
Discursus de melancholia, published at Heielberg in 1633).
He published various scientific and medical works, for
example many by the Bristolian Samuel Norton, including
his Admiranda chymica in 1635, and an edition of William
Gilbert De magnete in 1629. Although publishing work
by doctors and by Englishmen, he was very active as a
general printer/publisher.
Fludd’s medical career seems to have flourished in
London, first at Fenchurch Street and later at Coleman
Street in the City. Initially suspected of Paracelsianism, he
shewed himself to be sufficiently and traditionally Galenic
in his approach to medicine and patient treatment to
create a good practice and to be accepted by his fellow
practitioners and his patients. His Medicina catholica (III)
is his longest work of a medical nature. He believed disease
and sickness to be caused by sin, and that God was the
source of both the disease and the cure. He sees health as
a fortress assailed by the winds of disease, and illustrates
33
it in this way. In his Anatomiae theatrum he speaks of the
weapon-salve of Paracelsus. This is the idea that a wound
can be cured by smearing the weapon which caused it with
a mixture of the patient’s blood, moss grown on a human
skull and ‘mummy’ the flesh of a hanged man. The wound
itself needs only to be washed in the patient’s urine. This
was attacked by William Foster who nailed to Fludd’s door
a copy of his Hoplocrisma-spongus: or, A sponge to vvipe avvay
the weapon-salve. A treatise, wherein is proved, that the cure
late-taken up amongst us, by applying the salve to the weapon,
is magicall and unlawfull. Fludd answered him in English
in Doctor Fludds answer vnto M· Foster or, the squeesing of
Parson Fosters sponge, ordained by him for the wiping away
of the weapon-salue. VVherein the sponge-bearers immodest
carriage and behauiour towards his bretheren is detected (1631),
and the tract was later translated into Latin (IV.2). This
was his sole publication in English during his life time.
Everything else he wrote was published in Latin, and in
Germany, the exceptions being the two works published
posthumously in 1638 in Gouda, his Philosophia moysaica
(itself later published in English) and the Latin Responsum
(IV 1 & 2). Nothing about their publication is stated in
these works, which have the imprint of Pieter Rammezeyn,
active in Gouda 1626-1649.
That Fludd’s works were published abroad is, as Ian
Maclean remarks, no surprise given the complicated nature
of their printing. Fludd himself tells us that publication
in England would have been too costly, and that de Bry
indeed published them gratis, even presenting him with
free copies. That the separation of author and publisher/
printer caused problems, and had to be very carefully
overseen, particularly in respect of illustrations, is indeed
acknowledged by the publisher (see note to III.2). Some
of the illustrations draw on a common stock, and some
may be found in other books.
Fludd seems to have become interested in the occult
whilst still in Oxford, but it is in his published works that
his over-arching philosophical and iatro-chemical views
are stated. Leaving aside his attachment to Rosicrucianism,
an intellectual ‘fad’ which held great sway in Europe,
beginning in 1614 with the publication of Fama fraternitatis,
and which existed in the first three decades or so of the
century, we should concentrate on the extraordinary, and
lengthy work on the Cosmos, Utriusque cosmi historia with
its extraordinary amalgam of musical, philosophical and
other theories. The two volumes constituting this work,
which are heavily illustrated with engravings, some very
striking, and woodcuts, provide a text which, amongst
other things, affords detailed explanations of the pictures,
and, rejecting the Aristotelianism which was the staple
philosophy of the universities, give explanations of the
world of a neo-platonic, judaeo-christian, hermetic, and
scriptural kind. Fludd draws a parallel between macrocosm
and microcosm, the microcosm directed by man, who as
MAGGS
the ‘simia’ or ape of Nature, brings to completion, through
the geometric, musical, astrological and other arts, the
work of Nature. He posits a correspondence between the
world of the spirits and the physical world. He rejects the
heliocentrism of Copernicus, seeing the sun (the centre of
life-giving heat and light) go round the earth, and gives to
the world life, just as the holy Spirit gives life to man. Fludd
was, it appears from his texts, a consummate engineer
and inventor, a man with a detailed practical knowledge
of music and musical intervals, but nevertheless, although
apparently a successful doctor, he was no empiricist, and
remained outside the important developments of empirical
science in the seventeenth century. Indeed, we are told by
people, such as Fuller, who were almost his contemporaries,
that his works were very little read in England (and possibly
elsewhere). It may be, indeed, that the turmoil in the
German states caused by the Thirty Years War may have
hampered sales and distribution, as well as production,
and in one case the specific ransacking of the warehouse
at Heidelberg is mentioned. It is interesting therefore that
this set was acquired, albeit in the early 18th century, for
an English collection, and has the loose notes inserted of
a fellow of the Royal Society, William Jones (1675-1749),
as well as clear indications in Philosophia moysaica of a
reading which is sufficiently precise and careful so as to
emend the text and not simply copy a list of corrigenda.
The best brief account of Fludd is that in ODNB by Professor
I.W.F. Maclean. But cf. Partington History of chemistry ii,
324-327; F. L. Gardner, ‘Bibliotheca Rosicruciana’ in
A catalogue raisonné of works on the occult sciences, [reprint of
the original edition] Cambridge: CUP, 2011, nos. 163-194
gives a detailed listing of all Fludd’s works. For further
references see separate notices below.
Provenance: Early 18th-century English bookseller’s
cost code in each volume “c.yp/e 4 VB £RY”. Early 18thcentury pencil reference to Wood’s Athenae Oxonienses on
the flyleaf of Vol. I “see Woods Ath. vol. 1 col 509”. Two
18th-century manuscript leaves loosely inserted in Vol.
IV, listing the contents. These are in the hand of William
Jones FRS (1675-1749; see ODNB & Paul Quarrie, ‘The
scientific library of the earls of Macclesfield’ in Notes and
Records of the Royal Society of London, Vol. 60, No. 1 (Jan.
22, 2006), pp. 5-24; library of the earls of Macclesfield,
Shirburn castle, Oxfordshire, South library bookplate and
armorial blindstamp on the titles. Pressmark 165 E. 5-8.
Earlier pressmark VII.3.6-9.
CONTENTS:
Volume I:
Utriusque Cosmi maioris scilicet et minoris
metaphysica, physica atque technica historia in
duo volumina secundum Cosmi differentiam
divisa. Authore Roberto Flud aliàs de Fluctibus,
armigero, & in medicina doctore Oxoniensi.
Tomus primus De Macrocosmi historia in
duos tractatus divisa. Quorum primus de
metaphysico Macroscosmi et creaturaru[m]
illius ortu. Physico Macrocosmi in generatione
& corruptione progressu. Secundus de arte
naturae simia in Macrocosmo producta & in eo
nutrita & multiplicata, cujus filias praecipuas hic
anatomia vivâ recensuimus nempe Arithmeticam.
Musicam. Geometriam. Perspectivam. Artem
Pictoriam. Artem Militarem. Scientiam. Motus
[&] temporis scientiam. Cosmographiam.
Astrologiam. Geomantiam. Oppenheim: aere
Johan-Theodori de Bry, typis Hieronymi Galleri,
1617-18 [i.e. Frankfurt: sumptibus haeredum Johannis
Theodori de Bry; typis Caspari Rötellii, 1624].
2 parts 106 {sic =206], [10]; 788, [12]p (last leaf
blank, and lacking).
Second Edition but with engraved title of the first edition
of Part 1 re-used (as often) and the engraved title of Part
2 cut-round and inserted. In Part 2 leaves A2 (pp. 3-4,
“Lectori benevolo”) and A3 (pp. 5-6, opening of the text)
are inserted from the first edition of 1618, dedicated to
James I of England.
5 parts:
Tomus secundus [as above] Oppenheim:
impensis Iohannis Theodorj de Bry, typis
H. Galleri, 1619, 277, [1 (blank)].
Tomi secundi tractatus primi sectio secunda,
de technica microcosmi historia, in portiones
VII divisa. [Oppenheim: impensis T. de Bry,
typis H. Galleri, 1619?,] 191, [11]pp.
Tomi secundi tractatus secundus,
de praternaturali utriusque mundi
historia, Frankfurt: E. Kempffer, for
T. de Bry, 1623, [12], 199, [1 (blank)].
Anatomiae amphitheatrum effigie triplici…
designatum, Francofurt: E. Kempffer for
T. de Bry, 1623 [2], 285 [1 (blank)] [[287333] see vol. IV.4. Monochordum
mundi]; Pp. 5-6 are the dedication to John
Thornburgh, Bishop of Worcester.
Philosophia sacra & vere christiana seu de
meteorologia cosmica, Frankfurt: prostant
in officina Bryana, 1626 [8], (viz. title within
engraved frame of 8 sections); half-title
‘Aer Arca Dei thesauraria seu perspicuum
sanitatis et morborum speculum’ (verso,
engraved portrait of Fludd by Merian)]; 2
leaves dedication to John Williams, Bishop
of Lincoln (1582-1650), 303, [1 (blank)]pp.
ILLUSTRATION: Engraved title-pages to Tractatus 1
(the Microcosmus incorporating Vitruvian Man); 2 (a
naked man standing on a circle with representations of
the seven portions “De technica Microscosmi”) with folding
engraved plate (“Causarum Universalium Speculum”) at
part 2 p. 181; 3 engraved illustrations, woodcut diagrams.
The illustrations for the ‘Anatomiae amphitheatrum’
are taken from Vesalius, via Valverde de Hamusco. On
the verso of the engr. title to that part is a portrait of de
Bry with Latin verses beneath by Johann Ammonius, a
bookseller from Amberg, in Frankfurt, who was de Bry’s
brother-in-law.
ILLUSTRATION: Two engraved title-pages, that to part
1 of the Macrocosmus incorporating a Vitruvian Man,
that to part 2 incorporating an ape (i.e. man the ‘ape
of nature’) in the centre of a wheel of arts and sciences,
engraved by M. Merian; in part 1 p. 9 is a fly-title with large
engraving (verso blank): ‘Tractatus primus de macrocosmi
structura, ejusque creaturarum originis historia in libros
VII divisa’ with catchword ‘lectori’ picked up on p. 11
(‘lectori benevolo’ etc.); 2 folding engraved plates: part 1Integrae naturae speculum artisque imago’ (included in
the pagination and explained on pp. 7-8); part 2 a musical
temple (explained on pp. 161-163); 4 double-page engraved
plates of military manoeuvres included in the pagination;
numerous engraved illustrations, many full-page, some
musical in nature, woodcut illustrations and diagrams.
VD17 12:637305.
Volume II:
Volume III:
Tomus secundus de supernaturali, naturali,
praeternaturali et contranaturali Microcosmi
historia, in tractatus tres distributa.
Oppenheim: & Frankfurt, 1619-26.
1) Medicina Catholica, seu mysticum artis
medicandi sacrarium. In tomos divisum duos.
In quibus metaphysica et physica tam sanitatis
tuendae, quam morborum propulsandorum
NOTE: part 1 p. 17 has the underlined word added in ms.
Lectoribus lucis increatae fulgore illuminatis’ and there
are a number of places where individual words or spellings
have been corrected or changed (e.g. p. 12, 21, 25, 31, 35).
35
dedication to Abp. Abbot; [vi-xii contain a double-page
engraving (see below) and explanation thereof; quire
)( contains the table of contents with at end a note from
bookseller to the reader stating that any errors are not to be
attributed to Fludd, who was miles away from the press, but
to the lack of care of the amanuensis. The bookseller says
he has taken every care to reproduce faithfully the author’s
illustrations and place them properly in the volume.
These two sections are dedicated to Archbishop George
Abbot (1562-1633), and Sir Robert Cotton (1571-1631).
VD17 12:167435 & VD17 12:167442X.
3) Pulsus seu nova et arcana pulsuum historia,
e sacro fonte radicaliter extracta… hoc est
portionis tertiae pars tertia. 93, [1] pp., on p. [94]
is the catchword MEDI-, picked up in item 4.
ILLUSTRATION: engraved vignette of a hand from the
clouds taking a pulse from a fore-arm on title, engraved
illustrations, folding engraved plate a single-stringed
instrument demonstrating the Diapason (after p. 54)
woodcut diagrams.
VD17 12:167445V.
4) Medicamentosum Apollinis oraculum: in
quo ipsum catholicum medicandi mysterium…
aperire atque detegere videtur… hoc est
medicinae catholicae, seu mysricae medicandi
artis, tomus secundus: Typis excedebatur
W. Hofmanni, 1630. large folding letterpress
table (divided in 3 sheets), the whole printed
with a border of typographical arabesques.
ratio pertractatur. Frankfurt: Typis Caspari
Rötelii, impensis Wilhelmi Fitzeri, 1629. [22],
241, [7 (index)] pp., engraved publisher’s
device on title, engraved illustrations,
woodcut diagrams. Dedicated to Sir William
Paddy (1554-1634) of St. John’s, Oxford.
VD17 12:167343Z.
2) Integrum morborum mysterium: sive
medicinae catholicae, tomi primi tractatus
secundus, in sectiones distributus duas; quorum
prior generalem morborum naturam, sive variam
munimenti salutis hostiliter inuadendis atque
oppugnandi tationem, more nouo & minime
antea audito, siue intellecto describit. Ultima,
universale morborum sive aegrotorum depingit
catoptron, etc. Frankfurt: typis excusus Wolgangi
Hofmanni, prostat in officina Gulielmi Fitzeri, 1631.
MAGGS
2 parts [26 (of 28, without the blank leaf “)(“8], 503,
[1blank]; Kaq olikon medicorum katoptron… sive
tomi primi, tractatus secundi, sectio secunda, de
morborum signis. Anno 1631 [4], 413, [1blank]pp.
ILLUSTRATION: engraving of a man on his sickbed with
attendants on the title-page, engraved portrait of the author
on verso, engraving of the winds guided by Archangels
on the fly-title, double-page engraved illustrations (pp.
vi-vii) in the text with title “Hostilis Monumenti salutis
invadendi typus”, folding engraved plate (“Causarum
Universalium Speculum” at p. 181 [repeated from Vol.
1], folding engraved plate of an astrological circle of the
crises (part 2 p. 50) with text on the recto (p. 49), engraved
plate of the diurnal and planetary Hours (part 2 p. 56),
engraved vignette of an astrologer casting a horoscope
for a boy on fly-title to ‘Ouromantia, hoc est divinatio per
urinam’ (p. 233), & of a man holding a urine specimen on
fly-title to’ Ouromantia physiologica’ (p. 255).
NOTE: p. [iii] the fly-title to Sectio prima; p. [v] has a
NOTE: Found separately, and with Pulsus, see note to
VD17 12:167449A. Meteororum insalubrium mysterium, etc
Mainz: Bourgeal, 1682 (VD17 75:694791W; Gardner 190) is
a reissue of ‘Integrum morborum’, ‘Ka qoliko n’, and ‘Pulsus
historia’ all of 1631, but without dedications and engravings
of the first (see Gardner loc cit).
Volume IV:
This volume has from the title-page to the second item
been paginated consecutively in ink. The same hand has
also made some corrections.
1) Philosophia moysaica in qua sapientia
& scientia creationis & creaturarum sacra
vereque christiana (ut pote cujus basis sive
fundamentum est unicus ille lapis angularis
Iesus Christus) ad amussim & enucleate
explicatur. Gouda: Petrus Rammazenius, 1638. ff.
[4 (inc. half-title/explanation of the title-page
emblem)], 1-152., engraved emblem of Darkness
and Light on the title-page (repeated with
added lettering on f. 66, fly-title to Part 2), one
engraved and a few woodcut illustrations.
NOTE: This was translated into English and published
in 1659 (Wing F1391). There are a number of manuscript
changes or additions with corresponding words crossed
out e.g. on 5r &v 8v, 9r, 12r, 13v, 14r, 15v, 16v, 17r, 18v, 21rv, 20, 22v, 23v, 24r, 26r, 27r, 28r, 29r, 31r, 32r, 33r-v, 34r,
35r, 38v, 40r, 53v, 74r, 80v, 91v, 92r, 95v, 97r, 102v, 113v,
116r, 119r, 123r, 126v, 128r, 134r-v, 135r-v, 137v, 140r ff.
That on 12r reads: ‘neque unquam antea autem fui
with t deleted from fuit; that on 17recto (col. 2 para 2
reads: ‘tam condensatio, quam rarefactio, derivantur
quibus coelum, terra & omnia derivantur ex istis composita
videlicet composita corpora, tam meteorologica, qua quae
sunt in compositione sunt completa seu perfecte mixta
sunt complete perficiuntur’); that on f. 97r col. 1 ‘vitae &
studiorum nostrorum in hoc studiorum nostroum in hoc
mundo.’ These have not been made from a list of errata,
but clearly shew careful reading and understanding, and
are corrections.
2) Responsum ad hoplocrisma-spongum
M. Fosteri presbiteri, ab ipso, ad unguenti
armarii validitatem delendam ordinatum. Hoc
est, spongiae M. Fosteri presbyteri expressio
seu elisio. In qua virtuosa spongiae ipsius
potestas in detergendo unguentum armarium,
ex primitur, eliditur ac funditus aboletur:
ac tandem immodestia & erga Fratres suos
incivilitas, aceto veritatis acerrimo corrigitur, &
pentius extinguitur. Gouda: Petrus Rammazenius,
1638 ff. 30, small woodcut device on title.
NOTE: William Foster (1591-1643) published Hoplocrismaspongus: or, A sponge to vvipe avvay the weapon-salve. A treatise,
wherein is proved, that the cure late-taken up amongst us, by
applying the salve to the weapon, is magicall and unlawfull.
London: Printed by Thomas Cotes, for Iohn Grove, and are
to be sold at his shop in Furnivals Inne Gate in Holborne,
1631, a small quarto of some sixty pages (STC 11203). This
Responsum was published in English in 1631 (STC 11120),
and from the preface to the reader to the Latin text, it
would seem that Fludd has rewritten it in Latin.
3) Veritatis proscenium, in quo aulaeum
erroris tragicum dimovetur, siparium
ignorantiae scenicum complicatur, ipsaque
veritas a suo ministro in publicum producitur,
seu demonstratio quaedam analytica. In
qua cuilibet comparationis particulae, in
appendice quadam a Joanne Keplero, nuper
in fine Harmoniae suae mundanae edita, etc.
Frankfurt: Typis Erasmi Kempfferi, sumptibus
Joan. Theodor. de Bry, 1621. 54pp., woodcut
printer’s device on title (that of the Commelin
firm) shewing naked figure of Truth.
37
Of the Summum Bonum Fludd denied authorship, but it is
generally accepted that he wrote this short work. Robert
Huffmann (Robert Fludd and the end of the Renaissance¸1988,
pp. 63-64, who gives an account of the work and of the
Mersenne controversy) does not accept Fludd’s authorship.
From the note by the printer to the reader, it is clear that
this forms part 2 of Sophiae certamen, and was issued with it.
VD17 VD17 12:167461C. The description in VD17 calls for
another leaf at the end, which seems to be a folding plate.
This is not present in the BL copy, nor is it mentioned
by Gardner (2011), but is clearly listed as being in some
copies (e.g. Harvard EC F6707 B638p v.4, Yale, Cornell,
McGill). It is in fact the plate of the diapason found in
this set at p. 54 of Pulsus in volume III. Krivatsy 4139 &
VD 17 23: 298083A.
6) Clavis philosophiae et alchymiae fluddanae.
Sive Roberti Fluddi… ad epistolicam Petri
Gassendi theologi exercitationem responsum.
In quo: inanes Marini Mersenni monachi
obiectiones, querelaeque ipsius iniustae,
immerito in Robertum Fluddum adhibitae,
examinantur… Severum ac altitonans Franciscii
Lanouii de Fluddo judicium refellitur…
erronea principiorum philosophiae fluddanae
detectio, a Petro Gassendo facta, corrigitur,
etc. Frankfurt: [Wolfgang Hofmann for] W. Fitzer,
1633. 87, [1 (blank)]pp., engraved emblem (the
rose gives honey to the bees) on the title.
VD17 23:233313E; Caspar Bibl. Kepleriana (1936) pp.8788 (Kepler Pro suo opera Harmonices mundi apologia, 1622).
The Harmonices mundi was published with a dedication to
James I of England in 1619.
4) Monochordum mundi symphoniacum, seu
replicatio Roberti Flud, alias de Fluctibus
ad apologiam… Ioannis Kepleri, adversus
Demonstrationem suam Analyticam, nuperrime
editam, in qua Robertus validioribus
Ioannis obiectionibus, Harmoniae suae legi
repugnantibus, comiter respondere aggreditur.
Frankfurt: Typis Erasmi Kempferi, sumptibus
Ioan. Theodor. de Bry, 1623. [1 (title)], 288331pp., woodcut printer’s device on title, a
few woodcut diagrams. Dedicated to Kepler.
NOTE: This was originally published in 1622 in quarto
(VD17 23:289196M). This reprint forms part of vol. II.
5) Sophiae cum moria certamen, in quo, lapis
MAGGS
lydius a falso structore, Fr. Marino Mersenno,
monacho, reprobatus, celeberrima voluminis
sui Babylonici (in Genesin) sigmenta accurate
examinat. (Summum bonum, quod est verum
magiae, cabalae, alchymiae, fratrum roseae
crucis verorum verae subjectum. In dictarum
scientiarum laudem, & insignis calumniatoris
Fratris Marini Mersenni dedecus publicatum,
per Ioachimum Frizium [??Robert Fludd]).
[Frankfurt: Wolfgang Hofmann for William Fitzer]
Anno 1629. 2 parts 118, [2 (index)]pp., engraved
illustrations; 53 [=55], [1]pp., engraved emblem
(the rose gives honey to the bees) on the title.
NOTE: The work of Mersenne attacked is Quaestiones
in Genesim of 1623 (For the Mersenne-Fludd controversy
see Thorndike Magic iv, 439-444). The title is clearly an
allusion to Erasmus’ Laus moriae. The ‘Lydian Stone’ is a
touchstone. There are liminary verses against Mersenne by
one Iacobus Aretius Oxoniensis and I.M. Cantabrigiensis.
NOTE: The Clavis is a precise refutation of Gassendi’s
Epistolica exercitatio, in qua principia philsophiae Roberti
Fluddi medici reteguntur; et ad recentes illius libros, aduersus R.
P. F. Marinum Mersennum… respondetur. Paris: S. Cramoisy,
1630, but it returns again to Mersennes Quaestiones in
Genesim of 1623. The second section is the letter written by
François de la Noue (another Minim) to Mersenne, which
is criticised. The printer to the reader [paraphrased]: ‘I
was hoping to get this book out for the [Frankfurt] fair
now past, but, as they say, there is many a slip… There
has arisen in Britain an antagonist, who has viciously
attacked our author in the vernacular accusing him of bad
magic (‘Cacomagia’) so that it was necessary for him to
deal with this home-grown enemy first. He was therefore
held up from finishing this book. But now in this book
he takes on his other enemies. Two years ago [1628] in
the printing shop in Heidelberg copies were scattered
and dispersed by the army’s camp-followers. Now I have
judged the price (worth) of the work, by publishing it in
folio, as that is the format in which most of Fludd’s works
have been published’. This is perhaps a reference to the
fact that Gassendi’s attack was printed in quarto. VD17
23:298104M.
GENERAL NOTES: CONDITION
Some pages browned, very heavily in places, as often with
German books in this period, especially affecting the text
block. The items printed in Gouda have no discolouration.
Volume I: Second title-page cut-out and remounted,
a few illustrations very slightly shaved (the large one
at p. 41 turned-in at the fore-edge) many gatherings
heavily browned, a few small paper flaws, damp-stained
in the upper fore-corner from p. 641 to end (tract II),
manuscript annotations pp. 649, 662, 717, 726 (tract II).
Volume II: Lacking first A1 (half-title), pages browned, a
few illustrations shaved. The second volume ends with
the first section of the second treatise. It was to have
contained three treatises but was never completed. Vol.
III: Dedication leaf to George Abbot and the following leaf
(with the double-page engraving) cut-short at the outer
margins (no loss and not supplied from elsewhere). A few
minor, neat manuscript corrections in the preliminaries
(a slightly longer note on the first sub-title completely
faded (? or washed-out) leaving a large oval ring around
it; a short note “Nota” on p. 337 has had the same effect.
Volume IV: Upper outer blank corner of f. 85 missing
with loss of number.
[See back and inside front covers for further illustration].
39
81 FONTENELLE, Bernard Le Bovier de.
The Lives of the French, Italian
and German philosophers, late members
of the Royal Academy of Sciences in
Paris. Together with abstracts of some
of the choicest pieces, communicated by
them to that illustrious society, etc.
8vo (130 x 90mm.) 464, [4 (advertisements)] pp.,
contemporary calf, covers panelled in blind, gilt
spine, red morocco label in the second panel, red
sprinkled edges.
London: for W. Innys, 1717 £1500
As well as brief lives of eminent French scientists and
mathematicians, John Chamberlayne also translates
abstracts of the some of the most interesting scientific
papers from their Transactions: “the whole Book is
an Abstract of some of the Choicest Pieces, Memoirs,
Dissertations, &c. that have been brought or sent to the
Academy of Sciences, mostly by their own Members, within
the compass of Thirteen or Fourteen Years, and dispers’d
through almost twenty Volumes.”
In a Postscript addressed to Parker, Chamberlayne
notes that Fontenelle, in several places, attributes the
discovery of differential calculus to Leibnitz rather than
to Sir Isaac Newton, a cause of great dispute at the time: “…
Now it is notorious that the Writers of the Acta Leipsiensia
make Mons. Leibnitz the Author of the said Differential
Calcululation; but it is not less known to your Lordship,
that Dr. Keill, in the Commercium Epistolicum, has done our
British Philosopher justice; and has fully proved that which
Mr. L. did in some manner acknowledge to me (when I
attempted to reconcile these two Great Men) that Sir I. N.
might be the first Inventer, but that he himself had luckily
fallen about the same Time upon the same Notions.”
In the dedication to Lord Parker, Chamberlayne
praises him for his patronage both of the Sciences and
the Church: “Every body knows how much more weight
Examples have than Precepts; and I need not tell any body
here in England, that the Behaviour of a Lord Parker has
made more Mathematicians, Philosophers, and Divines
too, among the Gentlemen of the Long Robe [i.e. lawyers],
than even Sermons, or the Lectures of our most Learned
Professors.”
It was in the dedication to Lord Parker of his translation
of Bernard Nieuwentyt’s The Religious Philosopher: Or,
the Right Use of Contemplating the Works of the Creator….
Designed for the Conviction of Atheists and Infidels (3 vols,
1718-19), that Chamberlayne explained the principles
behind Parker’s combined interest in theology and the
new discoveries being made in science and astronomy at
the time and thus the principles behind the formation of
the Macclesfield Library which was to demonstrate the
MAGGS
“Divine Wisdom and Providence display’d in the Work
of the Creation” in order to confound the “Atheists and
Infidels” who “persist in the Denial of a God”.. In that
dedication, he refers first to the dedication of the present
volume: “My first Attempt was to present Your Lordship
with Imperfect Copies, after my manner, of the Originals
of several Famous French Philosophers [i.e. scientists &
mathematicians], drawn by one of the best Hands, that
of the most Ingenious Fontenelle.” He then describes
Parker as “a Philosopher and a Divine; for as the Royal
Society well know how Eminent your Lordship is in the
first of these Qualifications; so many of the Clergy know
that a very able prelate (now with God) and one mighty
in Scripture-Learning, has only profess’d that the Lord
Parker is one of the greatest Divines in England.”
references to other earlier and contemporary writers
(f. 11), which leads to the idea of the ‘luoghi’ or places,
which are of three sorts, imagined, natural and artificial.
These form the matter of readings 5 to 9. Readings 10-17
are concerned with the idea of ‘collocatione’ or grouping of
things or ideas in various ways, ending with a discussion of
dictation, and in section 17 ‘Della libraria della memoria’,
books and memory. Books, he writes ‘supply remedies for
both death and distance’ and ‘students speak with the
dead’’, but books compared with memory are ‘as a wooden
leg compared with one of flesh and bone’. Libraries cost
money and are for the rich, memory ‘is also common to
the poor’. Books ‘age and are consumed by use, memory by
use and over time makes it self everlasting. Books perish,
memory remains always’.
Provenance: Dedication copy to Thomas Parker, first earl
of Macclesfield.
CNCE 20828.
[See inside back cover for photo of binding].
85 GIUNTINI, Francesco. Commentaria
in Sphaeram Ioannis de Sacro Bosco
accuratissima[with the text].
THE NORTHERN LIGHTS
82 FROBESIUS, Johann Nicolaus. Nova et antiqua luminis atque aurorrae
borealis spectacula secundum saeculorum
sive annorum seriem subnexa mirabilis
phaenomeni consideratione philosophica.
4to (205 x 155mm.) [6], 160pp., disbound.
Helmstadt: C.F. Weygand, 1739 £500
This work is a chronological catalogue of lurid celestial
occurrences, based largely on Lycosthenes and various
chronicles, but from the seventeenth century more scientific
accounts are given, and for the eighteenth century these
become increasingly well attested, with details of those
who observed the phaenomena and where, as well as
details of the source of the story. The last report is one
for March 1739. There follows (pp. 129-160) a ‘consideratio
philosophica’ of such phaenomena, again based on such
writers as Gassendi, Leibniz, and Lubienicki.
There is a copy in the BL. OCLC lists 4 copies Switzerland,
3 copies in Germany, plus Adler Planetarium USA.
83 Geographia classica. The geography
of the ancients…the second edition.
4to [2], iv, [2]pp., 29 engr. maps, boards.
London: C. Brown [and others], 1717 £400
First published 1712.
ESTC records 6 copies, 2 in Oxford, 2 in Cambridge, one
in Nottingham and one in Illinois.
84 GESUALDO, Filippo, OFM. Plutosofia…nella quale si spiega l’arte della
memoria con altre cose notabili pertinenti tanto
alla memoria naturale, quanto all’ artificiale.
4to (187 x 140mm.) ff. [6], 64, device on title-page,
full-page woodcut figure of a man on f. [27], very
slightly cropped at foot, English binding c. 1700 of
brown calf, gilt fillets on covers, gilt spine, morocco
lettering-piece.
Padua: P. Meietti 1592 £2500
First edition of this work by a Franciscan friar born in 1550,
who died as bishop of Cariati in 1619. A second edition
was published in Vicenza in 1600 in which the full-page
woodcut is replaced by an engraving. Various works by
Gesualdo on Franciscan discipline and spirituality were
published in Italy in the last decade of the sixteenth century,
and his Officium quindecim graduum assionis Christi etc,
was published in Cracow in 1606. This work is dedicated
to Arnulf Uchinski, abbot of Suleovia in Eastern Europe.
The ‘dedication’ to St. Catherine is dated 10 November
1588 from Palermo, and in it Gesualdo explains the Greek
title Plutosofia, a name created as ‘artificial memory is the
treasure and riches of all human wisdom’, a point also
made on f. 2 of the text proper. The text is divided in to 20
readings (lettioni), and proceeds from a general discussion
of memory to a consideration of artificial memory (with
2 parts 8vo (168 x 105mm.) [8], 597, [1]; 476, [44]pp.
plus 2 bifolia with woodcut figures and accompanying
text, Kk4 with errata on recto and summa privilegii
on verso, woodcut portrait of author on both titlepages, numerous woodcut diagrams, maps and
figures, contemporary calf, gilt laurel wreath on
covers within a gilt fillet, upper joint split, the
woodcut figures at end slightly cropped at top.
Lyon:(ex off. typ. Jean de Tournes for) F. Tinghi, 157877 £1100
Giuntini (1522 Florence-1590) was at one time a Carmelite
friar, but on leaving Italy and going to Lyon in 1561,
became a Protestant, before eventually returning to the
catholic fold. He was the author of several theological
and literary works in Latin and Italian, amongst them
Speculum astrologiae (1573). This detailed commentary on
the medieval text of Sacro Bosco, here printed in italic
as opposed to the text in Roman type, was subsequently
translated into Italian and published in Lyon in 1582.
There was also another Latin edition printed at Antwerp
by Bellère in 1582.
Riccardi 609; Baudrier VI 470, 472 & 276; Cartier, De
Tournes, 588 & 583.
86 GODFREY, Ambrose & John. A Curious Research in the Element of
Water: containing Many Noble and Useful
Experiments on that Fluid Body. As I. Three
different Experiments of reducing Water into
41
Earth. II. Several Experiments of turning Salts
into Water; with a Method of discovering their
intrinsic Earths, and of what Nature they are.
III. A Method of turning Vitriol of Mercury
into Water; with a way to extract the genuine
Earth of that corrosive Body. IV. An Experiment
proving that there is a latent Fire in Water;
with a Method to attract the said Fire from the
Water, and to render it visible, &c. &c. The whole
Interspersed with Curious Queries and Remarks.
Being the Conjunctive Trials of Ambrose and
John Godfrey, chymists, from their late Father’s
[Ambrose Gottfried Hanckwitz] Observations.
87 GRAMAYE, Jean Baptiste. Specimen litterarum & linguarum
universi orbis in quo centum fere alphabeta
diuersa sunt adumbrata, & totidem quae
supersunt annotata operique maioiris
ratio & auctoris institutum aperitur. £850
4to (177 x 130mm.) ff. [20], Jesuit IHS device on
title-page, dedication ‘nobilissimo… senatui, consilio
populoque’, woodcut alphabets and illustrations,
somewhat cropped with some borders of woodcuts
etc., and on pp. 1 & 3 the last line of text affected.
Rebound in half calf, old style.
Ath [in Belgium]: excudebat Ioannes Masius. Incidebat
Christophorus agersdorf expensis auctoris [1622?] £2200
Ambrose Gottfried Hankwitz (1660-1741), the ‘late father’
of the title, was originally from Hamburg, and came to
England to work for Robert Boyle. His chief claim to
fame was his manufacture of phosphorus from urine and
excrement, but in fact through his two sons, who are the
authors of this pamphlet, he begot a long-lived firm of
industrial chemists, Godfrey & Cooke which lasted until
1915, when it was subsumed into Savory & Moore, now
itself defunct (1968) and a museum exhibit in Melbourne,
Australia. ESTC records the BL copy only.
A rare and interesting work of linguistic scholarship,
published by the author, at a town where there was no
printing.
The bibliographical description is a little complicated,
some leaves having been reset, as may be seen from a
comparison of the two copies of this tract in the British
Library (63.m.14 and 619.e.9.), both having a dedication
to Jean, count of Tserclaes, baron de Tilly & Marbais
(whose arms appear on the title-page), and not the present
dedication. In both cases the makeup of the book is clear:
4to (240 x 190mm.) [2], 18pp., disbound.
London: T. Gardner, 1747 Item 87, Gramaye.
the signatures can be seen: 2 A2, [2nd] A-C4, [3rd]A4, 20
leaves, pp. [8], 1-23, [1], 33-37, 6e, 03, 40, and in both cases
the order of these has been observed. In 619.e.9, first A
(‘Ad lectorem’) has been duplicated. In this copy the order
of the leaves, all of which are present, is not the same.
The author (1575-1635) describing himself on the titlepage as ‘Provost of Arnhem, dean of Leuze (near Tournai)
and the counsellor and historiographer of princes’, was
in fact the last Provost of Arnhem and a well known local
historian writing on the antiquities of Brabant, Antwerp
and much else, including the history of Asia in a book
published in 1604. He was also Bishop of Africa, and
his journal has recently (1998) been published. This is
a bilingual edition of his Diarium rerum Argelae gestarum,
part of his work on Africa published at Tournai in 1623.
In the section on Greek Gramaye writes about Greek
manuscripts and his informants on their whereabouts,
which indicate that someone from Mount Athos was
visiting Brussels, that the Genoese consul there was also
a source of information, and that some information about
the treasures of Moroccan libraries was current: ‘Graeca
extant SS. patrum volumina innumera in monasteriis
insularum archipelagi & orientis, prout asserit mihi
hoc anno Bruxellae episcopus de Monte sancto [Athos]
Graecus… superesse etiam multos graecos codices… docuit
me Lucas Sanchius consul genuensis… In Africa… multos
Graecos esse intelligo & latere in bibliothecis Fessanis &
Tuneti raros quosdam…’ (‘In the monasteries of the islands
of the archipelago and of the East there are innumerable
volumes in Greek of the Fathers, as I have been informed
this year in Brussels by the Greek Bishop of the Holy
Mountain (Athos) Luca Zanchi<?> the Genoese consul
has also informed me of the existence of many Greek
codices… I understand that there are many Greek books
in Africa and some which are hidden in the libraries of
Fez and Tunis’).
In the ‘Ad lectorem’ preface, Gramaye lists a large
group of those who have either provided him with books
from their collections, or have written books which he has
used. These include Angelo Rocca, his Bibliotheca sacra
vaticana, Trithemius, the judge Claude Duret, author
of Thrésor de l’histoire des langues de cest univers, contenant
les origines, beautés… décadences, mutations… et ruines des
langues hébraïque, chananéenne… etc., les langues des animaux
et oiseaux (Cologny (i.e. Geneva), 1613)., the brothers de
Bry (in Oppenheim/Frankfurt) of whose cutting of exotic
alphabets Purchas speaks,, various Jesuits, Bonaventure
Hepburn, the orientalist (1573-1620, see ODNB), whose
Lexicon linguae sanctum succinctum of 1620 may have been
used, and other works. On p. 22, when discussing the
Ethiopic language and those who write about it, we find the
Pater Noster given in both Latin and Angolan (‘Nigrorum
oratio’) in the same form as it is given in 1812 by Adelung
in his Mithridates p. 224, and today on-line.
Ath is a small town in Belgium, which was part of the
Spanish Netherlands until 1667 when it became the first
town to come under French control. This is the only book
printed there. Christopher Agersdorf would seem to have
been the cutter of the illustrations and the alphabets.
Use is made of this work in his section on world
alphabets in vol. 1 (part 1 p. 185) of Purchas his Pilgrimes
(1625), where complaint is made of the cost of engraving
exotic alphabets.
Copies: UK (5, BL, Bodley (2), Cambridge etc.);
Germany (2 -Göttingen, Regensburg); USA - no
copies.
88 GREEK ANTHOLOGY. An q olog ia d iafo wn epig ra m matwn.
Florilegium diversorum epigrammatum
veteru, in septem libros diversrum.
4to (250 x 155mm.)[4], 539 (=545, pp.283-288 bis),
[35]pp., device on title-page, later Dutch vellum
over pasteboard, yapp edges.
[Geneva]: E. Estienne, H. Fuggeri typographus, 1566
£2000
A fine, clean, large copy. As as p. 60 the epigrams are
fairly extensively annotated with interlinear and marginal
glosses and vocabulary notes in a small neat hand.
On the verso of the title-page is a key to the various
diacritical signs used by Estienne in this edition to indicate
proper names of men, women, digs, horses etc, to indicate
the names of peoples or places, to indicate the names of
mountains, to indicate the names of seas, rivers, fountains,
together with the pointing finger used (‘as in Aeschylus,
Xenophon, Thucydides, Diodorus Siculus and others’) to
indicate sententiae. This is particular useful in the Greek
Anthology where proper names abound in the titles of
the individual epigrams.
At the end there is a note addressed by Estienne to the
reader in which he tells us that it is a shortage of paper and
not of time which has made him offer such abbreviated
notes (‘annotatiunculae’) which constitute barely a tenth
of what he might of offered. He then proceeds to outline
his method of editing, and speaks of the epigrams he
has added, one of which he has taken from a manuscript
in the possession of the English doctor John Clement at
Louvain, as well as others from various ancient writers
such as Pauusanias. Certain verses in book VII he has
rejected as being modern (by Janus Lascaris).
Renouard 126.4; Schreiber 159. See Hutton The Greek
Anthology in France, Ithaca NT: Cornell UP, 1946, pp.
128-133.
Provenance: M. Bruningen 29 June 1657 (inscribed on
fly-leaf).
43
89 GROTIUS, Hugo, editor. Excerpta
ex tragoediis et comoediis graecis
tum quae exstant, tum quae perierunt:
emendata… ab Hugone Grotio. Cum
notis & indice auctorum ac rerum.
92 HARRIS, John. Navigantium atque
itinerantium bibliotheca: or a complete
collection of voyages and travels. Consisting of
above six hundred of the most authentic writers…
Containing whatever has been observed
worth of notice in Europe, Asia, Africa, and
America;… including particular accounts of the
manufactures and commerce of each country.
4to (228 x 160mm.) [12], 1006, [38]pp., title printed
in red and black, nineteenth-century polished
calf by Hatton of Manchester, with his ticket, gilt
Macclesfield arms on covers, gilt spine, red morocco
label, marbled edges.
Paris: N. Buon, 1626 £900
2 vols folio [xii], xviii, [iv], 984; [x], 1056, [22] (index
& list of plates) pp., frontispiece and 59 further
engraved charts, maps and plates (of 60, lacking
the map of Georgia), contemporary speckled calf,
gilt, backs & head-caps rather worn, some foxing
and spotting.
London, T. Woodward, 1744-48 £5000
This extremely elegantly printed volume (from the same
press as the first edition of De iure belli ac pacis) contains
passages from the Greek dramatists, Aeschylus, Euripides,
Sophocles, and of the writers of comedies, Aristophanes,
Alexis, Menander and others, all of them taken from extant
plays, with others from the Florilegium of Stobaeus, which
Grotius had earlier edited, and still others from citations
elsewhere. The Latin translation is given on the verso
facing the Greek text on recto.
The argument of the preface is a moral one, pointing
out the similarity between some of the utterances of
the ancients and the Christian message. Sophocles is
particularly singled out as an imitator of Homer,’ but not
of all Homer, just the best parts’, and Grotius explains how
he has gathered fragments from all over Greek literature,
using a collection previously made by Dirk Canter with
additions by Scaliger lent to him by the Geneva printer
P. de la Rovière.
Ter Meulen & Diermanse 468.
Provenance: ‘Sum Jacobi [Nicolai crossed out] Schonaei
Hornani [of Hoorn]’. In the section devoted to Euripides
someone has given the line numbers in pencil.
90 GUICHARD, Claude. Funerailles
& diuerses manieres d’ensevelir des
Romains, Grecs, & autres nations.
4to (230 x 145mm.) [8], 546, [22]pp., woodcuts, criblé
initials etc., eighteenth-century calf, gilt fillets on
covers, spine gilt in compartments, slight worming
at head of some leaves affecting headlines (bad in
quires d p & q).
Lyons: J. de Tournes, 1581 £650
The author (1545-1607) wrote on the history of Savoy,
but little seems to be known of him. The dedication to
Emanuel of Savoy is printed in civilité type.
Cartier De Tournes 616.
Provenance: ‘Ce livre apartient a Noble homme Laurois
Dary S[ieur] de St Aulaire <?>’. There is a signature on
MAGGS
This edition of Harris is the first to contain the first English
map by Bowen to depict continental Australia, A Complete
Map of the Southern Continent Survey’d by Capt. Abel Tasman
& depicted by order of the East India Company in Holland in
the Stadt House at Amsterdam. Bowen’s other contribution
to this edition, a map of Georgia, is missing.
93 HARTSOEKER, Nicolaas. Suite des conjectures physiques.
the middle of the title-page and at p. 212, and on p. 10
the note ‘Je suis au? de sainte Marie donné par le sieur
de?… 1630. François de???’
91 HALE, Sir Matthew. Pleas of the
Crown: or a methodical summary of the
principal matters relating to that subject.
8vo (160 x 104mm.) [8], 272, [8]pp., contemporary
rough calf, upper cover marked.
London: printed by the assigns of R & E. Atkyns, for
W. Shrewsbury and J. Leigh, 1678 £1000
Interleaved and copiously annotated, with additions in
margins and on blank pages, this work was reprinted
several times in its present form before being enlarged by
the addition of extra treatises in the edition of 1707, and
substantially enlarged by Giles Jacob for the edition of 1716.
Wing H254; ESTC records only the Huntington &
Stanford in the USA.
4to (287 x 223mm.) [8], 147, [1]pp., Large Paper copy,
5 medical engraved plates, 2 engraved armorial
head-pieces, woodcut figures, contemporary
vellum-backed boards, uncut, prelims slightly soiled
(particularly title-page), spine worn.
Amsterdam: H. Desbordes, 1708 £600
First edition, and a sequel to the first series of lectures
published in 1707 by Desbordes, both dedicated to the
Count of Hesse-Kassel. The subjects dealt with are all
physiological, and the plates illustrate Siamese twins etc.
A REVISED ISSUE NECESSITATED BY
THE RE-NAMING OF THE NAVY
AFTER THE RESTORATION
94 HAYWARD, Edward. The sizes and
lengths of riggings for all his Majesties ships
and frigats. As also proportions of boatswains
and carpenters stores, of all kinds, for eight
months sea-service on the coast of England:
together with sundry other useful observations,
as may appear by the index following.
Folio. (270 x170mm.) [13], 60, [1 (blank)] pp.,
woodcut Royal arms on the title-page. Very small
nick to the lower fore-corner throughout (slightly
more severe in the first sixteen or so leaves), shaved
by the binder with some loss of a few signatures (D1,
G1, H1, I1) and one catchword (D1) and to the rule
borders at the foot and pagination at the head and
touching the bottom line of text of “A List of his
Majesties Ships”, some browning to gathering “F”,
two (30mm) incisions caused by the removal of a seal
in the inner margin of D2 [see below], rebound in
half calf, old style; formerly part of a tract volume,
with facsimile bookplate.
London: by Peter Cole, 1660 [the date altered in ink
to 1666] £2400
First Edition, third issue of four, and a reissue of the sheets
of the first edition of 1655 (Wing H1229) with a new
title and preliminaries [see below]. The only distinction
between this third issue of 1666 and the second issue of
1660 is that the date on the title and dedication (June 21.
1660) to James, Duke of York have been altered by hand
from 1660 to 1666. A final reissue in 1666 identical to the
present but with a new title A Full and Perfect Account of the
Sizes and Lengths of Riggins [sic] is Wing H1230A (Christ
Church Oxford only).
This re-issue comprises the same sheets as the 1655
edition, but with [A]1-2, B1-2, C1 and D1-2 (imprimatur
leaf & title, dedications to Oliver Cromwell and General
Disbrowe [Desborough], address to the Commissoners of
the Navy (C1)and a double-table (D1-2) cancelled and with
a new title, a dedication to James II and new address “To
the Concern’d Reader”. Inserted before E1 is a “slip” (sic
ESTC) but actually a single leaf, which has been folded for
the post and has two slits and a stain in the inner margin
where a seal was attached) with “A list of His Majesties
Ships, whose Names have been changed,…” (ESTC states
that this slip, in fact a single folio leaf, is sometimes pasted
to the blank recto of E1). The fact that this leaf has been
folded and sealed for posting has not been noted in any
other copy, and is the sort of information that cannot
be obtained from electronic resources.
This results from the event, witnessed by Samuel
Pepys, on 23 May 1660, when King Charles II and his
brother James, Duke of York, first boarded the English
fleet sent to bring them from exile in Holland and found
them all unhappily named after leading Parliamentary
figures and victories: “After dinner, the King and Duke
upon the [quarter-deck table?] altered the name of some
of the Shipps, viz. the Nazseby into Charles - The Richard,
James; the Speaker, Mery, The Dunbar (which was not in
company with us), the Henery - Winsby, Happy Returne Wakefield, Richmond - Lamport, the Henretta - Cheriton, the
Speedwell - Bradford, the Successe.” (Diary,. ed. Latham,
I, 155).
45
When the present issue was produced (the dedication
is redated 21 June 1666 - although the day and month
are unaltered) news of the “Four Days’ Battle” (1-4 June)
of the Second Anglo-Dutch War, in which the English
Fleet, under the Duke of Albemarle, despite initial claims
of victory suffered heavy losses, had just begun to reach
London.
Little seems to be known about Edward Hayward
apart from the fact that, according to the title-page, he
had served for twenty-two years as clerk of the Survey at
Chatham dockyard. Pepys mentions him briefly in his
diary: “In the evening Mr. Hayward came to me to advise
with me about the business of the Chest [a fund to pay
disabled seamen with which Hayward had been concerned
since at least 1658], which I have now a mind to put in
practice” (20th August, 1662). The first edition of this work
seems to have sparked a certain amount of controversy
as a scarce pamphlet survives which is “Mr Haywards
answer to G. Kendals scandalous pamphlet […] wherein
the state suffers much damage by Mr. Hayward’s book
of rigging” (Wing K282A). Presumably this must have
been one publication in a series of attacks and rebuttals.
The work is predominantly a list of the measurements
of all the ships in the Navy along with an inventory of
their stocks of sails, ropes, anchors, carpenters’ stores, and
other nautical equipment. Some explanation is given to
the correct method for rigging measurement.
Wing H1230 (British Library, Bodley, Chatsworth,
Longleat House, Magdalene College Cambridge [Pepys
Library], Salisbury Cathedral; Bibliothèque Nationale
Paris; John Carter Brown Library [defective, lacking the
“slip”], New York Public Library & Yale.
95 [HELDOREN, Jan van]. A nomenclator English and Dutch.
Consisting in familar words with variety of
choise phrases used in common discours.
Eeen naamboekje, Engels en Duyts…
pp. 48; [1]- 64, 67-166; 48; 48pp., vellum-backed
boards, lacking pp. 163 -166 of the second part.
Amsterdam: widow Mercy Bruyning, 1675£900
Ibid.
An English and Nether-dutch dictionary…
Eeen engels en nederduits Woortboek…
Den eersten Druk. ff. [112] (signed A-O
in 8’s), vellum-backed blue paper boards,
marginal worm holes in some quires.
2 volumes 16mo (140 x 80mm.) early 18th century
vellum backed blue paper boards, lettered on spine
as volumes I & II.
MAGGS
The first work was published under the title A new English
grammar etc., with 2 preliminary leaves before the title
as given above (see the entry in ESTC). The ‘Dialogue
between a Frenchman and an Englishman’ (in Dutch and
English) has its own fly-title on F2 (p. 83).
The dictionary part is arranged according to the
number of syllables (1-6) with a dash between each syllable
of the English words. These are followed by a short section
on abbreviations and one on nicknames or adaptations
of christian names. Throughout the English words are
printed in Roman and the Dutch in italic.
Wing H 1372A.
96 HELMONT, Franciscus Mercurius van. Alphabeti vere naturalis hebraici brevissima
delineatio. Quae simul methodum suppeditat,
juxta quam qui surdi nati sunt sic informari
possunt, ut non alios saltem loquentes intelligant,
sed & ipsi ad sermonis usum perveniant.
12mo (130 x 65mm.) [36 (incl. additional engraved
title)], 107, [1]pp., 36 engraved plates, eighteenthcentury smooth calf, gilt.
Sulzbach: Abraham Lichtenthaler, 1657 (recte 1667) Sold
A handsome copy of this fascinating work, written when
van Helmont (1614-1698) was a prisoner of the Inquisition
in Rome, where without books he began to think what it
would be like to live on an island inhabited by deaf mutes,
and how he would communicate with them. In his preface
to the reader, dated 6 January 1667, van Helmont’s friend
Christian Knor von Rosenroth (1636-1689) discourses
upon the nature of society and societies, secular (including
such organisations as the Dutch East India Company)
and religious, or irreligious (he specifically condemns
the atheist Giulio Cesare Vannini). There is, he writes, a
third group, the society given over to the arts, and here
he very specifically mentions the Royal Society of London,
together with societies in France, Italy, and Germany
(Fruchtbringende Gesellschaft, and others) which use
vernacular languages to explain things. He advocates
that a society for the study of sacred languages, and in
particular Hebrew, which he (in common with others
both then and later) sees as ‘omnium linguarum regina’
and the language of God himself, what he calls ‘mater et
scaturigo reliquarum omnium’ (the mother and source
of all the rest). Citing a number of contemporary writers,
including Henry More, Lightfoot the Cambridge hebraist,
Heinsius and others, he speaks of the Hebrew influence
in the New Testament.
The work proper is divided into three parts and cast
in seven dialogues, the first dealing in general with the
motions of the mouth, the second with how the Hebrew
letters are ‘nothing other than pictures representing the
various movements of the tongue’, the third dealing with
the tongue and surrounding tissue, the fourth with the
prerequisite for all speech, breath, and so on. The last
dialogue is concerned with the perfection of the Hebrew
language.
Franciscus Mercurius van Helmont was the son of
Johannes Baptista van Helmont (1579-1644), and in
addition to editing his father’s works, he was closely
involved with Knorr von Rosenroth, and at the court in
Sulzbach he caried out all manner of studies, alchemical,
cabbalistic and mystical. He was from 1671 closely
connected with Leibniz, and with Henry More the
Cambridge Platonist, as well as with John Locke, with
whom he stayed at Oates during his last visit to England
in 1693/4 (see Locke Correspondence).
The book is dedicated to his patron the catholic convert
Count Christian August of Sulzbach. The correct date
appears in the colophon and on the engraved title. A
German translation of the work appeared in the same
year, 1667 (VD17 23:275902V).
98 HORNE, Andrew. [La somme
appelle Mirroir des iustices: vel
speculum iusticiariorum]. The booke
called, the Mirrour of Justices… With the
book, called The Diversity of Courts… Both
translated… by W.H. of Grays Inne Esquire.
12mo (136 x 80mm.) [32], 325 (=327, pp. 287-288 bis),
[9]pp., first leaf blank, contemporary sheep, worn.
London: printed for M. Walbancke, 1646 £900
Sir Thomas Clarke’s copy with his signature and marginal
notes. The note on the flyleaf reads: ‘Note in going over
the Mirror of Justices in French I cursorily compar’d the
French wth the English & wherever there appear’d any
material error in either of ‘em I corrected it in the margin’.
TC. Sir Thomas Clarke (1703-64) was a protegé of the first
earl of Macclesfield, and at his death left his library and
fortune to the family.
The original was published in 1642. Wing H2789.
VD17 12:153272L; Dünnhaupt (2nd edition) 2375.1;
Krivatsy 5426; For an English translation see The alphabet
of nature by F.M. van Helmont; translated with an introduction
and annotations by Allison P. Coudert & Taylor Corse. Leiden
etc: Brill, 2007.
97 HOBBES, Thomas. De mirabilibus
Pecci; Being the Wonders of the Peak in
Derby-shire, commonly call’d the Devil’s Arse of
Peak. The Latine written by Thomas Hobbes of
Malmsbury. The English by a Person of Quality.
8vo (187 x 113mm.) [2], 81, 84-85, [9] pp., with the
advertisements for Crook at the rear, some very
minor spotting in places, contemporary blindpanelled calf (neatly rebacked, new spine label).
London: W. Crook, 1678 £700
Originally written in Latin for the second Earl of
Devonshire as an account of their short tour of the Peak
District in June 1628. An advertisement before the text in
this addition proclaims the great popularity of the poem
and the call for an English translation. The translator
states that the work was done ‘without the knowledge
of Mr. Hobs’ but it is hope it will not displease him’. He
further recommends Hobbes’ translation of Homer calling
it ‘the most exact and best translation that ere I saw’ (A2r).
Wing H2224; Macdonald & Hargreaves, 10.
99 HUBIN, -. Machines nouvellement
executées et en partie inventées. Premiere
partie ou se trouvent une clepsydre, deux
zymosimetres, un peze=liqueur, & un
thermometre. Avec plusieurs observationes
faites à Orleans, sur les qualités de l’air,
& en particulier sur sa pesanteur.
4to (203 x 154mm.) [4], 23p., contents: [i] title; [ii]
Contents and explanation of plate; [iii] Au lecteur;
[iv] engraved illustration; 1-22 text; 23 Extrait des
registres dated 21 January, 1673, and errata; [24]
blank, disbound.
Paris: J. Cusson, et l’auteur, devant la rue aux ours:
ou se trouvent toutes ces machines, & plusieurs autres
curiositez, 1673 £500
Hubin, who seems to have been of an English family, was
well known as a maker of barometers one of which Hooke
47
presented to the Royal Society in February 1686, claiming
that he, Hooke, had made it. Described as ‘émailleur du
roi’, Hubin also made hygrometers and alcoholmeters - his
‘zymosimetre’ (cf. M. Daumas, Scientific instruments of the
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and their makers (1972)
p. 81). In a letter to Henry Oldenburg, the prior of St.
Lambert in Paris, Duhamel reports that he had just seen
Hubin who was making thermometers ‘with mercury and
water, very like the barometer of Huygens. When other
thermometers show a difference of two lines, this one shows
nearly a foot. I have not seen one, he had only made one
at Orleans (Correspondence ix, 609). The list of contents
etc. on p. [ii] ends’ ‘On n’a point mis icy la description
du Baromètre double de M. Hugens, sur lequel le Sieur
Hubion a fondé son Thermometre de la V. figure, parce
qu’elle a été donnée au public dans le Journal des Sçavans
du Lundy 12. Decembre 1672.’
Copies of this pamphlet are in the BL, the Bodleian (ex
Hans Sloane). OCLC records another four or so copies
(incl. Harvard, but not Yale).
100 HÜBNER, Johann. Museum
geographicum, das ist: ein Verzeichniss
der besten Land-Charten, so in Deutschland,
Frankreich, England und Holland von den
besten Künstlern sind gestochen worden;
nebst einem Vorschlage wie daraus allerhand
gross und kleine Atlantes können sortiret
werden. In Ordung gebracht… von J.H.J.
8vo (165 x 100mm.) [16], 320p., title printed in red
and black, contemporary German speckled paper
boards, a few ms. Notes.
Hamburg: T.C. Felginer, [1726] £850
A detailed account of maps, arranged by country, together
with a section (p. 225 sqq) on ‘twenty-four small and large
atlases to be used either at home or whilst travelling’. The
book affords a great deal of information on the map trade
at this period, both in terms of maps and their engravers,
but also in terms of how they could be assembled,
coloured etc.
The preface tells us that the book is based on Hübner’s
personal collection put together over many years with
great labour and expense, a task to which Hamburg was
ideally suited (‘in Hamburg sind viele Dinge möglich,
die sich an einem andern Orte nicht practiciren lassen’).
He tells us that the maps are coloured and outlines why
colouring is useful, but how it must not be taken to excess
so as to confuse the actual message of the map. The new
fashion is for colouring political divisions, and the author
particularly mentions maps of Switzerland and Holstein
with their various divisions (cantons etc.)
MAGGS
The book is undated but this copy has the date 1726 written
in by a contemporary hand, which has also made a few
additions in the text.
101 IAMBLICHUS. De vita pythagorica
liber… notisque… illustratus a Ludolphon
Kustero. Versionem latinam… confecit…
Ulricus Obrechtus. Accedit Malchus, sive
Porphyrius de vita Pythagorae [etc.]
2 parts 4to (202 x 145mm.) [16(incl. engr. frontis),
219, [17]; 93, [1]pp., 2 columns, title printed in red
and black, engr. frontispiece, contemporary English
panelled calf, gilt spine, red morocco lettering-piece.
Amsterdam: widow of S. Petzold & C. Petzold, 1707 £500
First separate edition, and a fine crisp copy. The translation
and commentary on Porphyry is by Lucas Holstenius
librarian of the Palatine library. Part 1 (Iamblichus) has
a new Latin version by Obrecht, and also contains a number
of pencilled annotations in English, possibly by Edward
Wake (see below). The work is dedicated by Kuster to the
Bishop of Norwich, John Moore, whose famous library is
in Cambridge UL, and whose son accompanied George
Parker, the second Earl of Macclesfield, on his Grand Tour.
Provenance: armorial bookplate of Edward Wake (1664/51732) of Christ Church, later canon of Canterbury.
102 INNES, Robert, of Magilligan,
County Londonderry. Miscellaneous
letters on several subjects in philosophy
and astronomy, modern boards.
4to (203 x 154mm.) [6], 65, [1]pp., 3 engraved plates,
disbound.
London: S. Birt, 1732 £500
The eight letters, addressed to Bishop William Nicholson
(1655-1727), are on Aurora borealis, Irish peat bogs, the
natural history of the parish of Magilligan, where Innes
held the living, and so on. On p. iv of the preface Innes
writes: ‘I do believe that I shall meet with opposition to
some of these papers, and the great… name of Sir Isaac
Newton may ruffle some people’s tempers, to see some of
his principles contradicted, and I must own, the veneration
I had for him, and the great inequality of my abilities to
his, had almost stifled some of them, etc.’
The advertisements on the last page for books sold
by Birt end: ‘Where may be had all sorts of Biblers and
Common-Prayers, the Fine Large Folio Bible printed at
Oxford, also Welsh Bibles and Common Prayers; neat
Pocket Bibles, with Cambridge Concordance; Duty of Man,
and all other Books of Devotion, History, &c…’.
ESTC lists 7 copies in UK, and 4 in USA (NYPL, Yale,
Chicago, Bancroft).
A POSSIBLE PAIR OF
UNCONSIDERED TRANSLATIONS
BY SAMUEL JOHNSON
“… starved to death in translating for booksellers…”
In the early 1740s Samuel Johnson was working primarily
for Edward Cave, bookseller and publisher of The
Gentleman’s Magazine. There is no doubt that Johnson was
much more productive in his early years than those books,
reviews, and articles which he could remember for Boswell
many years later. Many anonymous titles and minor pieces
have been attributed to him subsequently (e.g. by Hazen
and Fleeman) but many others must remain hidden. One
of his tasks for Cave was translating from French.
It is tempting to think that he was connected with these
translations which have previously escaped the notice of
his biographers and bibliographers.
Writing of Johnson’s career in London from the
time of his return from his last visit to Lichfield in 1740
Walter Jackson Bate, in Samuel Johnson (1978), said: “The
journalistic writings of Johnson during the next fifteen or
twenty years, first for Cave and later for other publishers,
were ‘so numerous, so various, and scattered in such a
multiplicity of unconnected publications’, said Boswell,
that it was doubtful whether Johnson himself in later
years could make a complete list.1 What strikes us most
about these publications is the sheer range, however
ephemeral, quickly written, or now forgotten [of] some
of the pieces. There are short biographies of men noted
in medicine, science, literature, naval exploration, and
warfare. Poems in both Latin and English; monthly articles
for the Gentleman’s Magazine, year after year, on foreign
history (that is political and other current events abroad),
and also the section, much of the time, on foreign books.
And there are reviews, essays, or other writings that show
his knowledge not only of literature, politics, religion and
ethics, but also agriculture, trade, and practical business;
philology, classical scholarship, aesthetics, and metaphysics; medicine and chemistry; travel, exploration, and even
Chinese architecture. Much of it, of course, was hack work,
but it was inspired hack work.”
It would perhaps not be surprising if, in the hothouse
atmosphere of Johnson’s writing at this time, he should
have, translated from the French these two titles (the one a
rare antiquarian/theological text and the other a modern
geographical work) that were published by Edward Cave,
and that he would either have forgotten, or chosen to
forget, them years later.
“It was less a matter of mere indolence than embarrassment and he did not care to be represented by it. Hence
he ‘declined pointing out any of his earlier performances
(in the Gentleman’s Magazine or elsewhere), when some of
his most intimate friends asked it as a favour.’ To others
he acknowledged that ‘he then wrote many things which
merited no distinction from the trash with which they were
consigned to oblivion’.” - Shaw, Memoirs of… the Late Dr.
Samuel Johnson (1785), p. 38, quoted in W.J. Bate, Samuel
Johnson (1978) p. 190.
103 [MUSSARD, Pierre]. [Les Conformitez
des Cérémonies modernes avec les
anciennes]. The conformity between
modern and ancient ceremonies: wherein
is proved, by incontestable authorities, that
the ceremonies of the Church of Rome are
entirely derived from the heathen. With
an appendix, shewing the conformity of
their Conduct toward their adversaries.
8vo (200 x 118 mm]) [4], xliii, [i (contents], 294,
[table of authors), [2 (advertisements for Cave)]
p., contemporary mottled calf, covers with a
gilt ornament in the corners, gilt spine in six
compartments, marbled edges (upper joint cracked
at the head, label missing).
London: by E. Cave, 1745 £1500
First Edition of this translation of Les Conformitez (Leyden:
1667). Mussard was a Protestant pastor in Lyons, born in
Geneva on 26 december 1626, who died in 1685 in London,
having left Lyons in 1671. The translator, surprisingly, is
unaware of another translation into English by James
Du Pré, Roma antiqua et recens, or the conformity of modern
and antient ceremonies (London: 1732), reprinted (or
reissued) as The Conformity of antient and modern ceremonies
(London: 1740).
Published in April 1745 at 4s/6d. Cave’s advertisements
at the end include Maupertuis’s Rudiments of Geography (see
the next item). ESTC records copies in the USA at Duke,
Perkins Theological Library (SMU) and Union Theological
Seminary. They list six in UK and one in Germany.
The translator was inspired by his discovery that Dr.
Conyers Middleton’s celebrated Letter from Rome, shewing an
exact conformity between popery and paganism (1729) appears
to have been largely plagiarised from Mussard’s book,
although Middleton had stated in his preface that his
work was not entirely original.
Was this translation, with its lengthy preface by the
translator, made by Samuel Johnson? The following points
may be raised in this connection.
1. It is dedicated by the translator to John Leveson-Gower,
2nd Baron (later 1st Earl) Gower: “To the true Lover of
his Country, and sincere Friend of the Church of England,
in Opposition to all false Patriotism, and false Religion.”
In 1739, Gower, at the behest of Alexander Pope, wrote
to a friend of Jonathan Swift in the hope of securing the
Dean’s help in obtaining the degree of Master of Arts
from Trinity College, Dublin for Johnson, who was hoping
49
to apply for the post of master of a grammar school in
Appleb, not far from Lichfield, a post which required an
M.A. degree from Oxford (a TCD degree could have been
converted to an Oxford one):
“They say he is not afraid of the strictest examination,
though he is of so long a journey [to Dublin], and will
venture it, if the Dean thinks it necessary, choosing rather
to die upon the road, than be starved to death in translating
for booksellers, which has been his only subsistence for some
time past.”
But the plan came to nothing.
“In political terms the 1730s saw Gower’s emergence
as the leader of the Tories in the Lords. He served as
Lord Justice in 1740 and, after Walpole’s fall, was the
one Tory to take high office as Lord Privy Seal and PC
(12 May 1742) in the new whig ministry. His alliance
with his political opponents, a move of considerable
party political importance, was short-lived, however. He
resigned in December 1743, only to be reappointed as
Lord Privy Seal under the Broadbottom administration in
December the following year, a position he held until his
death in 1754…. Gower’s proximity to the administration
provoked criticism from many who saw his actions as
desertion of the Tory [and the Jacobite] cause. Samuel
Johnson included him in his definition of ‘renegado’ in
his Dictionary (1755), though the reference was removed
by the printer.” – (ODNB).
Writing in the Life of Johnson, Boswell recalled Johnson
“Talking to me upon this subject [the Dictionary] when
we were in Ashbourne in 1777, he mentioned a still
stronger instance of the predominance of his private
feelings in the composition of this work, than any now
to be found in it. ‘You know, Sir, Lord Gower forsook
the old Jacobite interest. When I came to the word
Renegado, after telling that it meant ‘one who deserts
to the enemy, a revolter,’ I added, Sometimes we say a
GOWER. Thus it went to the press; but the printer
had more wit than I, and struck it out.” (Hill-Powell
edition, i, p. 296). Could this be a precursor to Johnson’s
famous spat with Lord Chesterfield over the dedication
of the Dictionary?
2. In 1739 Johnson had published under the pseudonym
Probus Britannicus an anti-government and overtly
Jacobitical tract, Marmor Norfolciense (Fleeman (2000) i,
38-39; 39.4MN/1). This was published by Cave.
3. The subject matter, the history of the Catholic Church,
was certainly on Johnson’s mind at this time. On 12
July 1737 Johnson had written to Cave proposing a new
translation of Fr. Paolo Sarpi’s History of the Council of Trent
from the original Italian as published in 1619, with a new
life of Sarpi, and a translation of the notes from Pierre
Le Courayer’s French edition published in 1736. Johnson
worked on this very long text for six months (August 1738-
MAGGS
April 1739), and in October 1738 had published Proposals
for the edition (again printed by Cave) which survives
in a unique copy found in a copy of the 1676 English
translation of Sarpi by Nathaniel Brent (Fleeman(2000) i,
32-33; 38.10SP). He also published a short life of Sarpi in
volume 8 for November 1738 of The Gentleman’s Magazine
(Boswell op cit i, 139; Fleeman (2000) p. 37; 38GM8). He
abandoned it in the face of another projected translation
by the Rev. John Johnson, a lecturer at St. Martin’s in
the Fields (d. 1747), who had accused Cave in the Daily
Advertiser of underhandedness (see Fleeman 38.10DA).
4. p. [i] The address from the translator opens in what could
be read as a Johnsonian manner: “That the Characters
of Persons of distinguished Merit ought to be faithfully
transmitted to Posterity, is an undoubted Truth. It is
a piece of Justice due to their Virtues; and it is a Right
belonging to Mankind in general, that succeeding
Ages may by such examples be incited to an Imitation
of their behaviour. And this likewise holds true with
regard to Books. The Rescue of a valuable old Treatise
from Oblivion, is a kind of Debt due to its Author; and
certainly is the greatest Service a Man can do to the
learned World, next to presenting it with a new Work of
real Use and Value.”
5. p [i] The second paragraph continues: “Had the Re-
publication of detached Tracts of an approved Character
been more frequently practised, I doubt not but many
excellent Pieces upon very important Subjects would
have been well known in the World, which are now
entirely sunk in Obscurity, and by disappearing have
made way for worse Performances upon the same
Points. Many admirable Books have been lost by the
Smalness of their Bulk; others have been destroyed
by falling into ignorant and illiterate Hands; and not
a few, especially those of he controversial Kind, are
either quite vanished, or become very scarce, by the
Diligence of those Men whose Doctrines or Practises
were thereby placed in a Light they could not bear.”
6. Compare this to the sentiments in Johnson’s Proposals
for Printing, by Subscription, the Harleian Miscellany (1743;
Fleeman (2000) I, 90-92; 43.12HMP):
“… It has long been lamented, that the Duration of the
Monuments of Genious and Study, as well as of Wealth
and Power, depends in no small Measure on their Bulk;
and that Volumes, considerable only for their Size, are
handed down from one Age to another, when compendious
Treatises, of far greater Importance, are suffered to perish,
as the compactest Bodies sink into the Water, while those,
of which the Extension bears a greater Proportion to the
weight, float upon the Surface…”
7. The preface continues with a discourse on the rarity
of books of certain types, and claims a familiarity with
the Harleian Library of the earls of Oxford. Johnson
had helped the bookseller Thomas Osborne produce his
catalogues of the printed books from the Harleian Library,
Catalogus bibliothecae Harleianae (1743-44; Fleeman (2000)
I, 84sqq; 43.1CBH)) and had written the introduction to
The Harleian Miscellany (1744-46; Fleeman (2000) i, 111sqq;
44.4HM) of rare tracts from the library. “The following
Treatise has, I think, had a very narrow Escape from
this Fate. For, tho’ I have been pretty much conversant
in large and well-furnish’d Libraries, I never saw
but two Copies of it: From one of these the present
Translation is made, and the other was in the noble
Collection of the late Lord Oxford….”
8. p. xx: Soul-cakes - “… in many of the midland Parts
of England at this day. It is usual for the Poor, upon
All Souls Day, to go from one Village to another a
begging Soul Cakes, which are freely dispersed by
many good Protestants, who believe neither Purgatory,
nor the Efficacy of Masses for the Dead;…” - cf. George
Tollet’s note 25 added to Johnson & Steevens’s edition
Shakespeare’s Two Gentlemen of Verona (Act II, Scene 1)
explaining that this is a Staffordshire custom (Johnson’s
birthplace, Lichfield, is the principal city of Staffordshire).
9. p.xli: “Country retirement” - “That in the Quotations
of the several Authorities here produced, Recourse was
always had to the Originals, where I had Opportunity,
which I sometimes wanted in a Country Retirement…”
Johnson’s last extended stay outside London had been at
Ashbourne near Lichfield, with Rev. John Taylor, from
August 1739 to April 1740, was when he was trying to
obtain the headmastership of Appleby Grammar School
(see 1, above) with Gower’s help.
10. p. xlii: Thrums and Knots: “For this Purpose I beg
leave to recur to that old Observation that Translations
are naturally like the wrong Side of a Turky Carpet,
full of Thrums and Knotes…”. This quotation comes
from John Howel’s Letters - cf. Steevens’s note 288 added
to Johnson & Steevens’s 1788 edition of Shakespeare’s
Midsummer Night’s Dream (Act V, Scene 2) quoting the
same passage.
104 MAUPERTUIS, Pierre Louis
Moreau de. [Eléments de géographie]
The rudiments of geography.
Small 8vo (168 x 98 mm.) [2], iv, 126pp. Fine copy
in contemporary calf, gilt spine, morocco label.
London: for E. Cave, 1743 £4000
This translation into English appeared within a year of
the original French, and is a rare book: ESTC records only
two copies: Cambridge UL (which we have examined) the
and American Philosophical Society (other libraries have
a microfilm). The text ends on M3r. The Cambridge copy,
in original wrappers, has 8pp. of advertisements for Cave
at the end (the last leaf largely torn away. These are much
smaller than the text block, c. 5mm shorter at the lower
and outer edges and cannot form part of the collation
of the book. They are not present in this copy, or in the
copy at the American Philosophical Society. The book was
published after 7 December 1743 at 1s/6d.
The Elemens de geographie had been published anonymously, in an abbreviated form, in Paris in 1740 (a copy
was in the Macclesfield Library, lot 2449, and there are
copies in the BL and BNF). It is concerned with the precise
shape of the globe and the measurements of Picard and
Cassini in the Arctic designed to explain the variations in
the earth’s gravity. It was finished, enlarged, and republished in 1742: ‘Nouvelle edition. A Paris, rue S. Jacques,
chez Gab. Martin, J. Bapt. Coignard, & Hipp. L. Guerin,
libraires’. After its publication Maupertuis was to be found
in Berlin with Frederick the Great, to whom introductions
had been effected by Voltaire.
The work was also translated into German and
published in Zürich by the Heidegger firm in 1742 as
Anfänge der Geographie. The French text was included in
a collective volume: Ouvrages divers de Mr. de Maupertuis:
Eléments de géographie. Discours sur les différentes figures des
corps célestes. Discours sur la parallaxe de la lune et Lettre sur
la comète, Amsterdam, aux depens de la Compagnie, 1744.
Maupertuis was ‘in the air’, and it is likely therefore that
Johnson, eager for work, would have been aware of him.
It must be remembered French was not taught in England
as part of any curriculum at this period: the aristocracy
might well have had tutors, but in general people would
have picked it up, and therefore no great level of linguistic
attainment might be expected from a native Englishman.
Johnson had however used some of his time at Oxford to
learn French, and had already translated Lobo from the
French in 1735 and Prévost in 1738.
In 1742 Cave published the first of 9 Numbers of
Miscellaneous Correspondence: Containing Essays, Dissertations,
&c. on various subjects, sent to the Author of The Gentleman’s
Magazine, &c. Item XIII in Numb. I was “M. Maupertuis
on Comets”, i.e. the Lettre sur la comète qui paroissoit en 1742
listed above. This had appeared with no place or printer
named in 1742, but presumably in Paris (cf. Conlon, P.M.
Siècle des Lumières, 42:550). The “Avertisement” on p. v of
Numb. I has been “tentatively” attributed to Johnson (cf.
Fleeman (2000) i pp. 79-80; 42.12MC. Fleeman however
writes: ‘the attribution of the ‘Advertisement’ to SJ is
unpersuasive: although it is business like and well within
his capacity, it contains nothing which is unequivocally
his…’. A long synopsis of the contents was published in
The Gentleman’s Magazine for December 1743 (p. 655) in
answer to a (probably planted) letter from “Criticus” dated
7 December 1743 asking whether the Earth is an oblate
spheroid flattened or lengthened at the poles.
51
It is known from Boswell’s Life that Johnson was familiar with Maupertuis’s opinion on the supposed suicide
of scorpions (Life ed. Hill-Powell, ii, p. 54). Boswell
comments in a footnote: “Who could have imagined that
the High Church of England-man would be so prompt
in quoting Maupertuis, who, I am sorry to think, stands
in the list of those unfortunate mistaken men, who call
themselves esprits forts.” This information had appeared
after a visiut Maupertuis had made to the Midi, during
which he had conducted some experiments with scorpions,
which involved experiments with a dog and a mouse..
This he had published in the Mémoires of the Académie
des Sciences in 1731.
There is, however, little else to connect this translation
with Johnson: the style is somewhat constrained by the
original French, and certainly therefore does not attain
the orotundity of Johnson’s later prose.
p. [1] “It is beyond all doubt, that in the first journeys
which men undertook, they travell’d from one place to
another, only by the information which the people of each
country to which they came gave them; and marked out
their course by trees, mountains and other fix’d objects.
It was a long time before voyages by sea were attempted,
especially such as carry’d out of sight of land. In this
manner did the first inhabitants make but slow progress
on the face of the earth, without knowing either its
figure or bounds, and perhaps without surmising, that
any such knowledge was attainable. The necessity under
which mankind find themselves of carrying on a mutual
intercourse, put them upon discovering other methods
to guide them in long journeys…”.
Provenance: Earls of Macclesfield. Maupertuis was known
to William Jones (c. 1675-1749), the mathematician and
protégé of the Earl of Macclesfield, and corresponded with
him. Maupertuis had come to London in 1727, the year of
Newton’s death, and was a supporter of Newton’s theory
of gravitation, in support of which he published in 1732.
For Maupertuis see: Beeson, D. Maupertuis: an intellectual
biography (Studies on Voltaire and the eighteenth century
299), Oxford, 1992. Terrall, Mary. The man who flattened
the earth: Maupertuis and the sciences in the Enlightenment,
Chicago, 2002. See also Les oeuvres complètes de Voltaire [edited by Theodore Besterman… et al.]. 32B. [Writings of
1750-1752], Oxford, 2007, which contains Voltaire’s review
of the Oeuvres.
105 JOSEPHUS, Flavius. Some observations
of the additions to & differences from
the truth contained in the storie of the holy
scripture. Together with a compend of the
rest of Josephus his XX books of the Jewish
Antiquities. (A compend of Josephus his 7
MAGGS
bookes of the Jewish warres. - A compend of the
ecclesiasticall historie in X books by Eusebius
Pamphilus…- A compend of the ecclesiasticall
historie in VII bookes by Socrates scholasticus. A compend of the ecclesiasticall historie written
in VI bookes by Evagrius scholasticus.)
107 KIRCH, Gottfried. Alter und
neuer rechter astronomische
Wunder=Kalender darinnen nich allein
zu finden die merckwürdige wahrhaftoge
Himmels=Begenbenheiten… MDCLXXXX,
usw. (Andere Theil des…Wunder-Calenders…).
8vo (142 x 90mm.) MANUSCRIPT in English, ff.
[228], first leaf and last 4 leaves blank, written in a
single hand in brown ink, 20 -26 lines to the page,
Contents: The 5 sections are dated 20 November
1651(1v) & 2 December (61v) (Antiquities); 3
December 1651 (62v) & 10 December 1651 (101r)
(Jewish Wars); 11 December 1651 (103r) (Life of
Josephus); 15 December 1651 (104v) & 23 December
1651 (149r) (Eusebius); 24 December 1651(149v) &
23 January 1651/2 (Socrates followed (196v) by
Evagrius). Contemporary rough calf, rubbed.
[London?] 1651-52.£2500
ff. [32], partly printed in red, title within woodcut
frame, woodcut on G4verso, contemporary German
mss. additions on same leaf.
Leipzig: Caspar Lunitz, [1680]
£900
Bound with:
Bound with:
Ephemeris motuum coelestium an annum….
M.DC. XIX etc. ff. [12] only [No place c. 1620]
3 works in 1 volume, calf.
The continuous text in the first part of the calender by Kirch
(one of an annual series) contains an account of Montezuma
and the conquest of Mexico, together with attendant
‘wonders’ ‘Etlicher Wunder-Geschichte. Wunderzeichen
welchevor dem Untergange des letzten mexicanischen
Königs in West-Indien geschehen’. VD 17 23: 653283L
(HAB and Nürnberg).
Cf. J-L. Quantin, The Church of England and Christian
antiquity: the construction of a confessional identity in the 17th
century, Oxford, 2009.
4to (200 x 150mm.) [16], 350; 141, [27]pp., title
printed in red and black, last leaf with errata etc.,
additional engr. title, engr. portrait, plates lettered
A-Z, (G.H.), (R.S.) (T.V) and (Y.Z being on four plates,
explanation of plates on pp. 135-139 of part 2, early
eighteenth- century ?Scandinavian century vellumbacked paper over thin wooden boards.
Amsterdam & Gdansk: C. Günther, auff Kosten des
Autoris, bey Heinrich Betkio & Consorten, 1679 £2100
16mo (115 x 74mm.) 167pp., woodcuts, speckled
calf c. 1700, gilt spine, red morocco lettering-piece.
Leiden: F. Raphelengius ex off. Plantiniana, 1596 £950
Third edition. 58 woodcuts, mostly unsigned, by Arnaud
Nicolai and Geeraard Jansen van Kampen after Luc de
Herre, Pierre Huys and Geoffroy Ballaing. Printer’s device
on title.
Landwehr 406.
J.R. Partington Hist. of chemistry ii, 368.
Pagan, Blaise. La theorie des planates… Paris:
C. Besogne, 1657, [8], 124pp., woodcut diagrams.
An interesting resumé of both OT and christian history
taken mostly from Josephus (ff. 1-103), and from the
histories of Eusebius, Socrates and Evagrius, the works of
whom are frequently printed together both in the original
Greek, in Latin translation and in the English version of
Meredith Hanmer, originally published in 1577. There
was an edition published in 1650 (Wing E3421), which
may well have been the book used. Josephus was similarly
translated into English and widely read.
At the very end are 2 pages of notes on Grotius De jure
belli ac pacis on the treatment of prisoners ‘captivis parci jus
naturale et commune’, with some references to Xenophon,
Sallust, and Camden (‘1598 in causa Hawkins’). Whether
these have some contemporary resonance is unclear.
106 JUNIUS, Hadrianus. Emblemata.
Eiusdem aenigmata libellus. Cum noua
& emblematum & aenigmatum appendice.
Künckel has added his own commentary and an
account of experiments. The book was reprinted in 1743
and 1756 in Nürnberg, and remained ‘by far the best
account of glass making in existence’ (Partington p. 368
quoting Thomson).
108 KÜNCKEL, Johann. Ars vitraria
experimentalis, oder vollkommene
Glasmacher=Kunst… samt einem II
Haupt-Theil, so in drey unterschiedenen
Büchern… mit einem Anhang, usw.
This important work on glass making incorporates (in
German) the text of Antonio Neri L’Arte vetraria, Florence,
1612. Christopher Merret FRS translated Neri into English
first with a substantial commentary (1662) and the Latin
edition of 1668 is made from this. The work was translated
into German by Gessler (1678). There was also a French
edition of 1752.
109 LA MOTHE LE VAYER, François. De l’instruction de Monseigneur le
Dauphin, à Monseigneur l’ eminentissime
Cardinal duc de Richelieu.
4to (230 x 165m.) 364, [4]p., engraved title-page
by Mellan, contemporary vellum lettered on spine.
Paris: S. Cramoisy, 1640 £600
La Mothe Le Vayer (1588-1672) is an important figure
in the French 17th century, and he has been studied at
length by René Pintard in his Le Libertinage érudit dans la
première moitié du xviie siècle Geneva: Droz, 1983. He was
an omnivorous reader and a great amasser of facts. Some
of this may be seen in this work: all aspects of history are
discussed as well as astrology, chemistry and alchemy (pp.
311sqq.). He had been intended as tutor to Louis XIV the
Dauphin. The inheritor of the library of Mademoiselle
de Gournay, he fits, as does Montaigne, into the French
Pyrrhonist tradition.
110 LEIGH, Edward. Three diatribes
or discourses. First of travel… Secondly,
of money or coins. Thirdly, of measuring, etc.
8vo (150 x 95mm.) [16], 88pp., contemporary sheep,
very worn, some leaves of prelims gnawed at edges.
London: printed for W. Whitwood, 1671 £950
First edition (republished 1680 as ‘The gentleman’s guide’).
The preface to the reader contains some interesting
observations on missionary work and its connection with
linguistic study, mentioning the Arabists, Golius, Erpenius
53
and Pocock, the Jesuits, John Eliot’s ‘honest attempts in
New-England…[which] maketh more serious spiritual
christians’, and Justus Heurnius (1587-1651/2), the Dutch
missionary to the Far East, who spent ‘above 14 Years,
preaching to the Indians in their Mother Tongue…’. The
Diatribe on Travel itself in addition to general remarks on
travel, what to look for, how to conduct oneself and so on,
discusses at some length the literature of travel, e.g: ‘Mr
Boyle in his Preface to his Experiments, touching Cold,
commends Captain James his Voyages, it being scarce,
and not to be met with, in Purchas’s Tomes (hauing
been written some years after they were finished) and
his Voyages published by the last Kings command; he
being bred in the University, and acquainted with the
Mathematicks’. The other two parts are similarly, but less
fully, structured.
Wing L1010.
111 LEON PINELO, Antonio de.
Question moral si el chocolate quebranta
el ayuno eclesiastico. Tratase de otras bebidas i
confecciones que se usan en varias provincias.
4to (190 x 130mm.) ff. [6], 122, [12]ff.. (2 leaves of
the prologue misbound in the index at the end),
engraved title by Jean de Courbes, very minor
worming at head of the first few leaves, tiny flaw
in engr. title, mid-18th-century English speckled
calf (rebacked).
Madrid: por la Viuda de Iuan Goncalez, 1636 Sold
First edtion of this rare work written by the historian
and protobibliographer of the New World Leon Pinelo
(1589-1660).
The question of what might, or might not, break the
eucharistic fast was something which exercised the minds
of canon lawyers, and something discussed and legislated
MAGGS
on at Councils of the Church held in Peru. Some things
were clearly not allowed, but new items like chocolate and
even tobacco, gave rise to discussion, from the sixteenth
century on. Was chocolate a necessary drink like water
or wine, or was it (A1verso) ‘materia comestible’, in which
case it could only be used on fast days at the stated times.
The spread of the use of chocolate into Spain, where it
became hugely popular, obviously led to the raising of
this question there, and by extension elsewhere in Europe.
The architectural engraved titlepage shows an Indian
woman holding a young cocoa plant with its fruit in her
other hand. Ff 1-104 contain three sections and cover
the nature of chocolate, what fasting is and its various
manifestations, whether or not chocolate is an essential
beverage etc., and then proceed to discuss other forms of
drink, including limonade, ‘hipocras’ (punch), beer, mixed
drinks, and drinks peculiar to S. America (pulque, chicha.)
There is then a lengthy survey of the various views, and
finally in part 3 (f. 95) an opinion that chocolate drunk
in moderate quantities can be used on fast days without
breaking the fast. Finally 105-122 contain the Advertencia,
which consists of a reprint of chapters from Juan de
Cardenas’s work De los problemas, i secretos maravillosos de
las Indias, Mexico 1591, as also Barrios’s tract on chocolate
also printed in Mexico (1609).
Palau 135746; Medina vi, lxxi-lxxii.
112 LETO, Giulio Pomponio. Romanae
historiae compendium, etc.
4to in 6’s (189 x 133mm.), ff. [62], woodcut illustration
on title-page, large device at end, eighteenth-century
smooth calf, gilt spine, red edges.
(Paris: Jean Dupré, 7 May 1501) £1200
A handsome copy of this resumé of Roman history from
the younger Gordian II (AD 238) to Justin III in the early
7th century. Pomponio Leto (1428-1497) was a well-known
Roman antiquary, author and editor of several works. This
work, first published in April 1499, and several times
reprinted in Italy and in France, was later translated into
Italian.
Moreau 1501/854; Goff L27.
Provenance: Nicolas Mallary of Rouen, possibly ?
Nicolas Maillard (c. 1486-1565) see Bietenholz, P. & al.
Contemporaries of Erasmus pp. 369-370. Another book from
his library is the 1513 Estienne Quincuplex Psalterium in
Paris (BNF Rés. G.a. 17).
113 LINACRE, Thomas. De emendata
structura latini sermonis libri sex,
cum indice copiosissimo.
8vo (130 x 95mm.) ff. 212, [], English calf c. 1700,
spine gilt, lacking lettering piece, gilt edges.
Venice: (Paulus Manutius), 1557 £500
Renouard 171 no. 7; UCLA 517.
Provenance: Italian 17th century library (Imperiali) stamp
on title-page; English note of purchase by (?) Rawlinson
‘Sept. 9 1720 Collat. & perfect’. There does not seem to
have been an auction sale on that date; Sir Thomas Clarke’s
(1703-64) copy with his signature.
PRINTING IN BELORUS
114 LITURGIES. Slavonic. Chasoslov
[Horologion or Book of Hours.]
8vo (155 x 90mm.) ff. [4], 178, 14 lines plus headline,
title within a woodcut border of the stem of Jesse,
woodcuts in text, including a full-page cut of the
Cross and the Lamb of God, contemporary (?)
Russian binding of brown calf over wooden boards,
uper cover tooled in silver with a centre-piece
within a panelled border, lower cover tooled with
4 impressions of a vertical roll, spine decorated, one
leaf with a brownish stain.
Kutein (Belorus): Press of the Monastery of the Epiphany,
1695 £900
The Press at Kutein in Belorus existed from the 1630s
and a number of books were produced there, including
grammars and dictionaries, some of which are to be found
in UK and at Trinity College, Dublin (from Narcissus
Marsh). This service book is unrecorded. Halenchanka,
H. I A., and others. Kniha Belarusi, 1517-1917, Minsk, 1986,
does not record this edition, or anything so late from this
press. A Chasoslov in 8vo dated 1697 is recorded (op. cit
no. 181) but from a completely different press at Mogilev.
Provenance: Bought at an early 18th-century auction sale
(N 1651), like a number of other books in the collection;
Macclesfield South Library 162.A.20. There are some notes
in Russian on the back paste-down.
A.S. Zernova, Knigi kirillovskoi pechati (Moscow, 1958), no.
462, which has the same format but 135 leaves in toto,
15 lines etc., but which is dated October 1694. There is
also another edition dated 1700 (op. cit 497). Cf. also I.V.
Pozdeeva & al. Katalog knigi kirillscheskoi pechati XVI-XVII
cent. (Moscow, 1980) no. 588.
Provenance: Included in an auction sale (N 1656) early
18th-century (for the acquisition of Slavonic books by Sir
Hans Sloane at this period see Cleminson p. xxxvii).
116 LIVIUS, Titus. Historiarum ab urbe
condita, libri, qui extant, XXXV. Cum
universae historiae epitomis, a Carolo Sigonio
emendati: cuius etiam scholia simul eduntur, etc.
2 parts folio (335 x 230mm.) ff. [4], 1-429, 428-430,
433-478; 98, [40], calf, title-leaf mounted, scholia
bound first.
Venice: P. Manutius, 1555 £1000
The first of Sigonio’s editions of Livy, the text based on the
Basel recension. This edition was several times reprinted
and became the textus receptus. Carlon Sigonio’s work on
Livy and on Roman political life was amongst the most
important of the sixteenth century (see W. W. McCuaig
Carlo Sigonio etc., Princeton UP, 1989).
Renouard 166.15; UCLA 47.
117 LIVIUS, Titus. Historiarum… libri, qui
extant, XXXV. Cum… epitomis. Adiunctis
scholijs Caroli Sigonii… Secunda editio.
2 parts folio (318 x 205mm.) [52], 399, [1]; 107, [1],
later calf, f. 70 with small stain, the odd leaf slightly
browned, light marginal dampstaining on ff. 140141, some margins washed near beginning with
traces of annotations.
[Niccolo Bevilaqua] for P. Manutius, 1566 £1000
The identification of the printer is given in McCuaig op. cit.
p. 59 no. 172, where reference is given to correspondence.
Here the index is bound first.
115 LITURGIES. Slavonic. Mesyatcheslov (Svyatyi).
Renouard 202. 19; UCLA 769 (imperfect).
12mo (155 x 90mm.) ff. 130 (quire H has 10 leaves,
not 12) 15/16 lines, printed in red and black, woodcut
head-piece on first leaf, contemporary (?) Russian
sheep over wooden boards, blind-stamped centrepiece ornament on covers, binding loose.
Moscow: [J. & P. Adrian?], [1694?] £800
118 LLWYD, Humphrey. Commentarioli
Britannicae descriptionis fragmentum.
Apparently unrecorded edition of this calendar, but cf.
8vo (153 x 94mm.) ff. [8], 79 [=78], [2(blank)], eighteenth century smooth calf, gilt spine, without the
final blanks.
Cologne: J. Birckmann, 1572 £800
First edition of Llwyd’s geographical and historical
55
description of ancient Britain. It is prefixed by his farewell
letter to the cartographer Abraham Ortelius dated from
Denbigh 30 August 1568 (the original dated 3o (tertio)
August is in the National Library of Wales) and ends with a
short Welsh vocabulary. An English translation by Thomas
Twyne, The Breuiary of Britayne, was published in 1573.
Humphrey Llwyd (1527-1568), was personal physician to
the Earl of Arundel for 15 years but returned to his home
town, Denbigh, in 1563. He was M.P. for East Grinstead
1559 and Denbigh 1563-67. He was also a noted antiquary
and the manuscript of this work was sent to Ortelius by
Llwyd from his deathbed, together with a map of England,
a map of England and Wales and one of Wales.
Shaaber, Check of Works of British Authors Printed Abroad, in
Languages other than English, to 1641, L335; VD16 L2153;
Libri Walliae no. 3313.
119 LOREDANO, Bernardino. In M. Tullii Ciceronis orationes de
lege agraria contra P. Servilium Rullum
tribunum pl. commentarius [with the text].
4to (200 x 150m.) 297, [3]pp., contemporary limp
vellum, ms. guards.
Venice: Paulus Manutius, July 1558 £500
Loredan was a member of a famous patrician family of
Venice, son of Andrea Loredan, and author of this single
work, which is dedicated to Girolamo Grimani (1496 –
April 1570) an important figure in Ventian politics. The
commentary is extremely detailed, and takes each of the
three orations separately, discussing verbal and historical
aspects.
There are quotations in Greek from Demosthenes,
Strabo, and others, and use is made of Latin inscriptions
to explicate the text. On p. 8 there is a quotation from
Quintilian book 2, where Quintilian quotes 8 lines from
Aristotle’s Rhetorica in Greek. This had been first printed in
1508 by Aldus père. These lines are printed in a larger type
than that used elsewhere in the volume (Gk6, see UCLA
p. 439 where the passage is reproduced). This type here
used for the first time by Aldus (Grand Augustin cut by
Granjon) was also used in the aborted 1559 edition in
Greek of Dionysius of Halicarnassus Judicium de Thucydide,
of which there are copies in Paris (see H. Omont in Revue
des études grecques) and Eton.
UCLA 535; Renouard 174:8.
120 LOUIS XIV, King of France.
Recueil de lettres, pour servir
d’éclaircissement à l’histoire militaire du
regne de Louis XIV [ed. Henri Griffet S.J.]
MAGGS
8 volumes 12mo (170 x 95mm.) contemporary
French mottled calf, gilt spines, red edges.
The Hague, et se trouve à Paris; A. Boudet, 1760 -64
£600
Henri Griffet (1698-1771) was from Moulins and entered
the Jesuits in 1712. A successful preacher, on the suppression
of the Jesuits in France, he left France for Brussels. He
was the author of a number of historical works.
Cioranescu 32399; Sommervogel iii, 1819.
121 LOWNDES, Thomas. Brine-Salt
improved: or, the method of making salt
from brine, that shall be as good or better than
French Bay-Salt.
4to 38, [2] pp. A few occasional spots and some
minor browning in places.
London: for S. Austen 1746 £800
Bound with:
LOWNDES, Thomas. A seasonable hint for
our pilchard and coast fishery: or a letter of
advice to the brine-salt proprietors of GreatBritain and Ireland. 4to 31, [1] pp., crease
across the centre of each leaf (possibly done
in the press), some occasional light spotting
in places. London: for W. Sandby, 1748.
2 works in 1 volume 4to, contemporary vellum
backed marbled boards, spine labelled in manuscript
(corners very slightly bumped, some foxing to the
flyleaves and slight off-setting from the bookplate).
Lowndes spent, in his own words, “ten of the best years
of [my] life, and no inconsiderable sum of money” on
a method to improve the bad quality of English salt.
Although his specimens were approved by the Royal
College of Physicians, the admiralty refused his terms. In
June 1746 the House of Commons petitioned the King to
instruct the admiralty to accept his terms and in September
of the same year he published the first pamphlet in this
volume. He died only a few weeks after the publication
of the second work, on 12 May 1748.
ESTC records: BL, Bodley, Queens’ College - Cambridge,
LSE, Worcester College - Oxford; Columbia, Harvard,
WACM, Illinois).
122 LYCOPHRON. Alexandra. Cum…
Isaaci Tzetzis commentariis… Adiuncta
est interpretatio versuum latina, ad verbum,
per Gulielmum Canterum. Additae sunt…
annotationes, necnon epitome Cassandrae
graecolatina, carmine anacreontico.
4to (225 x 150mm.) [16], 211, 59pp., nineteenthcentury blind-stamped calf by Hatton of Manchester
(with ticket), slight marginal worming as far as quire
C, small hole in blank part of title-leaf.
Geneva [stamped in]: P. Estienne, 1601 £550
In the dedication to Denys Godefroy, Paul Estienne
explains that he is publishing this volume as a companion
to Pindar, that at the next Frankfurt fair he will publish
Canter’s Euripides, and that for the moment he has been
obliged to omit the commentary on Lycophron of Jan van
Meurs or Meursius, which he had obtained either from
books already printed, or from his fathers own notes. He
has however added Canter’s commentary on Lycophron’s
Cassandra.
Lycophron’s Alexandra is a difficult and obscure piece
of 1474 iambic trimeters, which, as the author of the
review of the latest Budé edition (2008) remarks, can
only be read with a commentary, and even then is, to put
it mildly, obscure. Apart from the arcane information
therein contained, and contained also in the Byzantine
commentary of John Tzetzes, the work has little or no
literary merit. Here the poem has been lineated, and each
page divided into sections. There are a few notes written
in a small hand, mostly correcting the text, e.g. pp. 37, 67,
69, 115, 142 149, 164.
123 LE CORDIER, Samson. Instruction
des pilotes ou traité des latitudes, contenant
les tables de la déclinaison du soleil, et des
plus reconnaissables & plus claires étoiles du
firmament… Neuvieme édition… Seconde partie.
[8], 177, 3, [2]pp., (sig.[*4], A-L8, M5), last leaf with
privilege slightly torn, pp.1-3 at end with “Catalogue
des livres et cartes marines”.
Le Havre: veuve de Jacques Hubault, 1708 £1400
Bound with:
DARY, Michael. The general doctrine of
equation… in three chapters; concerning
the invention reduction solution of an
equation. 16pp., a few page numbers
shaved. London: for the author, 1664.
Wing D276 (3copies only).
Bound with:
MARROIS, Jean. Traité succint de la
trigonométrie géométrique aux triangles
rectilignes sans les sinus. Par une maniere
générale, laquelle donne la vraye proportion,
& grandeur des costés d’un triangle, soit en
longitude, ou en puissance. [6], 48pp., some
cropping of headline. Orléans: Cl. & J. Borde, 1647.
3 works in one volume, 8vo (154 x 100mm.), eighteenth century half calf, spine gilt in compartments,
red morocco lettering-piece, red edges.
Samson Le Cordier (Havre 1647-1709 Dieppe), taught
hydrography at Dieppe, and first published this little
book in 1683. It was still in print in the mid-eighteenth
century. This edition prints the second part only (cf.
J. Polak, Bibliographie maritime française, Grenoble, 1976,
no. 5566). Pages [iii-v] of the prelims contain an Avis from
the Archbishop of Rouoen reducing the number of Saints
days in the calendar to those listed in order to try to obviate
unruly behaviour.
Michael Dary ‘philomath’ was the author of a number
of works, all of them rare or uncommon. He was known
to John Collins, the mathematician whose books and
papers came into the Macclesfield library. Marrois
taught mathematics to a wide variety of students from
all over Europe from the 1630s until the 1660s. In 1632
he published with René Frémont at Orléans his Traité
de la méthode de nombre ou de la numération, in 1644
with Hotot Premier livre des élémens de mathématiques,
and this third work in 1647. In some totally exaggerated
verses he is addressed as: “Archimède nouveau, vivant
portrait d’Euclide, /“Oronce déguisé, Galilé de nos temps,
/“Copernic de nos jours, le Tycho de nos ans, /“Ptolémé
revenu pour nous servir de guide. “
Cf. the short article by H. Tranchau ‘Jean Marrois professeur de mathématiques à Orléans et son Album amicorum
quelques mots sur d’autres albums français et allemands’ in
Mémoires de la société archéologique et historique de l’Orléanais,
vol. 22 (1889) pp. 499-534). KVK lists copies at Weimar
and Paris Ste Geneviève only.
57
124 MACHIAVELLI, Niccolò. Discourses upon the First decade of
T. Livius, translated out of the Italian. To
which is added his Prince: with some marginal
animadversions noting and taxing his
errors. By. E[dward]. D[acres]. The second
edition much corrected & amended.
8vo [171 x 110 mm]. [24], 686, [2] pp; engraved
frontispiece portrait of Machiavelli by R. White.
Contemporary mottled calf, gilt ornament in the
spine panels, marbled edges (spine label missing).
London: for Charles Harper, and John Amery, 1674
£1000
This translation of the Discourses was first published in
1636 and reprinted in 1663 with Dacres’s translation of
The Prince and The Life of Castruccio Castracani of Lucca
(which had also previously appeared separately in 1640)
making this the third edition in English of The Prince
and the second collected edition of these works.
Wing M135A. This is the scarcer of two issues of 1674 (the
other adds Thomas Burrell and William Hensman to the
list of booksellers).
125 MACPHERSON, James. Original
Papers; containing the secret history
of Great Britian, from the Restoration to
the accession of the House of Hannover.
To which are prefixed extracts from the
Life of James II. As written by himself.
2 volumes 4to (270 x 200mm.) contemporary tree
calf, covers with a gilt border, spines with elaborate
gilt tooling and red morocco labels, gilt edges and
original green ribbon markers (joints slightly worn,
upper head-caps chipped, edges a little rubbed),
some slight spotting to the title-page of the first
volume and very occasional spotting throughout.
London: W. Strahan and T. Cadell, 1775 £1000
First edition and a handsome set. An enormous and
handsome collection of state papers, letters and speeches
relating to the Stuarts and Hanoverians. The editor
Macpherson (1736-96) is, of course, the celebrated ‘author’
of the poems of Ossian, a work which had truly European
repercussions.
The Stuart papers ‘consist of the collection of Mr.
Nairne [Sir David Nairne 1655-1740], who was undersecretary, from the Revolution to the end of the year
1713…The latter comprehend the material part of the
correspondence and secret negotiations of the house of
Hannover, their agents and their friends in Britain… The
MAGGS
extracts from the life of King james III… were partly taken
by the late Mr. Thomas Carte (bap. 1686, d. 1754) [and were
in print], and partly by the Editor… Mr. Nairne’s papers
came into the possession of Mr. Carte…’. Macpherson says
he consulted the mss. in the Scots College in Paris, but
that ‘the originals are now in the hands of the bookseller’.
[See inside back cover for photo of binding].
126 [MACQUER, Pierre Joseph]. A dictionary of chemistry. Containing
the theory and practice of that science; its
application to natural philosophy… and the
fundamental principles of the arts, trades,
and manufactures, dependent on chemistry.
Translated from the French. With notes and
additions by the translator [James Keir].
4to (270 x 215 mm)[4], vi, [2 (“Advertisement”; verso
blank), xii, 888 pp; engraved “Table of Chemical
Characters”; two engraved plates: 11 figures of glass
retorts; 17 figures of furnaces; one letterpress “Table
of Affinities… By Mr. Geoffroy”; lacking the second
“Table of Affinities… by Mr. Gellert”, contemporary
light brown calf, morocco label (very short crack at
the foot of the upper joint; lower headcap torn-away).
London: for S. Bladon, 1771 £500
First edition in English. ‘The Work… contains a very
extensive knowledge of chemical history, facts, and
opinions, and exact descriptions of the operations and
instruments of chemistry. The facts and operations are
well and fully explained, so far as the present state of
chemical knowledge permits [e.g. there is a long entry
on phlogiston but not one of oxygen]. The author has
farther rendered his work of very extensive utility, as
well as curiosity, by the applications which he has made
of Chemistry to Natural History, Medicine, Pharmacy,
Metallurgy, and all the numerous arts and trades, the
operations of which depend on chemical principles.’ (from
the preface).
127 MACROBIUS Ambrosius Theodosius. In Somnium Scipionis lib. II.
Saturnaliorum lib. VII.
8vo (165 x 104mm.) 567, [73]pp., device on title-page,
contemporary limp vellum, yapp edges, lacking ties.
Lyons: S. Gryphius, 1556 £550
Baudrier viii, 284-285.
128 MANNINGHAM, Henry. A Complete
Treatise of Mines: extracted from the
Memoires d’artillerie [by Pierre Surirey
de Saint-Remy]. To which is prefixed, by
way of introduction, Professor Bellidor’s
Dissertation on the force and physical effects
of gunpowder. Illustrated by a great variety
of copper-plates. The second edition.
8vo (207 x 128mm.) xix, [i], 168 pp., engraved
arms of General Sir John Ligonier at the head
of the dedication, 21 folding engraved plates,
contemporary calf, covers mottled with browns and
reds, gilt spine (joints rubbed and edges, upper
joint cracked at the head, upper headcap broken),
preliminary leaves spotted, light offsetting from
the plates.
London: for A Millar, 1756 £500
First published in 1752. Manningham, in his preface,
states that “as there is now a Demand for a second Edition
of this Tract, I have made it my Business, not only to
correct it from such Inaccuracies, as might have escaped
my notice in the former Publication; but to render it still
more entertaining and useful, have given it this singular
Advantage: That it brings into View with it those excellent
Dissertations of the famous Marshal de Valliere and
Professor Belidor, as Matters of real Consequence to the
important Subject under consideration.” It seems likely
that the both editions were small ones. The dedication to
General Sir John Ligonier is signed by Manningham, but
it is clear from the preface signed ‘The Translator’ that
the work is a tissue of translations from Pierre Surirey de
Saint-Rémy whose Mémoires d’artillerie first published in
1702, had recently (1745) been enlarged in a Paris edition
of 1745 (cf. Sloos 07356).
129 MANUZIO, Antonio, editor. Viaggi
fatti da Vinetia, alla Tana, in Persia, in
India et in Costantinopoli etc. (by various
authors, ed. with a preface by Antonio Manuzio).
8vo (145 x 90mm.) contemporary vellum over
pasteboard, lettered in ink on spine (Voyages), f.
168 damaged with loss of text (some supplied in
ms.), tear in f. 169 with slight loss.
Venice: (figliuoli di Aldo), 1543 £1500
The authors are Josaphat Barbaro and Ambrogio
Contarini, both Venetian merchants, whose accounts of
their travels in Persia are here printed or reprinted, and
Luigi di Giovanni, who journeyed into India. There are
also two anonymous works. The book precedes Ramusio
(who reprinted several of these tracts). A second edition
was published in 1545.
Göllner 822; UCLA 317; Renouard 128 no. 8; Censimento
CNCE 26947.
Provenance: Etienne Baluze (1630-1718).
130 MARTINEZ DE ESPINAR, Alonso.
Arte de ballesteria y monteria.
4to (192 x 134mm.) ff. [17], 252, lacking all prelims
and the engr. plates, eighteenth-century English
calf, gilt spine, red edges.
[Madrid: Imprenta real 1644] £550
Palau 154967. The plates should be as follows: added
engraved allegorical title-page, engraved portraits of
the author, and Prince Balthasar Carlos of Spain, and 5
engraved plates, several signed by Juan de Noort.
An uncommon book. Copies at BL, NLS, London University; Vienna ONB, 2 copies in Germany and 4 in Spain
(some imperfect), with a few copies in USA (Yale, Harvard,
Huntington (imperfect) etc.)
131 MENNENS, Frans. Militarium
ordinum origines, statuta, symbola, et
insignia, iconibus, additis genuinis. Hac editione
multorum ordinum… accessione locupletata. etc.
4to (203 x 148mm.) 12, 120pp., printed in 2 columns,
woodcut illustrations, late eighteenth-century English tree calf, spine gilt, yellow edges.
Macerata: P. Salvioni for F. Manolessi, 1623 £800
Frans Mennens (1582-1635) Originally published at Cologne
in 1613, this edition is dedicated by the publisher Manolessi
to Antonio Barberini, the pope’s nephew. The imprint
reads: ‘Coloniae Agrippinae, et denuo Maceratae, apud
Petrum Salvionum… ad instantiam Francisci Manulessii
bibliopolae Anconitani’.
Bodley (Ashmole 563) only of this edition in UK, which is
very uncommon outside Italy (where 9 copies are recorded).
The work was more than once reprinted at Cologne.
132 MIRANDOLA, Giovanni Pico. Opera.
2 volumes in one, folio (320 x 200mm.) [60], 519,
[1];[80], 890, [2]pp., last leaf in part 2 with device
on verso, English 17th-century brown calf.
Basle: S. Henricpetri, 1601 £600
VD17 1:046797W.
59
133 MISHNA. BABA QAMA. Baba’ Qama’… de legibus Ebraeorum
liber singularis… commentariis illustratus
per Constaninum L’ Empereur ab Opwyck.
London: printed for J. Tonson: and sold by Thomas
Combes, at the Bible and Dove in Pater-Noster-Row;
and James Lacy, at the Ship between the Two Temple
Gates, Fleetstreet, 1722 £900
4to (195 x 145mm.) [4], 306, [22]pp., text in Hebrew
letter (square & Rabbinic), notes etc. in Arabic, Syriac
[etc.], contemporary vellum, lacking ties.
Leiden: ex off. Elzeviriorum, 1637 £500
First edition in English. Montesquieu’s Lettres persanes
were first published in French with the false imprint
‘Cologne: P. Marteau’, the book actually being printed
in the Netherlands. This édition originale contains 150
letters. The number was augmented in the second edition
of the same year (with the same imprint) but 13 letters
were suppressed, and the actual number of letters is
therefore 140. There are this number of letters in this
English translation, which must have been made from
the second edition.
This edition is, according to ESTC, uncommon, as
indeed are all five editions up to 1736. John Ozell (d. 1743,
see ODNB) translated Fénélon, Boileau, Vertot, Madame
Dacier’s Homer, and many other French writers, as well
as revising the translation of Don Quixote.
A handsome copy of this the treatise called ‘The first gate’
which deals with civil matters under Jewish law.
Steinschneider 1539; Willems 459.
134 MOLINIER, Etienne. [Les politiques chrestiennes] A mirrour
for christian states… Translated into English,
by William Tyrwhit, Sen. Esquire.
4to (182 x 130mm.) [24], 361 [=359 (pp. 217-218
omitted)], [1]pp., short tear in the title affecting one
letter, title and dedication slightly short at the foremargin. Contemporary sheep, red edges (rubbed,
slightly scuffs).
London: by Thom[as]. Harper, 1635 £550
A very nice, crisp copy. The work was originally published
in French in 1621, and this English translation, dedicated
to James Stewart, Duke of Lennox, is by William Tyrwhit
was made as a book for those not understanding French
and ‘yet desirous to enable and adorn themselves with
those vertues and qualities requisite for such who by an
honest and noble ambition doe any way ayme to be rightly
usefull for the service of our Soveraigne…’ The work in its
English guise (reissued in 1636) clearly has a monarchist
aim, and the abbé Bremond speaks highly of the chapters
on the use of eloquence in the use of the state. Tyrwhit
also translated book I of the letters of Guez de Balzac.
Molinier (d. 1650), a priest from Toulouse, where he
published various volumes of sermons, also wrote Le lis
du Val de Garaison (1630), a work on a local Marian shrine
of some celebrity, as Louis XIV was taken there by his
mother for a cure. This went through several editions.
STC 18003.
135 [MONTESQUIEU Charles de
Secondat, Baron de]. Persian letters.
translated by Mr. Ozell.
2 volumes 12mo (150 x 85mm.) [1-2], [4], [3]712(=271), [17]; 309, [15]p., final leaf blank,
contemporary calf, gilt fillet on covers, a few leaves
slightly foxed.
MAGGS
136 MORE, Alexandre. Poemata.
[4], 176pp., device on title and p. [50]
Paris: O. de Varennes, 1669
£600
Bound with:
LUCRETIUS CARUS, Titus. De rerum natura
libri sex, etc. (ed. T. Le Fevre). [16], 522pp., title
printed in red and black, Saumur: J. Lenier, 1662.
2 works in one volume. 4to (236 x 166mm.) contemporary vellum, mottled edges.
Alexandre More (1616-1670) was French on his mother’s
side and was born at Castres, the home town of Fermat the
mathematician. His father was a Scottish presbyterian. In
July 1649 he had been forced to flee Geneva for immorality.
He had gone to Middleburg in Holland where he later
seduced and made pregnant an English maid called
Garret in the Salmasius household. His moral improbity
was therefore well-known and made him the butt of an
unknown wit who used the root ‘morus’ in several ways to
lampoon him: ‘Who will deny, Pontia, that the Frenchman
More has slept with you and left you pregnant? Who will
deny that your well placed lingering [bene moratam] has
left you carrying more [morigeram]?’ (The epigram is
printed in Parker Milton (1968) i, 423.)
More’s work and character was known to John Milton,
and shades of More therefore enter the Milton-Salmasius
controversy. This elegantly printed work contains More’s
long hexameter poem on Christ’s Nativity (pp. 3-49),
preceded by his sapphic ‘Hymnus in Christum’, both,
of course, echoing the subject of one of Milton’s famous
poems. Given the well-rehearsed nature of the story, it
would be surprising if verbal echoes were not found.
Most of the poems are addressed to contemporary
scholars and public figures, some of them English. Some
of the poems are epicedia, for example those on the death
of Giovanni Diodati (Milton’s friend), Roger Townshend,
and a few are epithalamia. Amongst those addressed
are Charles Dormer Lord Carnarvon, John Cecil Lord
Burghley and Marquis of Exeter, the Florentine Carlo
Dati, Francesco Turretini, the Geneva theologian, the
librarian Lucas Holstein, the erudite Dutch lady Anna
Schurmann, and Willem Pison (1611-1688) whose Historia
naturalis Brasiliae of 1648 is commemorated, as is his patron
Prince Maurice of Nassau.
137 MORIN, Jean Baptiste. La Science
des longitudes de Iean Baptiste
Morin… Reduite en exacte et facile pratique
par luy-mesme, sur le globe celeste…
avec la censure de la nouvelle théorie et
pratique du secret des longitudes du père
Léonard Duliris, Recollet. [8], 62p.
Paris: aux dépens de l’autheur… chez lequel le livre se
vend: ensemble chez Iacques Villery, libraire, 1647
£2500
Bound with:
Response… a l’Apologie scandaleuse du P.
Leonard Durilis [sic] Recollect, touchant la
science des longitudes; pour les navigations.
88p. Paris: aux dépens de l’autheur… chez lequel
le livre se vend: ensemble chez Iacques Villery,
libraire, et chez Iean le Brun au globe céleste, 1648.
Bound with items 169 & 195 and another item.
5 works in 1 volume 4to (200 x 150mm.) eighteenthcentury mottled calf, gilt spine.
Morin (1583-1656) was, like many other savants of the
period, interested in all manner of things - medicine,
hermeticism, astrology and mathematics, in which last he
held a chair at the Collège royal (de France). Indubitably a
man of learning and talent, his unfortunate approach to
controversy and society (he corresponded with Descartes
and the Minim, Marin Mersenne) did little to endear him
to people. Some aspects of this may be seen here. In his
dedication of the first work to Cardinal Mazarin, Morin
complains of Duliris’s plagiat, and at the end of the second
he lambasts him as a lunatic and sings his own praises as a
‘nom fort bien cogneu dans toute l’Europe & plus loin pour
toutes les sciences des Astres: dont ie rends graces à Dieu’.
There are various mentions in the text of Duliris voyage
to Canada. Leonard Duliris was a Franciscan Recollect
(an order at the time excluded from French territory)
and missionary, who was fascinated by the problems of
how to determine longitude. In 1645 he sailed to Canada,
where he observed the solar eclipse of 24 August, as well
as making some very inaccurate calculations of longitude.
On his return he published La théorie des longitudes Paris,
1647, and it is work which attracts Morin’s ire (see the
article by R.P. Broughton ‘Astronomy in seventeenthcentury Canada’ in JRASC.75. 175B.)
At the end of the first work are advertisements for
other works by Morin available from him at his house. La
Science des longitudes was reissued in 1657 with a cancel
slip pasted over the original imprint (copy at Harvard).
The first work is in BNF, but not the second. COPAC
records copies of first work in UK at BL (which also has
second work) and Cambridge; OCLC records a copy of
both at Madrid.
138 MUZIO, Pio. Considerationi sopra
il primo libro di Cornelio Tacito.
4to (220 x 155mm.) [56], 544, [4]; [36], 360 [4]
pp., eighteenth-century English calf, spine gilt in
compartments, red morocco lettering-piece.
Venice: Marco Ginammi, 1642 £500
Originally published in Brescia in 1623, the work is commentary on Book I of Tacitus Historiae.
139 NANNINI, Remigio. Orationi militari…
da tutti gli historici greci, e latini, etc.
4to (215 x 148mm.) [40], 1004pp., italic letter, eighteenth-century tree calf, gilt spine, red morocco lettering piece, red edges.
Venice: all insegna della Concordia (G.A. Bertano),
1585 £600
A handsome copy of this third edition of Nannini’s
translation of all the ‘battle speeches’ to be found in
Thucydides, Livy, Quintus Curtius, Josephus and other
ancient writers as well as Saxo Grammaticus, Aretino,
Sabellicus, Poggio, Accolti, Bembo, and Machiavelli
(pp. 860-879). The book was first printed in 1557,
reprinted in 1560, 1585, and 1587. Nannini (1521-1580)
was a Dominican who translated and edited a number of
classical or post-classical and medieval writers into Italian,
as well as more modern works by such as Marullus and
Guicciardini.
Bertelli & Innocenti, Bibl. Machiavelliana no. 174.
[See inside back cover for photo of binding].
61
140 NATHANAEL, Hegumen of the Monastery
of St. Michael, Kiev. Kniga o vere edinoi
istinnoi pravoslavnoi [Book of the one true faith].
Folio (310 x 195mm.) f. 1 and 10 printed in red
and black, with large woodcut head-pieces and
ornamental initials, some red printing elsewhere,
contemporary Russian binding of brown blindstamped calf over wooden boards, centre piece in
central panel on upper cover with traces of gilding,
lettered in Slavonic in 2 panels above and below,
brass clasps, a few leaves slightly dusty.
Moscow: 1648 £3000
Zernova (1958) no. 209 (listing 3 copies in Moscow and 2
in St. Petersburg). No copy outside Russia.
Provenance: Bought 1675 in Moscow (inscription in
Russian on front pastedown); In an auction sale(?) early
18th century with no. N 1663; Macclesfield Library (no
bookplate but embossed stamp on first leaf).
141 NEVE, Richard. The city and country
purchaser’s and builder’s dictionary: or, the
complete builder’s guide… The third edition etc.
8vo in 4’s (197 x 120mm.) xvi (incl. frontispiece of
Chiswick House), ff. [192], contemporary smooth
calf, gilt fillet on covers, spine gilt.
London: printed for B.Sprint, D. Browne, J. Osborn, S.
Birt, H. Lintot & A. Wilde, 1736 £600
‘The third [and much enlarged] edition of 1736 is a forced
effort…to out-do the rival two volume Builder’s Dictionary
of 1734’ (Harris p. 332). These included a number of
articles added or adapted from other names sources, items
borrowed from The Builder’s Dictionary, and corrections
or enlargements.
Harris 597.
142 NICOT, Jean. Thrésor de la langue
françoyse tant ancienne que moderne:
auquel entre autres choses sont les mots
propres de marine, venerie, et faulconnerie
cy-devant ramassez par Aimar de Ranconnet…
Reveu et augmenteé en ceste derniere
impression de plus de la moitie; par Jean
Nicot… Avec une grammaire francoyse et
latine, & le recueil des vieux proverbes de la
France. Ensemble le Nomenclator de Iunius,
mits par ordre alphabetic, & creu d’une
table particuliere de toutes les dictions.
MAGGS
4 parts folio (355 x 225mm.) [4], 66[sic-674], [2];
[4], 32; 24; [4], 192, [36] pp., eighteenth century
English calf.
Paris: David Douceur (de l’imprimerie de D. Duval),
1606 £1500
First edition of this important dictionary by Jean Nicot
(ca. 1530-1604) who came from Nîmes, and who gave his
name to the tobacco plant (Nicotiana tabacum), having
introduced the plant into France in 1560 from Portugal
when he was ambassador there (see the entry in this
dictionary).
A diplomat and philologist, friend of Ronsard and
Baif, his work is of immense importance in the study of
the French language. In 1573 Jacques du Puys published
the Dictionnaire françois-latin (itself based on an earlier
Estienne Latin dictionary goping back to 1539) which
includes observations by ‘M. Nicot Conseillier du Roy &
Maistre de Requestes de l’hostel’, which increased the
size of the book over the earlier edition (1564) by more
than a third. By the time Nicot died in 1604, he had been
connected with the dictionary for more than 30 years. This
work was seen as documenting the French language from
an historical standpoint and what Wooldridge (p. 35) calls
‘réforme thérapeutique de la langue,’ a not uncommon
feature of French linguistic activity.
Also included (with separate title-pages and pagination)
are: Jean Masset’s ‘Exact et tres-facile acheminement a
la langue francois’ the ‘Nomenclator octolinguis’ (which
excludes English) of Adrien Du Jon (Junius), together
with ‘Adagiorum Gallis vulgarium, in lepidos et emunctos
latinae linguae versiculos traductio’ of Jean Gilles of Noyers
(24p), originally published in Troyes in 1519 as%Proverbia
Gallicana. This work is generally attributed to the abbot
of Clairvaux, Jean de la Véprie, but translated into Latin
verse and edited by Gilles.
Wooldridge (pp. 61-62; 1.7.2.) gives a census of copies
but this is by no means complete. As might be expected,
the book is to be found in all major libraries.
T.R. Wooldridge Les débuts de la lexicographie française
Estienne, Nicot et le Thresor… Toronto etc., 1978.
143 NONIUS MARCELLUS. Nonii
Marcelli [De compendiosa doctrina]
nova editio. Additus est libellus Fulgentii
de prisco sermone, & notae in Nonium
& Fulgentium [ed. Josias Mercier].
8vo (170 x 105mm.) [16], 212, [4], 568pp., device
on title-page, re-used vellum (plain chant ms.) over
pasteboard, loose (sewing bands to covers broken).
Sedan: A. Perier, 1614 £550
Nonius Marcellus, a North African writer of the 4th century AD, is an important source for Latin lexicography,
inasmuch as he preserves quotations from lost writings. In
the preface Mercier, whose work on Nonius is still highly
regarded, speaks of various manuscripts used, most
importantly a copy made 30 years previously of manuscript
in the library of S. Victoire, Paris, another (imperfect)
which belonged to the jurist Cujas, and a third belonging
to Nicolas Fabre. He had, he tells us (a3verso) some 28
years earlier handed the copy to the Paris printer [Gilles]
Beys, who had every intention of beginning it, but the
French Wars of religion intervening, he had abandoned
the project, and returned the manuscript to Mercier, who
had managed to rescue it from the wreck of his own library,
and eventually prepared it for the press ‘in hoc rusticano
otio’. Beys did print Junius edition of these texts in 1583.
This edition appears with Paris and Sedan as place of
publication, although Paris is where it was printed. The
text was first printed by Lauer in Rome in about 1470
(Goff N253.)
See Roudaut, François. Jean (c. 1525-1570) et Josias (c. 15601626) Mercier: l’amour de la philologie à la Renaissance et au
début de l’âge classique: actes du colloque d’Uzès (2 et 3 mars
2001). Paris: Champion, 2006.
Provenance: signature on verso of title-page of Otto
Heurnius (1577-1652) Dutch scholar.
144 NORRIS, Richard, Mariner.
[Caption title.] The manner of finding of
the true sum of the infinite secants of an arch,
by an infinite series. Which being found and
compared with the sum of the secants found,
by adding of the secants of whole minutes…
from a table of natural secants, do plainly
demonstrate that Mr Edward Wright’s nautical
planisphere is not a true projection of the sphere.
4to (190 x 145mm.)16pp., some leaves cropped at
bottom, lacking plate, disbound.
London: printed by Thomas James for the author,
1685 £650
Recorded in four copies, one at the British library (with
the plate) and three in Bodley.
battle scene on p. 125; in part 2 full-page woodcuts
of a battering-ram on p. 74, a siege-tower (p. 82),
mechanical bows (p. 86 & 88) and smaller woodcuts
of a siege-tower and a galley (p. 78 & 79), late 18thcentury English polished calf, single gilt fillet,
ornamental gilt spine, yellow edges.
Paris: (S. Prevosteau for) A. Saugrain & Guillaume des
Rues, (December) 1598. £2200
Onosander‘s treatise on the education of a general dates
from the reign of the emperor Claudius, and from the
late 15th century (Rome, 1494; Goff S-344) had circulated
in the Latin version of Sagundinus. Joachim Camerarius
had also made a version, based on a faulty Greek text,
published by his sons in 1595. This the Editio princeps of
the Greek text is dedicated to Henri IV of France, and is
founded upon two manuscripts from the Medici library
and one which may have been used by Camerarius, all of
which Rigault had used and collated. When all the work
had been done, he was told that the French scholar Federic
Morel had a further manuscript, and Rigault says he was
obliged to start again for the fourth time.
The Greek and Latin text is printed in parallel
columns, the former handsomely printed in the Grecs
du Roi. Urbicius’s (or Orbicius) extremely short treatise
on how Roman imperial infantry can defeat Barbarian
mounted archers, was written in the reign of the emperor
Anastasius AD 491-518.
The Latin errata have all be corrected in a neat hand
in part 1. On p. 123 (Urbicius) is a 10-line marginal note
in a 17th-century hand) reading ek rh matwn and not
‘eu r e matwn’ and ‘ekteq eisa i’ and not ektethe?? (with a
reference to Saumaise’s note on Spartianus in Hist. Aug.
scriptores, p. 83 of the 1671 Leiden 8vo Variorum edition).
Some copies are dated 1599. The privilege is dated
30.12.1598.
JEAN BODIN’S FIRST WORK
146 OPPIAN (OPPIANUS). Kunhg etikwn
b iblia tessa ra . De venatione libri IIII.
[ed. J. Bodin].
ff. [38] Paris: M. Vascosan, 1549 £1550
Bound with:
145 ONOSANDER. Strathg ikoV. Sive de
imperatoris institutione. Accessit Ou r b ikiou
epith d eu ma. Nicolaus Rigaltius… publicavit,
latina interpretatione & notis illustravit.
Ibid. De venatione libri IIII. Ioan. Bodino
Andevagensi interprete… His accessit
commentarius, etc. ff. [4], 42, [2], 43-110, dampstained at end, last leaf somewhat damaged
with loss of text Paris: M. Vascosan, 1555.
2 parts 4to (250 x 175mm.) 19, [1], 160 [=161],
[3(blank); [8] 69 [i.e. 96]p., full-page woodcut of a
2 works in 1 volume 4to (220 x 155mm.) contemporary
limp vellum 1549-1555.
63
The Greek poet Oppian wrote on Fishing (Halieutica, an
important work for our knowledge of Greek fishes) and
hunting with dogs (Cynegetica) both of which works had
a huge popularity in France. First printed together in
1517 by Aldus, although Musurus had edited Halieutica
with Giunta two years earlier, this Greek text is a straight
reprint from the Aldine text. The Greek type used is that
designed by Colines. The Latin translation by Lippius of
Halieutica first appeared in 1478, and was reprinted in
the 16th century more than once, including 1555 in an
edition which also included an anonymous word for word
version of Cynegetica, but Bodin’s version of Cynegetica is
the first verse translation into hexameters.
The translation and commentary (which shews massive
reading, including the recent (1552) commentary of
Brodaeus) form the first work of the young Jean Bodin,
born in 1530, and later famous for his works on political
philosophy and sorcery. The translation is dedicated to
the Bishop of Angers, Gabriel Bouvery (bishop 1540-1572).
The bifolium signed * (Ioannes Bodinus candico
lectori) in the second work is clearly meant, from the
catchword ‘COMMENTARIUS fol. 43’ to be located there,
although sometimes found at the end of the prelims.
149 POIGNARD, François Guillaume. Traité des quarrés sublimes contrenant
des methodes generales, toutes nouvelles
& faciles, pour faire les sept quarrés
planétaires et tous autre à l’infini, par des
nombres, en toutes sortes de progressions.
147 OXFORD UNIVERSITY. Pietas
universitatis Oxoniensis in obitum
serenissimi regis Georgii II. Et gratulatio in
augustissimi regis Georgii III. inaugurationem.
Oblong folio [4], 352 pp. (large few pages with a
vertical crease). Contemporary boards lined with
light-blue paper, sheepskin spine; uncut (spine dried
out and worn, upper joint split but cords firm).
London: for the Author, and sold by J. Knapton, 1759 £600
Folio (375 x 238mm.) ff. [2], [116], 3 engraved
vignettes, contemporary panelled morocco.
Oxford: e typographeo Clarendoniano, 1761£900
Verses in English (most), Latin, Greek (without accents),
Hebrew, Arabic, Syriac.
148 PERSIUS FLACCUS, Aulus. Satyrarum
liber I. D. Iunii Iuuenalis satyrarum lib. V.
Sulpiciae satyra I. Cum veteribus commentarijs
nunc primum editus. E bibliotheca P. Pithoei, etc.
8vo (160 x 97mm.) [12], 302, [10]pp., device on title,
last leaf of prelims blank, eighteenth-century smooth
calf, gilt double fillet on covers, spine gilt.
Paris: M. Patisson, in officina R. Stephani, 1585£600
This is the first proper edition of Persius and Juvenal, and
includes the ancient scholia. The two poets are edited from
a 9th century manuscript from Lorsch, now in Montpellier
(Montpellier MS.125). Part of Juvenal has been heavily
annotated (? by Casaubon) but the notes are now very
faint indeed, having possibly been washed.
Renouard, Estienne p. 186; Schreiber 258.
MAGGS
4to (190 x 145mm.) [6], 79, [1]pp., disbound.
Brussels: Guillaume Fricx, 1704 £600
This work on magic squares by the abbé Poignard was, we
are told, a popular work. ‘In recreational mathematics, a
magic square of order n is an arrangement of n2 numbers,
usually distinct integers, in a square, such that the n
numbers in all rows, all columns, and both diagonals
sum to the same constant. A magic square contains the
integers from 1 to n2. The term “magic square” is also
sometimes used to refer to any of various types of word
square’.(Wikipedia).
Copies in BNF, Warburg Inst., UCL. Not in OCLC.
150 POSTLETHWAYT (James, F.R.S.).
The history of the public revenue, from
the Revolution in 1688, to Christmas 1753, etc.
“This work gained a considerable reputation during the
second half of the eighteenth century as an authority
for writers on the subject, containing as it did detailed
summaries of annual supply, grants, and sinking fund
accounts, together with short statements on ‘the historical
state of the Bank of England and ‘of the South-Sea
Company’. It appears to have been extensively used by
Sir James Steuart in Principles of Political Economy (1767;
bk 4, pt 4, chap. 5) and Adam Smith in The Wealth of
Nations (1776; bk 5, chap. 3) and it remains one of the
more valuable sources on the financial history of Great
Britain for the period which it covers (ODNB).
ESTC records numerous copies but it is scarce in commerce
(the last copies recorded as sold at auction were in 1982
& 1991).
151 PRAETORIUS [SCHULZE], Johann. De suspecta poli declinatione et
eccentricitate firmamenti vel ruina coeli, Ultro
citroque ventilata Materia, potissimum tamen
heic contra Domin. Mariam, Astrolog. 2. D.
Gregor. Francum, Theol. Calvin. & 3. Illic
contra Childraeum Britann. in Ephemerid.
curios. directa, cum inserta simili dissertatione
parastatae nostri Joh. Adolphi Tassii, & explicata
capacitate montium, contra Linemannum &
Caesonem Grammium, &c. Ex privatis scriniis…
communicata a M. Johanne Praetorio, P.L.C.
4to (208 x 160mm.) 239, [1]pp., eighteenth century
English calf, spine gilt.
Leipzig: C. Michaelis, 1675 £1500
An uncommon work, written in Latin,and an extraordinary
mixture of science, theology, pseudo-science, mythology
and history, all piled one upon the other with elaborate
references to multifarious sources ancient and modern
and with (sometimes) extensive quotations in German.
The author is much addicted to acrostichs and on p. 150,
where there is a discussion of explorations beyond the
columns of Hercules (Straights of Gibraltar), there is
one reading AMERICA, followed by a discussion as to
whether America was the Atlantis of the Ancients. Indeed
on p. 151 there is an opinion cited that Noah was born
in America (‘Lescarbotus Noachum in America natum,
eamque post diluvium recepisse potius, quam accepisse
adfirmare non veretur…’ i.e. Lescarbot is not afraid to
affirm that Noah was born in America, and that it was
America which received him back rather than accepted
him’) Lescarbot is, of course, the author of Histoire de la
nouvelle France, 1607.
Faber du Faur (no. 646sqq.) describes many of the works
of this extraordinary author Hans Schulze 91630-1680)
who wrote under the name of Praetorius, but not this.
VD17 39:121428R; there is a copy in the BL in the UK,
but none at Harvard or Yale.
152 PROCLUS Diadochus.
Elementa theologica etc.
4to (190 x 130mm.) ff. [3], 69, device at end, modern
half calf.
Ferrara: D. Mammarello 1583 £2200
Proclus is one of the ‘chief links between ancient and
medieval thought… the unique position of the Elements
of Theology as the one genuinely systematic exposition
of Neoplatonic metaphysic which has come down to us’
(Dodds).
The work survives in a number of Greek mss.,
including one from the library of Ficino, and a couple
from Bessarion’s library. There are some twelve or so
sixteenth-century manuscripts The autograph draft for
the 1618 editio princeps of the Greek text by Portus is in
65
Copenhagen. The work was early translated into Georgian,
on the basis of a text a century or so earlier than any
surviving Greek manuscript. Translated first into Latin
in 1268 by William of Moerbeke, this version by Patrizzi
is said by Dodds to be based on renaissance copies of
his second group of manuscripts of which the main ms.
is Marcianus graecus 678, which belonged to cardinal
Bessarion. However the lacuna in Prop. 209 (f. 55r) is left
blank in this translation; in Marc. Graec. 607 it has been
filled at some point in the second half of the 14th cent.
Carefully read and extensively annotated by someone
well acquainted with the Greek text not published until
1618, but well known in manuscript. The annotations take
the form of:
The prose commentary which follows is by Puteanus
(1574-1646) a Belgian humanist, and is divided into twentyfour sections (signed with the letters of the Greek alphabet),
all discussing various aspects of the Virgin Mary, Proteus
and the natural and spiritual worlds.
Sommervogel i, 1051; Simoni STC 1601-1621 P217.
156 REITZ, Wilhelm Otto. Belga graecissans.
155 PUTEANUS, Erycius. Thaumata in
Bernardi Bauhusii… Proteum parthenium,
unius libri versum, unius versus librum,
stellarum numero, siue formis M.XXII. variatum.
1. Cross references.
4to (225 x 160mm.) 116, [6]pp., engraved titlevignette, modern half calf over mottled paper
boards.
Antwerp: B. & J. Moretus ex officinina Plantiniana,
1617 £550
2. Interlinear corrections and additions, e.g. 33v Prop.
123 ‘Demonstratio. Sed a separatis, quales…’ corrected
to ‘dependentibus’ (the correct word). 41v Prop. 155 Dem.
‘ad unigenam seriem’ correctef to ‘vivificam’ (pr oV thn
zw og onon seiran); 54v Prop. 206. where descendens is
corre4cted to ‘descendere’ (governed by ‘potest’).
3. Some additions made from the Greek, e.g. Prop. 206 Dem.
CNCE 35916.
Provenance: Rodolph Weckherlin manuscript ex-libris
title-page, probably Rodolph W. (1617-1667) son of Georg
Rodolph Weckherlin (1584-1653, poet, Latin secetary
before Milton, and politician). Weckherlin senior has
been extensively studied by the late Leonard Forster in
various articles and his 1944 monograph G.R. Weckherlin,
zur Kenntnis seines Lebens in England, Basel, 1944.
153 PROCOPIUS of Caesarea. [Historia
arcana] The secret history of the court of…
Justinian… Faithfully rendred into English.
8vo (162 x 104mm.) [2], 162 p., contemporary calf,
upper cover detached.
London: printed for John Barkesdale bookbinder,
1674 £700
It is from Historia arcana that Gibbon quotes a famously
lubricious passage about the empress Theodora’s days in
the theatre, although veiled ‘in the decent obscurity…’
John Barkesdale as publisher appears solely in this book.
He is recorded as a binder in London and Cirencester.
Provenance: G Rouffignac.
MAGGS
PRINTED IN LIMA
154 PUENTE, Francisco de la. Tratado breve de la antiguedad del linaie
de Vera, y memoria de personas señaladas de,
que se hallan en historias, y papeles autenticos
(Parrafos, que se an de añadir en este libro [etc.]).
2 parts 4to (200 x 140mm.) ff. [6],180 (corrected
to 182); 12pp., marginal notes printed in italic,
armorial woodcut on p. [iii], contemporary limp
vellum, lacking ties, minor marginal dampstains to a
few leaves, number 37 written in ink on upper cover.
Lima: G. de Contreras, 1635 £4000
A handsome, crisp copy of this family history of the Veras,
a noble Aragonese family, tracing them back to Numa
Pompilius. There are some ms. annotations on ff. 13verso
and 15verso, and a few elsewhere, transcribed from the list
of addenda at the end. Ff 173-180 which have only partially
have been numbered in print, have been numbered in ms.
It is possible that these ms. additions (all written in the same
hand) may have been made in the atelier of the printer.
Medina (Lima) 177 (copies at BL (606.c.43), Bodley, ONB
(60.J.21), Portugal, JCB (?), NYPL (*KE 1635; imp. lacking
Parrafos) Not at Yale, Harvard. No copy seems to have
been sold at auction. Attributed by some bibliographers
to Fernando de Vera.
The poem by the Jesuit Bauhuis or Van Bauhuysen (15751619) is 1022 different combinations of the words ‘Tot
tibi sunt dotes, Virgo, quot sidera coelo’, 1022 being the
number of stars calculated at that time to exist. The work
is described as the Book of one verse and the Verse of one
book The engraving on the title shews the Virgin holding
the Christ child and seated upon clouds, surrounded by
stars, and having beneath the clouds a banner supported
by two angels with the words of the verse. The work is
dedicated to Albert and Isabella, the rulers (1598-1621)
of the Spanish Low Countries (famously portrayed in the
Ommegang of 31 May 1615 painted by van Alsloot).
The poem occupied pp. 13-50, and its title Proteus
Parthenius plays upon the name of the Virgin (‘parthenos’
in Greek), and the name of the marine god Proteus who
could change his shape. It is followed by Puteanus’s
dedication of his part of the book to William of Orange,
some liminary verses addressed to the Marian shrine at
Montaigu or Scherpenheuvel-Zichem (Aspricollum in
Latin) in the Belgian province of Brabant. This shrine
was a combination of Marian and pre-christian devotion,
the pre-christian element lying in a tree (later felled as
pagan) and the Marian element lying in a miracle said to
have been worked by the Virgin Mary in around 1500. By
the middle of the sixteenth century the place had become
a centre of pilgrimage. Early in the seventeenth century,
Archduke Ferdinand and Isabella contributed to the
construction of a chapel there, which was erected in the
baroque style and finished in 1627. It is often viewed as
a fine example of town planning and architecture in the
service of the Counter-Refomation. The town flourished
as a place for pilgrims, and from 1624 the Oratorian order
was established there to run the church.
8vo (200 x 115mm.) [2], 636pp., folding engraved
plate of alphabets at p. 28, title printed in red and
black, contemporary Dutch mottled calf, gilt spine,
red edges, green silk marker.
Rotterdam: Joh. Hofhout, 1730 £450
A work on the kinship of Greek and Dutch considered
across various grammatical categories. All the Greek here
printed is without accents and most of the connections
strain the imagination, but it is an interesting reflection
on philological studies in Holland at the time. The author
(1702-1768) was a German scholar born at Offenbach,
but settled in Holland, who from 1722 to 1736 taught at
Rotterdam.
157 RICHER, Edmond. Grammatica obstetricia.
8vo (164 x 98mm.) ff. [8], 162, [1(errata)], folding
table at p. 126, device on title-page, seventeenthcentury calf, gilt fillet on covers gilt spine, top[of
upper hinge weak, marbled edged.
Paris: P.L. Febvrier, 1507[= 1607] £550
An uncommon elementary Latin grammar dedicated to
the Dauphin, later Louis XIII. Edmond Richer (1569-1631)
was hugely active in the university of Paris and author of
a number of theological works. He published a general
introduction to learning called Obstetrix animorum, in 1600,
addressed to French youth.
Copies recorded at BL, Erfurt, BN, Arsenal (2) and B
Sainte Genevieve, Paris. No copies recorded in USA.
158 ROBORTELLO, Francesco. De artificio
dicendi… Eiusdem tabulae oratoriae.
4to (190 x 130mm.) ff. 52; 20; 32; [18], italic type, large
device on title-page, 9-line woodcut mythological
initials, Dutch polished calf c. 1700, spine gilt, red
edges.
Bologna: Alessandro Benacci, 1567 £600
First edition and an extremely handsome book with
fine initials, and in particular a long-tailed Q at the
beginning of Ratio artificii. Robortello, (1516-67), known
as the ‘grammatical hound’ because of his belligerence in
67
160 SACCO, Bernardo. De italicarum
rerum varietate et elegantia, libri X…
Item de prouinciarum proprietate, & romanae
ecclesiae amplificatione; praecipueque
de Ticini rubis primordiis… Eiusdem de
Papiensis ecclesiae dignitate… Cum autoris
Sacci vita, ac indice… refertissimo.
controversy, is chiefly known for his work on Aristotle’s
Poetics¸ but was also the author of others works on allied
topics, such as this on rhetoric.
CNCE 32419. See: K.-J. Miesen, Die Frage nach dem Wahren,
dem Guten und dem Schönen in der Dichtung in der Kontroverse
zwischen Robortello und Lombardi und Maggi um die “Poetik”
des Aristoteles, Warendorf 1967 (= Diss. Köln); E. Kessler,
editor. Theoretiker humanistischer Geschichtsschreibung.
Nachdruck exemplarischer Texte aus dem 16. Jahrhundert,
Francesco Robortello, usw. Munich, 1971. Antonio Carlini
‘L’attività filologica di Francesco Robortello’ in Atti
dell’Accademia di Udine 1966-1969. Ser.7. Vol.7.
159 ROUILLARD, Sebastien.
Histoire de Melun contenant plusieurs
raretez notables, et non descouuertes en
l’ histoire générale de France. Plus la vie
de Bourchard, conte de Melun… Ensemble
la vie de Messire Iacques Amyot, etc.
4to (225 x 150mm.) 759 [1], title printed in red and
black, engraved portrait, engraved device on titlepage,eighteenth-century English calf, gilt fillets on
covers, slightly rubbed, upper joint weak.
Paris: Guillaume Loyson, 1628 £800
A handsome copy of this elegantly printed and important
local history, by a locally born lawyer from Paris. He was
the author of a number of works of a devotional nature,
some legal works, and an intriguing work of 63 pages
Capitulaire auquel est traité qu’un homme nay sans testicules
apparens et qui ha néantmoins toutes les autres marques de
viirilité, est capable des oeuvres du mariage’ published in
1600, reprinted in 1603 (BL copy destroyed in WWII)
and 1604 (BL 877.c.9.(1).)
There is a variant imprint with the name of Jean
Guignard dated MDCXXVIII. In addition to 2 copies
in Paris BL and Bodley (Meerman 502) only in UK, OCLC
adds a copy in Denmark. The BNF catalogue records,
but gives no details of, a 1623 edition in the Arsenal
Library (4-NF-17918.) This must be an error. Here the
author’s dedication to the town of Melun is clearly dated
August 1627, and there is no trace of an earlier edition
elsewhere. Page 203 is heavily annotated and there are a
few annotations elsewhere. Cioranescu 60400.
MAGGS
4to (207 x 150mm.) [52], 287, [1]p., italic type,
contemporary limp vellum, half of some leaves
lightly discoloured by an old water stain, part of
preliminary gathering a loose, a5recto soiled. North
Library bookplate.
Ticino [Pavia]: G. Bartoli, 1587 £600
First published as two separate works in 1565 and 1566 (in
Pavia). Sacco (September 1497- 1 July 1579) was a nobleman
of Pavia (here called Ticino), pupil and protégé of Giovanni
Francisco Pico at Mirandola, and had a long and active life
as secretary to various noble families, including eventually
the Bishop of Pavia. This work of local history contains
a good deal of information on plants, trees, etc., and is
concerned with the region of Pavia, which lies on the river
Ticino, which flows from the southernmost Swiss canton
of Ticino, down to where it joins the river Po just a few
miles from Pavia.
Censimento 16 CNCE 31113.
Provenance: ‘Ex libris Antonij Halley prof regii’, i.e.
Antoine Halley (1595-1675) professor at Caen; engraved
bookplate of N.J. Foucault.
161 SAINT- EVREMOND, Charles de
Marguetel de Saint-Denis, seigneur de.
Oeuvres…publiées sur ses manuscrits, avec
la vie de l’auteur; par mr. Des Maizeaus…
Quatrième édition…. augmentée. Enrichie
de figures gravées par B. Picart le romain.
(Mélange curieux des meilleures pièces…)
November 1721. In his dedication the editor praises
Macclesfield’s prowess in ‘l’étude immense & épineuse
des Loix’, his knowledge of antiquity sacred and profane,
together with his skill in mathematics etc.
The ‘Avertissement’ in volume I is extremely interesting
from a bibliographical standpoint. It gives an account of
the various editions of Saint-Evremond, and Des Maizeaux
writes (p. xi)’ Je remarquerai, en passant, que toutes les
éditions de France, ayant été faites secretement ou par
connivence, portent le nom de Londres. Le Libraire de
France ayant eu avis de l’édition de Hollande & craignant
qu’elle ne fût preferée à la sienne, tâcha de prévenir le
Public par cet Avertissment’ (he then quotes it), which states
that this second edition has as its title Les véritables oeuvres…,
that in the 1705 London quarto edition of Tonson there
were many errors even of proper names, which P. Mortier
had slavishly reproduced and augmented, all of which
has caused the friends of Saint-Evremond in London
to publish a new 12mo edition in 5 volumes entitled (to
distinguish it from all the other defective editions) ‘Les
veritables Oeuvres…’. This is all pure fiction, writes Des
Maizeaux, and ‘such a title can only be true in opposition
to the impressions made in France & Holland, before the
London edition’.
We are then told that the 1709 London edition is in
3 volumes quarto, that the booksellers of Paris in 1711
copied the 1706 Amsterdam 12mo edition in five volumes,
and that Des Maizeaux had some part in this. This 1711
edition has the title Oeuvres and not Oeuvres mêlées, which is
found in the false editions, and which had passed into the
first London edition. This edition was pirated in Rouen
in 1714 in 12mo under the title Oeuvres… publiées sur les
manuscrits de l’auteur… redigée par Mr. Des Maizeaux, but
he states ‘I had no part in this edition, which is neither
beautiful or correct’.
Des Maizeaux proceeds to describe this present ‘fourth
edition’, and the fact that he had written originally written
(at Bayle’s request) the life of Saint-Evremond in 1705,
which he had sent to Amsterdam, and which had been
printed first in 1709<?> This was separately printed in
an English version in 1714 (also found as part of the 1714
and 1728 editions.)
7 volumes 12mo (162 x 90mm.) titles printed in red
and black, engraved frontispieces, engraved title
vignettes of two men with a draft of fishes and motto
Socios ditata labore contemporary English calf,
gilt ornament in centre of covers within a double
gilt fillet, spines gilt, red morocco lettering-pieces,
somewhat damaged, all edges gilt.
Amsterdam: Covens & Mortier, 1726 £700
162 SALE, George. The lives and
memorable actions of many illustrious
persons of the Eastern nations… who
have distinguish’d themselves, either by
war, learning, humanity, justice &c.
This edition of Oeuvres is dedicated by Des Maizeaux to
Thomas Parker, the first Earl of Macclesfield and volume
I has an armorial head-piece engraved by Bernard Picart
& dated 1725. There are other head-pieces etc. by Picart.
Thomas Parker was created Earl of Macclesfield on 15
12mo (167 x 95mm.) [8], 300, [4(advertisements)]
pp., contemporary mottled calf, gilt fillets on covers,
spine gilt, green silk marker, label chipped.
London: J. Wilcox, 1739 £750
An interesting and very uncommon collection of oriental
biographies.
The Advertisement facing the title reads: ‘these short
memorials of the lives of the most eminent persons…
was design’d, and begun to be translated by the late
ingenious Mr. George Sale… and several of the books in
mss. mentioned… are now in the hands of Mr. William
Hammerton, a merchant in Lothbury, London…’ Another
issue without this leaf has a preface which denies any
involvement by Sale and states that the work was done
by one J. Morgan. Wilcox published Sale’s translation of
the Qur’an.
The first 60 pages are devoted to lives of Persian figures,
then follow lives of Muhammad, the Umayyad and Abbasid
caliphs. This is followed by accounts of Saladin, Zoroaster,
Avicenna and many other figures (mostly Persian.) The
final story is: ‘Harm watch, Harm catch; or the strange
adventure of a derwish. A moral Turkish tale’.
This issue is recorded by ESTC in four copies, BL, Bodley,
Worcester College, Oxford and UCLA; the other Morgan)
issue is recorded in copies at BL, Cambridge (2) and one
in Germany.
163 SCALIGER, Josephus Justus. Collectanea
in M. Terentium Varronem de lingua latina.
8vo (168 x 107mm.) [8], 221 [3]pp., device on title,
last leaf blank, contemporary limp vellum, first few
leaves damp-stained at head, title leaf a little frayed
at bottom.
Paris: R. Estienne, (22 August) 1565 £455
First edition of this important work by the twenty-five
year old Scaliger.
Renouard 167 no. 6; Schreiber 235.
164 SCALIGER, Julius Caesar.
Animadversiones in historias
Theophrasti (In eosdem libros viri maxima
doctrina praediti annotationes).
8vo (172 x 110mm.) 424pp., early 18th-century calf,
spine gilt, red edges, lettering piece lacking.
Lyons: Jeanne Giunta, (achevé d’imprimer le 18 mai),
1584 £550
It was Josephus Justus Scaliger who, as the preface to
the reader tells us, had the manuscript of this work by
his father at Lyons, which was used to print the work, to
which the anonymous annotations (pp. 345-424) by a ‘vir
perspicassimus’ were added. The writer was French, as on
p. 414 when discussing the word lotos, he gives various
vernacular equivalents ‘nobisque alisier’ (sorb apple tree).
69
The privilège speaks of ‘Jeanne de Ionty, fille de feu
Iaques de Ionty gentilhomme florentin, quand uiuoit,
libraire de Lyon’. For the Giunta family at Lyons see
Baudrier VI and for Jeanne de Jonty, active 1577 until
her death in 1584 pp. 337-384, for this book p. 382.
and Arabic writings (including several extracts from the
Qur’an: sura 21 (p. 60), sura 38(p. 53 & 61) 27 (pp. 64-65)
19 (p. 77); sura 2 (p. 97), suras 4 & 5 (pp 97- 100).
In his dedication to the emperor, Marchtaler explains
how this elegantly written manuscript (a genealogical
roll; ‘propter immanem longitudinem convolutum in
spiras’; on p. 13 Schickard writes that it is 45 feet long,
and gives a detailed physical description) was found in
the mosque during the sack of Fillek (Fülek) in Hungary.
Marchtaler wishing that the manuscript not be simply
forgotten (like another previously given to Ferdinand’s
grandfather), consulted in vain with various dragomans
(whose versions he did not trust) and came across Schickard
who immediately grasped what the roll was about. The
translation is offered as a gift until such time as the
‘autographum ipsum’ be lodged in the imperial library.
The bibliography of Schickard’s works by Friedrich Seck is
appended to his edition of the Briefwechsel, Stuttgart 2002.
Provenance: “Nathan Wright of Englefield”, Berkshire
(cropped signature at head of title), probably Sir Nathan
Wright (1654-1721), lawyer, appointed Lord Keeper in
1700 (see ODNB).
166 SCHOTT, Frans. Itinerarium Italiae.
12mo (128 x 68mm.) 606, [6]pp., engraved title
(with stub), 17 folding engraved plans (of 19?),
contemporary vellum.
Wesel: Andreas van Hoogenhuysen, [c. 1670]£550
This is an uncommon reissue of the 1655 Jansszoon edition
(with 19 engravings) printed at Amsterdam, having a
cancel title-leaf. As it is a reissue, it is possible that not
all the plates were available. Andreas van Hooghuysen
is described at active at Wesel between 1667 and 1676.
QUOTATIONS FROM THE QUR’AN
165 SCHICKARD, Wilhelm. Tarich
h.e. series regum Persiae…cum proemio
longiori… Omnia ex fide manuscripti
voluminis… quod a Turcis ex archivo
Fillekensi reportavit… Vitus Marchtaler, etc.
4to (190 x 140mm.) 231pp., woodcut illustrations,
eighteenth-century calf, gilt spine, red edges, last 2
leaves cropped at outer margin with loss of letters.
Tübingen: T. Werlin, 1628 £1500
Schickard (1592-1635) was one of the most learned men of
his age, astronomer, professor of Hebrew, mathematician
and orientalist. Here he edits a manuscript brought to
Germany by Veit Marchtaler of Ulm and provided it with
a detailed commentary quoting from various Hebrew
MAGGS
167 SCHOTTEL, Justus Georg.
Ausführliche Arbeit von der teutschen
HaubtSprache worin enthalten Gemelter dieser
HaubtSprache Uhrankunft/ Uhraltertuhm/
Reinlichkeit/ Eigenschaft/ Vermögen/
Unvergleichlichkeit/ Grundrichtigkeit/ zumahl
die SprachKunst und VersKunst Teutsch und
guten theils Lateinisch völlig mit eingebracht/
wie nicht weniger die Verdoppelung/ Ableitung/
die Einleitung/ Nahmwörter/ Authores vom
Teutschen Wesen und Teutscher Sprache/ von
der verteutschung/ Item die Stammwörter
der Teutschen Sprache samt der Erklärung
und derogleichen viel merkwürdige
Sachen; Abgetheilet In Fünf Bücher.
4to (200 x 160mm.) [36], 170, [2], 171 - 1466, [28]0pp,
engr. portrait and add. engr. title, 18th-century
mottled calf, gilt spine, marbled edges.
Braunschweig: C.F. Zilliger, 1663 £900
First edition. A handsome copy. Schottel (1612-1676) was
the son of a Protestant pastor and may be said to have
been the progenitor of the study of the German language,
and an influence on Leibniz. He was also a poet, and
writer on poetics.
VD17 12:130315E; Gödeke 3, 118, 63,10; Faber du Faur
697; Dünnhaupt, Personalbibliographien zu den Drucken des
Barock. Band 5. Hiersemann, Stuttgart 1991, pp. 38243846. There is a growing literature on his philological
work and there is a catalogue of an exhibition held at
HAB Jörg Jochen Berns, editor. Justus Georg Schottelius.
Wolfenbüttel 1976.
168 SECRETS. Secrets concernans
les arts et metiers. Nouvelle édition,
revûë, corrigée et…augmentée.
4 volumes 12mo (165 x 90mm.) [2], 435, [25];[28],
408; [22], 371; [2], 475, [13]p., last leaf with privilege,
conemporary French calf, gilt spines, red edges.
Rouen: Charles Ferrand, 1724 £500
First published in one volume by Jombert in 1716, the
book was still in print a century later, and editions came in
various formats. It is an anonymous work of great interest
covering, as it does, all aspects of tanning and dyeing, the
making of dyes, the gilding of papers and books, engraving,
the making of wine and liqueurs and much else besides.
This edition is also found with the variant imprint of
Jombert. Copies of this Rouen edition at Glasgow and
Felbrigg Hall (NT) in UK. KVK adds a handful of copies
in European libraries.
HARRIOT’S RULE
169 SEGNER, Janós Andrós. Ad… Georgium Hambergerum
dissertatio epistolica qua regulam Harrioti
de modo ex aequationum signis numerum
radicum… demonstrare, simulque rationem
structurae instrumenti novi… exponere
conatur Ioannes Andreas Segner.
4to (202 x 150mm.) 23pp., somewhat foxed, Jena:
C.F. Buch, [1728?].
Bound with: no. 137.
The first work by Segner, dated at end 7 September 1718.
This may be a misprint for 1728, the date given by various
sources for this pamphlet (e.g. DSB). The Hungarian Segner
(1704-1777) who came Poszony (known as Pressburg, and
now Bratislava in Slovakia) is best remembered as the father
of the water turbine. He studied medicine at Jena, where
Hamberger (1697-1755), himself the author of a popular
Elementa physices was professor, qualified as a doctor and
became a noted figure in German intellectual life and a
prolific writer on medicine, science and astronomy.
Harriot’s rule, sometimes called Descartes rule, is
named after the English mathematician Thomas Harriot
who wrote on navigation and equations. Sections 1-17 of
the pamphlet deal with equations and in section 18, in
which references are made to ‘figurae’ or illustrations,
Segner proceeds to discuss his new instrument for
describing conic sections. No ‘figures’ are present in this
copy, neither does any one of the handful of copies listed
on KVK contain any.
170 SELDEN (John). Opera omnia,
tam edita quam 8nedita. In tribus
voluminibus. Collegit ac recensuit;
vitam auctoris, praefationes, & indices
adjecit, David Wilkins, S.T.P.
3 volumes folio (386 x 230mm.) [6], xxxiv, lvi pp.,
1891 (columns), [80 (indexes)] pp; [6], xviii (columns),
1721 (numbered in columns & pp), [40 (indexes)]
pp; [8] pp., [2 (subtitle)] pp., 2080 (columns), [1
(blank)] p., [38 (indexes)] pp, engraved portrait.
contemporary calf, gilt spines with red and green
morocco labels, marbled endleaves and edges (short
crack at the foot of the upper joint of Vol. 1, slight
area of worm damage at the top of the lower joint
of Vol. 3 a few short scuffs/scratches on the covers,
lower edges rubbed, small area of damage to the
lower corner of the rear cover of Vol. 1).
London: Typis Guil. Bowyer, impensis J.Walthoe, G.
Conyers, [etc.], 1726 £2000
A very handsome set of this collected edition of Selden. Vol.
2 was printed by S. Palmer and Vol. 3 (the English Works)
by T. Wood. William Bowyer printed the preliminaries
and, perhaps, the indexes to each volume. 650 sets were
printed on ordinary paper (as here) and 100 on large
paper. Two of the large paper sets listed by ESTC are
dated 1725, the rest 1726 as here.
Edited by the Rev. David Wilkins (1685-1745), Prussianborn Coptic and Arabic scholar, who was librarian to
William Wake, Archbishop of Canterbury at Lambeth
Palace for three years from 1719. “His edition of Selden
is careless, but credit must be given to his diligence in
assembling unpublished material.” (ODNB).
71
171 SEYSSELL, Claude de,
Archbishop of Turin & Cappel, Jacques. La doctrine des Vaudois. Rapresentee par
Cl. Seissel… & Cl. Coussord… Avec notes
dressées par Iacques Cappel [with a preface by
the same addressed to Elisabeth of Nassau].
8vo (160 x 110mm.) 16, 111, [1]p., disbound.
Sedan: de l’imprimerie de Jean Jannon, 1618£700
Claude de Seyssel (1450?-1520) became Archbishop of
Turin in 1517, and devoted much time and energy to
those in his diocese (and elsewhere) suspected of being
Waldensians. In 1520 he published in Paris a volume of
Latin Disputationes against them, a work subsequently
translated into French. The work by Claude Coussord was
published in Paris in 1548. It is Valdensium ac quorundam
aliorum errores, praecipuas ac pene omnes, quae nunc vigent,
haereseis continentes: quibus accessit recens illorum omnium
ex sacris potissimum literis impugnatio.
Jacques Cappel (1570-1624) was professor of theology
at Sedan, the Protestant academy. The lengthy dedication
by him is to Elizabeth of Nassau (1577-1642). In it on p. 6
he remarks à propos the Apocalypse of St. John, that the
apostle has not chosen to write the history of the entire
universe. ‘He does not mention what happens under the
antarctic pole, in America, nor amongst the Persians and
Indians, east or west. In Cappel’s eyes St. John is out to
discuss the work of the Antichrist, i.e. the pope of Rome.
173 SIGONIUS, Carolus. Emendationvm
libri dvo. Quorum argumentum
proximæ pagellæ indicabunt.
4to (200 x 145mm) [12] 159 f. [i.e.155], large printer’s
devices on title-page and colophon, woodcut initials,
f.15 misnumbered 11, numerotation continues f.25
after f.20, late seventeenth, early eighteenth century
calf, spine gilt in compartments, lettering-piece,
spine crackled.
Venice: Aldus 1557 £750
BAUMBACH, Johann Balthasar. Quatuor
utilissimi tractatus I. De trium orientalium,
hebraeae, chaldaeae & syrae, linguarum
antiquitate… Una cum tabula de hebraicarum
vocum radice inquirenda. II. De appellationibus
Dei, quae in scriptis Rabbinorum occurrunt.
III. De Urim & Thummim, & Bath kol. III.
De modo disputandi cum Judaeis. ff. [4], [24],
lacking folding table, and without final blank
leaf, Nurnberg: Abraham Wagenmann, 1609.
First edition. Renouard 127.
VD17 23:246229T.
Bound with:
GRÖNWALL, Anders (1671-1758), praeses.
Historiola linguae dalekarlicae, praeside… Mag.
Andrea Grönwall… dissertatione publica, placido
eruditorum examini submissa a Reinholdo E.
Näsman Dalekarlo. In auditor. Gust. Maj. d.xxi.
Jun. 1733. Horis ante meridiem solitis. [10],
74, [4]pp., Uppsala: literis Wernerianis, [1733].
3 works in 1 volume 4to (200 x 140mm.) eighteenthcentury half calf, lacking lettering piece. The typography of the dedication changes at pp. 14-16,
which are set in a very small italic, possibly occasioned by
an error of casting off (29 lines as opposed to 24).
2 copies in Paris (BNF and Ars) but otherwise unrecorded.
A modern facsimile has been published.
172 SIBBALD (Sir Robert). Nuncius
Scoto-Britannus sive admonitio de atlante
scotico seu descriptione Scotiae antiquae et
modernae.
[4], 15, [1]p.
Edinburgh, David Lindsay et al. 1683
£500
Bound with:
Ibid. An Account of the Scottish Atlas or
description of Scotland ancient and modern. 10p.
Two works in one volume. Folio. Vellum-backed
boards. Sibbald’s prospectus for a Scottish atlas which was never
completed, the English version, (which is much rarer than
the Latin there being only three copies listed in Wing) has
the last leaf pasted to a blank obscuring the final verso.
Wing S3724 & 3720.
MAGGS
174 SIMON, Etienne. Historia linguae
graecae methodica, cujus exemplo tum
hebraea & latina, tum caeterae omnes, quibus
homines sub sole utuntur… doceri discique
possunt; ut quod superioribus seculis, annuo
spatio, xix ac ne vix… industria hic praestabatur,
eidem efficiendo menstruum nunc sit satis.
4to [12], 38, [2]pp., first quire soiled, title-leaf damaged and cut down, with slight loss of imprint.
Paris: C. Morel, 1615
£1100
Bound with:
Extremely uncommon. The author is described as a
physician, and we know he also wrote a book on French
orthography published in 1609, but little else is known of
him. As the title says, the author is offering a crash course
in one month to learn as much as previously had taken
a whole year, an approach, he writes in the dedication to
Cardinal du Perron, ‘which works not only for the dead
languages, Hebrew, Greek and latin, but also for living
languages, viz. Arabic, Slavonic, Ethiopic, American, and
all the rest… which are in use among all the inhabitants
of the earth, so that hence the christian religion may
be spread far and wide, and the arts of commerce may
here and there be easily fostered’. The work is essentially
concerned with orthography and pronunciation, with
a section on prosody, and is in no way a grammar or
accidence. In the preface by Pierre Robinet particular
stress is laid upon questions of pronunciation, and tribute
is paid to the help afforded by David Rivault de Fleurance
(1571-1616) the mathematician and collector of Arabic
manuscripts.
There are liminary verses in Greek by Nicolas Bourbon
and Robinet, and in Latin by Pontius Privatus, a doctor
from Tarascon, and Elie Garel, sieur des Boisrichers
from Angers, the author of several works of symbolic or
balletic exegesis published between 1610 and 1620. There
appear to be copies only at BNF (X. 1903) and Cambridge
(Dd*.2.30(D)).
The second work by Baumbach, which should have a
table of Hebrew roots, is in part a general survey of Semitic
philology, with a chapter on Syriac studies, and in part a
discussion of very specific Hebrew terms, like Urim and
Thummim, which have a connection with the high priest,
and Bath Kol (‘small voice’ of the Holy Spirit). The third
work is a university thesis on the Dalarna dialect of the
Swedish language. Ten years after the publication of this
pamphlet, there was an uprising against the government
in the province, called the Dalecarlian rebellion.
175 SPINOZA, Baruch de. Renati Des
Cartes Principiorum philosophiae pars,
I, et II, more geometrico demonstratae…
Accesserunt… Cogitata metaphysica, etc.
4to [16], 140pp., woodcut figures, title-leaf soiled,
last leaf damaged with loss of about 10 words on
recto, title-page soiled, modern half-calf.
Amsterdam: Johannes Riewerts, 1663 £2500
First edition of Spinoza’s first book, which in 1664 appeared
in Dutch as Beginselen van de cartesiaanse wijsbgeerte. In it the
author apparently gives a resumé of Cartesian ideas, but in
fact explains his own, particularly in his Cogitata metaphysica.
His controversial ideas about miracles are already here
adumbrated (cf. J.I.Israel, Radical Enlightenment, OUP,
2001, p. 219).
Provenance: William Forster, Emmanuel College, Cambridge 168?. This William Forster was admitted sizar
at Emmanuel July 5 1682 (MA 1690) and came from
Huntingdonshire. He held various livings, from 1708
until his death that of St. Clement Dane’s, London. He
died 11 December, 1719 (Venn i, ii 164b).
176 STEPHANUS Byzantinus. Per i
polewn… De urbibus quem primus
Thomas de Pinedo… Latij jure donavit, &
observationibus scrutinio variarum linguarum…
illustrabat, etc. (Collationes J. Gronovii cum
codice manuscripto Stephani, ex bibliotheca
abbatiae Perusinae. -Index verborum &
rerum… a Martino de Guichardo Germano).
Folio [20], 800, engraved title-vignette and emblematic frontispiece, contemporary Dutch vellum.
Amsterdam: J. de Jonge, 1678 £800
An extremely fine copy of this handsome edition of
Stephanus of Byzantium’ important gazetteer edited
as a monument, by Thomas de Pinedo (1614-1679), a
Portuguese Jew ‘qui primum orientem solem visit in
Lusitaniae oppido Trancozo ortus’, his father a Pinheira
and his mother a Fonseca, who, educated as a pupil of the
Jesuits in Madrid, was forced, accused of all crime but envy,
73
to flee to these [Dutch] shores, etc.’ The use of the word
envy here is a reference to the emblem on the second leaf,
shewing a porcupine attached by dogs which has the motto
‘Nil Moror invidiam’ and the couplet ‘Integritas virtusque
suo munimine tuta,/ Non patet adversae morsibus Invidiae’.
The work is dedicated to D. Gaspar de Mendoza Ybañez
de Segovia y Peralta.
177 STRADA, Famiano S.J. Histoire de la
guerre de Flandre… traduite par P. Du-Ryer.
2 volumes 8vo (168 x 105mm.) [12], 768, [36]; [12],
881, [65]pp., titles printed in red and black, engraved
portraits in text, late eighteenth-century English
tree calf, spines gilt, joints a little weak.
Suivant la copie imprimé à Paris [Leiden: B. & A.
Elzevier],1652 £500
The Jesuit Strada’s (1572-1649) history of the Spanish
campaigns in Flanders was written in Latin and published
in two groups of ten books (decades) in 1632 and 1647.
Its success was immediate and considerable,and it was
quickly translated. The French translation by Du Ryer,
who is chiefly known for his French translation of the
Qur’an, appeared in 1644 and 1649 in folio in Paris, and
was again widely reprinted.
This edition has the Elzevier device on the title-pages,
but only the preliminary leaves were from their press, the
text proper being from the press of Abraham Verhoef
(Verhoeven) active at Harlignen and then (later) at Leiden.
However it was published under the aegis of the Elzevier
firm (see Willems).
De Backer Sommervogel vii, 1607sqq.; Willems 708.
178 STURM, Johann. De imitatione
oratoria, libri tres, cum scholiis, etc.
[ed. V. Erythraeus].
8vo (160 x 103mm.) ff. [88]; [184], title within a
woodcut border, woodcuts, contemporary English
calf, gilt stamp on covers.
Strassburg: B. Jobin, 1574 £750
FIRST EDITION of this work by the Strassburg pedagogue
Sturm. An annotated copy with a few notes in ink (and a
few corrections, e.g. D4r where ‘quarta’ has been changed
to ‘quinta parte’ in the chapter heading) and a number in
pencil marks of reading, underlining (particularly towards
the end of Book II), together with some annotation in
an English hand (later?). On the end board is a pencilled
note about other works by Hermogenes (De collocatione
verborum) and others.
Buisson p. 612; VD16 S9942.
MAGGS
Provenance: Bernardus Philippus, possibly Bernard
Phillips who matriculated from St. John’s, Cambridge
in 1577, transferred to Pembroke Coll, and in 1596 was
rector of Southerton, Suffolk. Macclesfield Nofrth Library.
Dated 28 November 1550, and is amongst the books
printed right at the end of Robert Estienne’s time in
Paris: in November 1550 he was already treating with
the authorities in Geneva.
Renouard 80 no. 8; Lawton, Térence en France (1926).
179 TABOUET, Julien. De republica,
et lingua francica, ac gothica,
deque diversis ordinibus Gallorum,
vetustis & hodiernis, etc. 67, [1]p.
Lyons: T. Payen for François Pomar of Chambéry, 1559
£700
Bound with:
BRECHENMACHER, Johann Caspar. Notitia Sueviae antiquae, qua omnis gentis
historia ab origine ad proelium usque
Tolbiacense describitur… sub praesidio
Burcardi Gottheflii Struvii ventilata nunc
publici iuris facta. [12], 195, [1]pp., errata on
last page Augsburg: for C. Brechenmacher, 1716.
2 works in one volume 4to (205 x 145mm.), eighteenth
century half-calf over marbled paper boards, red
edges.
The work by Tabouet or Taboetius (ca. 1500- ca.1563) is
an account in Latin of various aspects of the French state
(with French equivalents) penned by a jurist at one time
procurator general of the senate at Chambéry (hence the
imprint; Pomar is recorded at Annecy) It is not common.
Only the BL in the UK has a copy; OCLC lists 3 copies in
Germany, and there is a copy at Yale. The second work
on the Suevi, a tribe described by Caesar and Tacitus, is
an academic thesis put forward by Brechemnacher, and
published at his own cost. The praeses was Burkhard
Gotthelf Struve (1671-1738.) Of this OCLC records but
one copy at Strassburg.
180 TERENTIUS AFER, Publius.
[Terentius]. In singulas scoenas
argumenta, fere ex Aelij Donati commentariis
transcripta. Versuum genera per Erasmum
Roterodamum. (De metris comicis etc.)
8vo (170 x 105mm.) 381, [3]p., last blank leaf excised,
eighteenth-century sprinkled calf, head of title- leaf
torn away with loss of one word.
Paris: R. Estienne, (4 Cal. Dec. 1550) 1551 £1300
Printed throughout in italic. An extremely fine copy,
marred only by the damage to one word of the title. This
extremely uncommon edition is recorded in one copy in
the Bodleian, one copy at Freibourg, one at Rotterdam.
Provenance: sixteenth-century inscription on title (crossed
out) Huius libri vere est possessor Claudius de la???.
181 THACKER, Anthony. A miscellany
of mathematical problems… By Anthony
Thacker, Teacher of the mathmaticks at
Birmingham Free-School. And the Author of
the Ladies Diary. Vol. I. Containing, I. A new
method of solving geometrical problems… III.
A collection of spherical problems. … V. The
solutions to the questions in the Gentleman’s
and Ladies diary, for the present year 1743.
8vo (195 x 120 mm). x, 210 pp. Contemporary half
calf, marbled boards, gilt spine.
Birmingham: by Thomas Aris, 1732 £750
Only Vol. I was published as Thacker died in 1744. ESTC
lists copies at British Library, Birmingham Central
Libraries, Birmingham University Education Library,
Bodley, National Library of Ireland, John Rylands Library;
Brown University, University of Virginia, Yale.
Bound with:
Ibid. A Treatise containing an entire new
method of solving adfected quadratic, and
cubic equations, with their application to the
solution of biquadratic ones; in an easier, and
more concise way, than any yet publish’d;
together with the demonstrations of the
methods. And a set of new tables for finding the
roots of cubics. Invented by the late ingenious
Mr. A. Thacker, deceased; but calculated
entirely, and in a great measure exemplified,
by W. Brown, teacher of the mathematicks, at
the Free-School, in Cleobury, Shropshire.
8vo viii, 115, [1 (blank))], [2 (errata/blank)] pp.,
lacking half-title (pp. I-ii). Birmingham: by Thomas
Aris, 1746.
ESTC lists copies at British Library, Birmingham Central Libraries, John Rylands Library, London School of
Economics; University of Michigan only in USA. A “Second Edition” of 1748 is a reissue (Birmingham Central
Libraries only).
FEMININE CULTURAL INFLUENCE
182 TOMASINI, Giacomo Filippo.
Elogia virorum literis & sapientia illustrium
ad vivum expressis imaginibus exornata.
4to (215 x 155mm.) [12], 411, [1]pp., device on titlepage, engraved portraits attributed to J.F. Greuter,
contemporary vellum over pasteboard.
Padua: S. Sardi, 1644 £500
A handsome copy of this separate part, supplemental to a
collection published in 1630 (and having an engraved title
and a portrait of the author). Although the title expressly
mentions the lives of men, there are in fact also given the
lives (and portraits) of a number of women, including
Cassandra Fedele (1465?-1558), whose works Tomasini
edited, the Nogarolas, and others. The work is dedicated
on the title-page to Anne of Austria (1601-1666), regent
of France, and, in a slightly longer dedicatory epistle to
Cardinal Mazarin, tribute is paid to feminine genius and
its influence through the salon.
Cicognara 2117; Vinciana 3617.
75
183 VALERIUS FLACCUS, Caius.
[title within a woodcut frame] Argonauticon
libr. viii (ed. L. Carrio)… seorsim excusa
ejusdem Carrionis castigationes etc.
16mo (120 x 75mm.) 205, [3(blank)]p.; ff.[48][, last 3
leaves blank, seventeenth-century Dutch vellumn,
yapp edges.
Antwerp: C. Plantin, 1566 £500
Second Plantin edition with Carrio’s Castigationes. The text
alone appeared in 1565 and was full of printer’s errors,
and the book was reprinted.
Valerius Flaccus lived towards the end of the 1st century AD,
and this is his only work. He tells, as did the Alexandrian
poet Apollonius Rhodius, the story of Jason and the
Argonauts. Known in the ancient world to Quintilian and
others, the text was known in the Middle Ages, and in the
Renaissance to Politian and was first printed in Bologna
in 1574. Mentioned by Chaucer, his literary influence on
such writers as Camoens was considerable, and this is
traced in an excellent article by Zissos.
Louis Carrion (1547-95) was Belgian. Barely seventeen
when he prepared the text, for which he used a manuscript,
the existence of which has for centuries been doubted,
Carrion’s own competence has also until recently been
doubted. However in an article in Classical Quarterly P. R.
Taylor has drawn attention to the presence in the library
catalogue of the religious house at Lobbes in Belgium of
a manuscript of Valerius Flaccus in the eleventh/twelfth
century. This manuscript, now not findable, could well have
been used by Carrio, and she demonstrates as more than
credible bot only the readings given by this manuscript in
relation to the text of Valerius Flaccus, but also Carrio’s
own competence as collator of manuscripts, and editor,
thereby coincidentally giving a greater importance to this
edition.
Voet 2409; see A. Zissos ‘Reception of Valerius Flaccus
“Argonatuica”’ in International Journal of the Classical
Tradition’, Vol. 13, No. 2 (Fall, 2006), pp. 165-185.; P. R.
Taylor ‘The Authority of the Codex Carrionis in the MSTradition of Valerius Flaccus’ in Classical Quarterly 39 (20,
1989 pp. 451-471.
184 VAYRAC, Jean de. El arte frances,
en que se van puestas las reglas…
para apprehender… la lengua françesa…
Con una tratado de la poesia.
2 volumes 12mo (162 x 95mm.) xxxiii, [3], 453,
[7]; [3], 454-964pp., contemporary vellum, a few
marginal notes.
Paris: P. Vitte, 1714 £700
MAGGS
First edition. The abbé Vayrac (1664-1734) was the author
of a number of such works on Spanish language, history
and geography. This work gives a very thorough treatment
of the language, how to write letters, and how to write
poetry.
Palau 353490; not listed by Cioranescu and a very
uncommon book. There is no copy recorded in the UK,
one at Jena is recorded by KVK, and there is a copy in
Paris BNF.
Provenance: some notes on flyleaves of vol. I ‘3 laced
hancherch. 1 camb. Hancherch. M.W. Hen: Chamberlain
upon the new Haven near the packing bridge’.
185 VELDE, Jan van der. Sphieghel
der Schrijfkonste, inden welcken ghesien
worden veelderhande Geschriften met hare
Fondementen ende Onderrichtinghe.
(Artificiosissimum grammatices verum
nobilissimusque speculum. In quo varia
scripturae tessellata paradigmata, belgicis,
latinis, hispanicis… typis adumbratae.)
2 parts obl. 4to (217 x 325mm.), ff. [20] of letterpress,
engraved title-page, frontispiece portrait (mounted),
5 plates, engraved illustrations, woodcut initials
head- and tail-pieces; engraved title and 58 plates
later vellum-backed boards, a few plates with small
tears or stains, and a few slightly shaved (affecting
flourishes), corners rubbed.
Rotterdam, 1605 [after 1610] £1850
Engraved throughout by Simon Frisius, this issue in which
part 2 has been enlarged to 58 plates, is tentatively dated
after 1610.
Bonacini 1931; Simoni BL 1601-1621 V42-43 (describing
2 editions published by J. van Waesberghe in 1609 and
[1610?], in which part 2 has 50 and 51 plates respectively.)
186 VERGIL, Polydore. [De rerum
inventoribus] The works… english’t by
John Langley… a work useful for all divines,
historians, lawyers, and all artificers.
8vo (142 x 92mm.) [2], 311, [25]pp., contemporary
sheep, worn, spine split.
London: S. Miller, 1663 £500
A reissue, with cancel title-leaf (verso blank) of the sheets
of the 1659 edition.
Wing V596.
187 VERGILIUS MARO Publius.
Praelectiones in P. Virgilii Maronis
Georgicorum libros IIII. Diligenti
recognitione multis in locis emendatae
[with the text]. 368 [=360]pp.
Frankfurt: heirs of A. Wechel, 1584
rebacked, spine lettered, lettered on bottom edge:
‘Victorius Varia Lectio’, title-page slightly damaged
(with small repair) and spotted.
Florence: L. Torrentino, 1553 £600
£500
Bound with:
Ibid. Bucolica, P. Rami… praelectionibus
exposita… editio quinta. [2], 168, [8],
last leaf blank. Frankfurt: C. Marny &
J. Aubry heirs of A. Wechel, 1580.
2 works in 1 volume 8vo (165 x 99mm.) binding of
English calf c. 1600, blind-stamped fillet on covers,
some worming in middle of volume sometimes
affecting letters/words 1584. Dedicated to Charles, cardinal of Lorraine, this work is
a detailed commentary on Virgil’s Georgics by Ramus,
who was killed in the massacre of St. Bartholomew in
1572. The Praelectiones on the Georgics first appeared
in 1564 from the Wechel press, and the shorter work on
the Eclogues in 1539 from the press of Estienne. Wechel
printed the first work in Frankfurt in 1578, and again
as here in 1584. The work on the Eclogues was several
times printed: 1539, 1558 (‘editio 2da’), 1572 (ed. 3) in
Paris, and in Frankfurt in 1582 the ‘editio 4ta’, and 1590
The ‘editio 5ta’.
VD16 V1517 & V1560.
Provenance: Thomas Naylor pretium ijs; John Waite.
188 VERRIUS FLACCUS, Marcus &
FESTUS, Sextus Pompeius. M. Verri
Flacci quae extant. Et Sex. Pompei Festi de
verborum significatione libri XX. Iosephi
Scaligeri… castigationes recognitae & auctae.
8vo (172 x 110mm.) [12], [16], cccix, [27]; ccxvi,
[24]; lxxv, [1]pp., pp.; last leaf in parts 1 & 2 blank,
contemporary yelowish doeskin, spine with 5 raised
bands, some marginal notes in part 2 (heading
words).
Paris: M. Patisson, 1576 £750
One of Scaliger’s most important philological works.
Amongst the contributors to the liminary verses are Dorat
and Florent Chrestien.
189 VETTORI, Pietro. Variarum lectionum libri xxv.
Folio (312 x 190mm.) [28], 410, [14]pp., Italian vellum,
First edition; Censimento 16 CNCE 34608.
Provenance: ‘Angeli Angelotii Camertis’ (Angelo Angelotti
of Camerino) stamped name on title-page.
190 VREDEMAN de VRIES, Jan. Architectorum sui seculi facile principis,
Architectura continens quinque ornamenta
architecturae, scilicet Atticum, Jonicum,
Doricum,Corinthium, & Compositum
item regulas, demonstrationes ac figuras
perfectissimas… Studio atque opera
summi mathematici Samuelis Marolois
recognitum atque illustratum.
Folio (313 x 207mm.) ff.[10], woodcut device on
title-page, 29 (of 30) double-page numbered and
lettered engraved plates by Jan and Paul Vredeman
de Vries and Hondius, later vellum-backed blue
boards, lacking plate number 6 (letter L). Amsterdam [Amstelodami]: Joannis Janssonii, 1647
£900
191 VRIES, Simon de. Wonderen soo
aen als in, en wonder-gevallen soo op als
ontrent de zeeën, rivieren, meiren, poerlen
en fonteynen: historischer; ondersoeckender,
en redenvoorstellender wijs vernhandeld.
4to (233 x 182mm.) [16(incl. additional engraved
title-page)], 688, [56]p. last leaf with list of books
published by Hoorn, contemporary Dutch vellum
over paper boards, central blind-stamped ornament.
Amsterdam: Jan ten Hoorn, 1687 £1500
A very fine copy. The author (1630-1705) was a schoolmaster
from Utrecht, a correspondent of Spinoza, and the author
of many books. He bases this book, which deals with the
wonders of the deep and all sorts of marine matters, on
what he has read (there is a list of authors used) and
reproduces all sorts of strange tales, from such things
as the purchase by prince Radziwill of two mummies,
one male, one female (p. 295sqq). The work is cast as
a dialogue taking place at the end of winter between
Honorius, Marinus, and Polylector (who must be the wellread author), and occasionally involves a lady Honesta. It
is the sort of book which makes one wish one read Dutch
fluently.
77
European Americana IV, 687/145.
The only copy in GB is at the BL. OCLC lists apart from
five copies in Holland, and two in Germany, two in S.
Africa, and three in the USA (Bedford Whaling Museum,
NYPL and JCB).
Provenance: On front flyleaf is written N409. This
indication of a lot number in a sale is found in a number
of Macclesfield books, many of them having some Baltic
connection, and some in Russian (cf. item no 140).
192 WALLER, William. [Begin:] Honour’d
Sirs, It is… to give you the present
state of the Mines [in Cardiganshire], etc.
8vo () 22pp., (printed on versos only from p. 3),
large folding map of Cardiganshire and 10 smaller
folding plates, a few leaves shaved at foot.
[s.l.1704] £1050
This is the first account of such mines. Waller in 1698
published An essay on the value of the mines, late of Sir Carbery
price, writ for the satisfaction of all the partners, which was an
attempt to sell the sales in these mines profitably. In the
present work, which is basically just a description of the
plates, Waller provides a map of where the mines belonging
to the Governor and Company of Mine Adventurers
are located, and plans of the several mines at Bwlch yr
Escair, Bwlch Caninog, Cwmsymlog, Goginan, Brinpica,
Cwnarvin, Pencraggddu, Ystum tuen and Cwmystwth
together with the new lead mines at the last place.
There are 2 issues of this pamphlet, one as here with no
title-page, and one with a title-page and first 2 leaves
reset. Both are extremely uncommon, and of this ESTC
lists copies in UK, one in Germany and one in the USA
at Lehigh University. There has been a modern facsimile.
A HANDSOME SET
193 WALPOLE, Sir Robert, afterwards 1st Earl
of Orford - COXE, William. Memoirs of the
Life and Administration of Sir Robert Walpole,
Earl of Oxford. With original correspondence
and authentic papers, never before published.
3 Vols 4to (273 x 210mm.) with the half-titles, errata,
engraved frontis portrait (Vol.1) four facsimile leaves
of plates (Vol. 2) and the folding genealogical table
(Vol.1). Off-setting from the title-page onto the
frontis leaf, small tears to the blank lower edge of
4T2 (Vol.1) and T3 (Vol.3), sporadic foxing and
browning in places throughout and some marking
to the inner gutter margin in each volume where
the original green ribbon marker has discoloured
the paper, contemporary diced russia, covers ruled
in gilt, spine tooled and lettered in gilt, marbled
edges and endleaves (a couple of joints just starting
to split).
London: (printed by James Easton, Salisbury) for T. Cadell,
jun. and W. Davies,1798 £650
An account of the British Prime Minister which is still
considered “the starting point for all serious study of its
subject” (ODNB).
The first volume of this set is Coxe’s enormous biography of Walpole which was published fifty years after
the subjects death. The second and third volume are
devoted to the correspondence and feature numerous
letters to and from politicians, the nobility and Walpole’s
own family. The four facsimilie plates show examples of
the handwriting of George I, George II, Queen Caroline,
Robert Walpole and the signatures of various members
of the nobility.
194 WATIN, Jean-Félix. L’Art de faire et
d’employer le vernis, ou l’art de vernisseur,
auquel on a joint ceux du peintre & du doreur.
Ouvrage utile aux artistes & aux amateurs
qui veulent entreprendre de peindre, dorer &
vernir par eux-memes toute forte de sujets, &c.
divisé en deux parties. Dans la premiere on y
traite de la facon de fiare les meilleurs vernis,
soit a l’esprit de vin, soit à l’huile, suivie d’une
dissertation sur les moyens de les perfectionner.
Dans la seconde on enseigne la maniere de les
employer, polir & lustrer sur des sujets nus, des
peintures & des dorures, ce qui amene le détail
des procédés des peintres d’impression & des
doreurs, &c. Par le Sieur Watin, peintre, doreur,
vernisseur, & marchand de couleurs & de vernis.
8vo (200 x 120mm.) xvi, 249, [1 (errata)], [6 (table/
privilege)], 8 (supplement), contemporary English
half calf, marbled boards, red morocco label.
Paris: Chez Quillau. [& Chez] L’Auteur, 1772 £650
The 8pp. supplement lists artists’ materials for varnishing
and painting with prices available from Watin’s shop.
Watin was an important gilder and decorator working
in the new rococo style. A second edition was printed at
Paris in 1773 and followed by several more. Yale has the
Liège, 1778 “nouvelle edition”.
Item 191, Vries.
79
195 WEIDLER, Johann Friedrich. Institutiones geometriae subterraneae.
4to (202 x 150mm.) 80pp., 4 engraved plates.
Wittemberg: widow Gerdes, 1726.
Bound with: no. 137.
Weidler (1691-1755) was a mathematician and astronomer
chiefly known for his Bibliographia astronomica, and his
short Latin works which were translated into Russian and
printed in St. Petersburg & Moscow in the 1760s. This
work on mining was reprinted in 1751 (copy at Harvard).
This first edition is known in some copies in Germany
and two in England.
196 WILLIAM OF NEWBURGH HEARNE, Thomas, editor. Historia sive
Chronica Rerum Anglicarum libris quinque.
3 volumes royal 8vo (180 x 130mm.) cxxxiv, [2], 346,
[2], 347-600, [2], 601-944pp; 3 [of 4] folding engraved
plates, engravings in the text, contemporary red
morocco, covers with a gilt panel of a wild-strawberry
roll with fleurons at the corners, gilt spines, gilt
edges, marbled endleaves (spines and lower cover
of vol. 1 slightly faded).
Oxford: E Theatro Sheldoniano, 1719 £450
A fine Large Paper copy of William of Newburgh’s (11361201?) history of Britain from the time of Gildas and Bede
to May 1198.
197 WOLLEBIUS, Johannes. [Christianae theologiae compendium]
Az Keresztyéni Isteni-todomanyak… rövid
summaja… Mellyet- irt volt… Magyar nyelure
forditott… Comaromi Csipkés György.
it was ‘considered with equal or greater veneration than
the Bible itself’.
An English translation appeared in 1650, and the work
was known to Milton (cf. Parker John Milton, i, 293). The
translator into Hungarian György Csipkés Komáromi,
was born in 1628 at Komárom (hence that element of his
name) and died at Debrecen in October 1678. He seems to
have been immensely prolific, and he is chiefly known for
his translation of the Bible. Of this Hungarian translation
of Wollebius only the BL copy is recorded on OCLC, but
there is also a copy in the Bodleian.
198 WORCESTER, Edward Somerset, earl of.
A century of the names and scantlings
of such inventions, as at present I can call
to mind to have tried and perfected, which
(my former notes being lost) I have, at the
instance of a powerful friend, endeavoured
now in the year 1655. to set these down in
such a way as many sufficiently instruct me
to put any of them in practice. (An exact and
true definition of the most stupendiouos [sic]
water-commanding engine…- An act [dated 29
September 1663] to enable Edward Marquess
of Worcester to receive the benefit and profit
of a water-commanding engine – Verses
by James Rollock in Latin & English)
2 parts 12mo (125 x 70mm.) signed continuously
A-D12 E 6F12 G 6; [22], 72, [1blank leaf], [11], 34pp.
(A11v, D12, E5v, E6r are blank, woodcut of royal
arms on F1v), eighteenth century speckled calf, spine
gilt in compartments, red morocco lettering-piece,
hinges cracked, binding rubbed, without blank E6.
London: J. Grismond, 1663£2200
12mo (122 x 70mm.) [20], 452p., contemporary
Dutch vellum, yapp edges.
Utrecht: Jan van Zwol, 1653 £600
A rare and important first edition with the second part
present (34 final pages) which is not recorded in ESTC.
There is a copy with the 34 additional pages at UCL, and
one at Göttingen (4 BIBL UFF 735).
This work was originally published in Latin in 1626.
Wollebius (1586-1629) was a Swiss theologian, and his
Compendium was widely reprinted, and hugely influential,
being used both in Europe and America. It was in use at
Yale early in the 18th century.
In an article about the Hebrew words in the Yale seal,
Professor Dan Oren writes ‘Clarification of the Hebrew
words in may reside in Yale’s primary divinity text,
Johannes Wollebius The Abridgement of Christian Divinitie,
which was then studied all afternoon every Friday by
Yale students. Wollebius’s book was of such importance,
Samuel Johnson (class of 1714) noted sarcastically, that
Edward Somerset (1601-1667), sixth Earl and second
Marquis of Worcester presents 100 of his inventions in
a few words, and outlines especially the applications of
the steam engine. The ingenious Earl of Worcester, with
Gaspar Calthoff as an associate engineer, set an area in
Vauxhall, south of London, for mechanical and scientific
experimentations, such as an early precursor of the steam
machine, the “water commanding machine”. Besides the
book records other curious inventions: a mute discourse
by colours, an unsinkable ship, a pleasant floating garden,
a portable bridge, an artificial bird, to write in the dark,
“how to make a man to fly; which I have tried with a little
MAGGS
boy of ten years old in a barn, from one end to the other,
on a hay-mow.”, and others such.
The work was several times reprinted in the eighteenth
century, including an edition printed in Glasgow by Foulis,
and some in Newcastle and it was reprinted also by John
Murray in 1825. James Rollock or Rollo describes himself
as ‘Scoto-Belga -Britannus’, but seems otherwise unknown.
Wing W3532.
199 WRIGHT, Edward. A Short Treatise
of Dialling: shewing the making of
all sorts of sun-dials, horizontal, erect,
direct, declining, inclining, reclining; upon
any flat or plain superstices, howsoever
placed, with ruler and compasse onely,
without any arithmaticall calculation.
Small 4to (170 x 125 mm) [51], [1 (blank)] pp., fullpage woodcut of a clinatory, an instrument for
determining the declination of planes on B2r
(slightly shaved at the fore-edge), woodcut diagram
on B4r, the last 16 pages with full-page woodcut
diagrams (some slightly shaved) A2 cropped at head
with loss of the heading “The Contents of this Booke”
on the recto, sidenotes on C1r slightly shaved; a few
headlines shaved or cropped.
London: by John Beale for William Welby, 1614 £4400
Reissue of the first edition, The Arte of dialing of the same
year with the last folding sheet “H” cancelled and replaced
with a bifolium signed “G” and “(G2” [sic] with three
full-page woodcut diagrams numbered “Figure 16” to
“Figure 18”.
Edward Wright (1561-1615), mathematician and cartographer, was captain of the Hope on Drake’s West
Indian voyage of 1585/6 and was a captain on the Earl of
Cumberland’s raiding expedition to the Azores in 1589.
He is best-known for his navigational text Certaine Errors
of Navigation (1599). In later years he was employed by the
East India Company as a lecturer on navigation and was
a tutor to Prince Henry. The errata have been corrected
in ink.
STC 26023 Copies in USA: Folger (ex Harmsworth),
Bawdoin College (lacking portions of the title-page, the
contents leaf and the first three leaves of text), Harvard,
Horblit private collection (dispersed).
Bound with:
STIRRUP, Thomas. Horometria: or the
compleat diallist: Wherein the whole mystery
of the art of dialling is plainly taught three
several wayes; two of which are performed
geometrically by rule and compasse onely:
And the third instrumentally, by a quadrant
fitted for that purpose. With the working of
such propositions of the sphere, as are most
usefull in astronomie and navigation, both
geometrically and instrumentally… Also
how to draw a diall on the on the seeling of a
room, by W. L[?eybourn]. [12], 203, [1 (blank),
of 5 (without the final two blank leaves)] pp.,
woodcut frontispiece of a quadrant (repeated
on p. 116), numerous woodcut illustrations
and diagrams (a few very slightly shaved at the
fore-edge). Light browning, heavier towards
the end, a few headlines and page numbers
shaved, small hole from a paper flaw at the head
of Dd1 touching the headline, paper flaw in the
lower margin of N2 London: by R. & W. Leybourn,
for Thomas Pierrepont, 1652. Wing S5688.
Provenance: Heavily deleted contemporary inscription
on the back of the frontispiece: “Sum ex libris Row[…]
J[…] e Coll…”; annotations on the frontispiece, verso of
the title (defining Area, Tangent, Complement, Azimuth)
and on pp. 22 and 33 (cropped). A neat annotation in the
margin of p. 15 (cropped) may be by the mathematician
William Oughtred (1575-1660).
2 works in 1 volume 4to, mid-18th-century calf, spine
panels with a gilt floral ornament, red morocco
label; red edges.
PHILIP SIDNEY AS
PARAGON OF THE COURTIER
200 ZOSIMUS, the historian. Isto r iwn
b iblia H. VIII. Cum Angeli Politiani
interpretatione & huius partim supplemento,
partim examine Henrici Stephani:
utroque margine adscripto… Historiarum
[Zosimi] herodianicas subsequentium
libri duo, nunc primum graece editi.
2 parts 4to (233 x 157mm.) [8], 182 [2]; 79, [1(blank)]
pp. small burn holes in margins on pp. 35-40 (part
1), affecting the odd letter of printed marginal
notes, late seventeenth-century English panelled
calf, somewhat rubbed.
[Geneva]: H. Estienne, 1581 £700
Dedicated by Estienne to Sir Philip Sidney (1554-1586),
courtier and man of letters. Estienne stresses the utility
of history to courtiers (‘aulici’) and writes how these two
81
historical commentaries are as it were theatres in which
the tragedies, comedies and tragicomedies of court life
are played out and may serve as a parallel to modern life.
He urges Sidney, who he hopes is the same man that he
knew in Germany and Austria and unchanged by life at
court, to read the translation, and ends with two couplets
urging the reading of these two historians above all in
order to see Rome staggering towards its decline (‘Qui
titubantem uult Romam tandemque cadentem /cernere,
prae cunctis legat historicis’). Estienne and Sidney had
met in 1573 and the former gave Sidney a collection of
the Greek paroemiographers, and dedicated to Sidney
his 1576 edition of the Greek New Testament.
In his preface to the reader Estienne explains how
he has corrected Politian’s Latin version, which is ‘more
elegant than accurate’, and gives a number of specific
examples where Polititian has misunderstood the Greek.
His own versions are printed in the margin of the text.
First edition. This work went through several editions up
to the early eighteenth century. The author (1573?-1647),
a cleric from Lucca, who has studied at Louvain and had
been a pupil of Lipsius, and at Pisa, taught in his home
town from 1609. He was the author of several books on
Roman antiquities.
202 MURET, Marc Antoine.
Variarum lectionum libri XV.
8vo 325, [23]p., last leaf blank, contemporary vellum,
yapp edges.
Leiden: [F. Raphelengius] C. Plantin, 1586
£600
A reprint of the 1580 Plantin edition, in which seven new
books were added to the original eight published in Venice
in 1559. This appears to be the only copy recorded in which
‘Lugduni Batavorum’ actually appears in the imprint. Most
copies have ‘Antverpiae, apud C. Plantinum’.
Renouard 149.7; Schreiber 249.
Voet 1724.
ADDENDA
203 NONIUS MARCELLUS. De proprietate sermonum, iam
demum… restitutus… industria Hadriani
Iunii medici. Addita est in calce Fulgentij
Placiadae libellus de prisco sermone.
201 LAURENZI, Giuseppe
[LAURENTIUS, Josephus]. Amalthea
onomastica in qua voces universae abstrusiores…
e latinis, latinograecis, latinobarbaris…
excerptae, italice interpretatae, etc.
4to (230 x 165mm.) [8], 960 [=900]; 88p., title printed in red and black, half-title, contemporary calf,
fore-edges coloured.
Lucca: Baldassare del Giudice, 1640 £550
8vo (162 x 105mm.) [16], 592, [40]p., contemporary
panelled calf, gilt
Antwerp: ex officina C. Plantini, 1565 £600
Printed in 1250 copies. Voet 1752B.
5
SAPER E AUDE
Left to right: items 125; Macpherson, 61; Dalrymple, 139; Nannini, 28; Birch, 81; Fontenelle.
MAGGS
Item 80, Robert Fludd