Antique Books

First edition from the Imprimerie Royale, complete in nine quarto volumes with all 262 black-and-white engraved plates.

Contemporary full mottled calf, spines with raised bands decorated with guilloche tooling and gilt ornaments in the compartments, red morocco lettering-pieces and numbering-pieces, triple gilt fillet border on boards, double gilt fillet on board edges, marbled endpapers and pastedowns, marbled edges. Minor variations in the tooling on volume 3.

In...

New edition, partly original, revised, corrected and enlarged.

Bound in full red morocco, spines with five raised bands decorated with gilt garlands and compartments adorned with crowned “LL” monograms, gilt rolls on the caps, triple gilt fillets framing the covers, gilt armorial stamps of Louis XV at the centre of each board, gilt dentelle border on the turn-ins, gilt fillets along the edges, marbled edges. Slightly rubbed corners. Contemporary bindings.

Some leaves slightly yellowed, minor paper flaw on page 101 of the second volume.

Extensive and highly useful table of contents at the end of the second volume. Jean-Antoine Soulatges, lawyer at the Parliament of...

A rare first edition, of which no subsequent reprint exists, complete with all his Neo-Latin poems, chiefly composed in Rome. The volume also contains two Greek poems at ff. 60 and 62, together with a poem which inspired the celebrated sonnet Happy he who like Ulysses.

Modern binding in full limp vellum, smooth spine, red edges, white pastedowns and endleaves.

Some defects within: discreet restoration to inner margin of title verso; small tear without loss at foot of ff. 2-3; dampstaining to lower margin of ff. 25-28 and 45-48; minimal marginal defect to f. 44, not affecting...

The ‘Kehl edition’, the most renowned edition of Voltaire's works, illustrated and published on deluxe paper. It was printed on five different types of paper, and only the deluxe editions, such as ours on laid paper, feature engravings. These are naturally the most sought-after and rarest copies.

Binding in full painted sheep decorated with a “honeycomb” motif, smooth spine tooled with gilt fleurons, fillets and compartments, light beige calf lettering and volume pieces, gilt chain-roll border on covers, marbled endpapers, gilt roll on edges, all edges marbled, contemporary binding. Two volumes (nos. 50 and 70) with slight variations in gilt tools on the spines and...

First edition.

Full red morocco binding, round spine with five raised bands decorated with gilt fleurons, slight rubbing on the caps, double frame of blind-stamped gilt fillets on the covers, with fleurons at the corners of the inner frame, edges slightly blunt, marbled paper endpapers and back covers, gilt edges and heads, very elegant 19th-century binding ‘a la Du Seuil’ signed Quinet on the first endpaper. 

Rare first edition of Chamblain de Marivaux's first theatrical success, The Surprise of Love, published four years before The Second Surprise of Love. This play, performed in the spring of 1722 before being published the...

Rare first edition of the French translation prepared by Thomas-François Dalibard at the request of the Comte de Buffon (cf Wheeler Gift 367d. Waller 11339. DSB V, pp. 129-139).

Full mottled calf, spine with five raised bands ruled in gilt and decorated with double gilt compartments with floral tools, red morocco lettering-piece, gilt rolls on the caps (partly rubbed), restorations to head and tail of spine as well as to the corners of the boards, marbled endpapers and pastedowns, gilt fillets on the edges, marbled edges, contemporary binding.

Some foxing, a dampstain to the upper right corner of the first endpaper.

The English first edition was published in London in...

First edition of Leonhard Euler’s first book devoted entirely to astronomy, published in Berlin by Ambrosius Haude in 1744, with no date printed on the title-page. Quarto, illustrated with an allegorical frontispiece after F. H. Frisch, engraved by Berot, and four folding plates of astronomical and geometrical diagrams. The frontispiece was printed on leaf A4, which would normally have contained pages 7 and 8, and was then placed facing the title-page: the pagination consequently passes directly from 6 to 9, with no loss of text. 185 pages, numbered through 187.

Modern...

First edition of the French translation, illustrated with a folding copper-engraved frontispiece by Bénard: "Mort du Capitaine Cook à Owhy-hée, Fevrier 1779," and a folding map titled "Carte montrant la route suivie par M. Cook… dans son troisième et dernier Voyage."

See O'Reilly and Reitman, 419. See also Hill, p. 253, for the first English edition. Forbes, Hawaiian National Biography, 45.

Contemporary binding in half marbled calf with vellum-tipped corners, spine decorated with gilt floral compartments, red morocco title label, marbled paper boards, red edges.

Restored loss to the title page. The half-title is lacking in our copy; the boards are modern.

"An...

First edition of Pierre Le Tourneur’s French translation, published in Paris by Buisson in 1787, in two quarto volumes. It appeared the same year as a more common three-volume octavo edition issued by the same publisher. The work is illustrated with a folding frontispiece showing a view of the Cape, a large folding map of the Cape and 15 hors-texte plates, several folding. In the present copy, the plates have been bound at the end of volumes I and II. Some still bear the indication “Tom. III”, inherited from the pagination of the octavo edition, showing that the two authorised editions circulated with the same engraved plates.

French-language Dutch edition of the Six Voyages, published in Utrecht in 1712 by Guillaume Vande Water and Guillaume & Jacob Poolsum, one of only three French editions of the work printed outside France between the original Paris edition of 1676 and 1724, the others being Amsterdam 1678 and The Hague 1718. Illustrated with a portrait of Tavernier, an allegorical frontispiece signed J. Goeree, and 34 plates, 27 of them folding, depicting among other subjects coins, objects, plans, customs, and precious stones encountered during his travels.

Contemporary full brown calf, preserved in a modern slipcase covered with old...

Second edition.

Bound in full roan, spine with five raised bands framed in gilt and decorated in gilt, edges framed in gilt partially faded in places, all edges speckled.
Lower corners bumped, worming visible on the first seven leaves.

A rare edition of this work, which include Dialogue de l'amour et de l'amitié, Critique de l'Opéra, La Peinture, Le Miroir ou la métamorphose d'Orante, La Chambre de justice de l'amour, une Critique de l'opéra Alceste.
Also featured is Charles Perrault's description of the now-lost Labyrinth of Versailles, a creation by the great Le Nôtre.

This remarkable labyrinth boasted thirty-nine fountains, each illustrating one...

Charming edition illustrated with a frontispiece, a framed title and 9 half-page illustrations, reproducing vignettes by Fokke after De Sève - with the final illustration for L'Adroite Princesse, newly added. 

Complete with the Épître dédicatoire by P. Darmancour [Charles Perrault] to 'La Grande Mademoiselle', Anne-Marie d'Orléans, cousin of Louis XIV.

Half-sheep binding, smooth spine ruled in gilt, and a diagonally stamped gilt title. Beige paper boards, speckled edges. Small paper defect in the margin of page 75, scattered foxing, a small brown stain affecting the illustration of Cinderella. A name written in ink in the lower margin of page 21.
 
This...

Three quarto volumes in uniform contemporary full dark red morocco. Spines with raised bands richly decorated in gilt, boards tooled in the Du Seuil manner with double gilt panels and floral cornerpieces around the central compartment, gilt rolls to the board edges, elaborate gilt turn-ins, all edges gilt.

Bindings rubbed, with the corners slightly turned. Small loss of leather at the head of the New Testament volume and a loss at the foot of the lower joint of the first volume. The opening endleaf of volume I is becoming detached. The first six leaves of the New Testament show marginal browning from earlier damp exposure, extending...

First edition.

Contemporary full tree-grained sheepskin, spine with five raised bands, gilt compartments and fleurons between the bands, blond leather lettering-pieces, gilt fillet to the board edges, shell-paper pastedowns, red edges. Some rubbing and losses, corners lightly bumped, upper corner of the rear board damaged, a manufacturing flaw to the pastedowns, minor foxing and soiling.

The fundamental work of sensualist philosophy, in a strictly contemporary binding.

First edition. A few head-piece vignettes, ornamental bandeaux, decorated initials, and tailpieces.

Contemporary full mottled sheep, spine with five raised bands, gilt panels and fleurons between the bands, gilt-lettered tan leather label, doublures of French curl paper, red edges. Upper corners lightly bumped, a few rubbed patches and small losses, a dampstain to the first leaves, a few minor paper losses to some leaves.

Published several decades before the results of Edward Jenner's research on vaccination, this collection brings together the principal texts on inoculation, the procedure that constitutes its direct forerunner.

Le Barbier de Séville and Le Mariage de Figaro bound in one volume.

Modern half brown chagrin binding, sides in yellow and black marbled paper, spine with five raised bands, author, titles and dates gilt, one gilt fleuron, stone paper doublures. Corners lightly rubbed, leaves lightly browned, a few scattered spots of foxing and soiling, a tear to the title page, a modern repair to the upper margin of the first leaves.

Rare piracies bearing the date of the first edition and issued by the same publisher.

First complete edition.

It is illustrated with two frontispieces, twenty-four full-page engravings, and a folding map of Telemachus's travels. The portrait of Fénelon serving as frontispiece to the first volume is signed Baillieul and Duflos; the second frontispiece, together with the plates, is signed Bonnart fils and Giffart, while the map is drawn by Rousset and engraved by Berey. A few head-pieces, bandeaux, and ornamental initials. 

Bindings in full red morocco signed Chambolle-Duru, richly decorated covers, spine with five raised bands ruled in gilt, gilt panels and fleurons between the bands, author, title, volume number, place and date lettered in gilt on...

Illustrated edition with twenty-two copper-engraved vignettes, including one used as frontispiece. A few engraved tailpieces.

Plain wrappers in blue-grey, with manuscript title and date written lengthwise on the spine in ink. Wrappers slightly soiled, with a few creases and tears; scattered foxing and soiling to the leaves.

New edition of this ancient pastoral romance, illustrated with a frontispiece and eight full-page engravings. With several headpieces, decorated initials and tailpieces.

Dark yellow morocco, spine with five raised bands, author, title and date lettered in gilt, gilt fillets to board edges and headcaps, gilt inner dentelle, all edges gilt; tan morocco case by Riviere & Son, spine with five raised bands, author, title and date lettered in gilt, blind-tooled fillets. Raised bands lightly rubbed, with a few scuffs to the slipcase, otherwise a handsome copy.

Mortimer L. Schiff's guilt red morocco bookplate on the front pastedown.

Revised and enhanced edition, illustrated with a frontispiece, an allegorical composition on the title page, and four full-page engravings by Bernard Picart. An allegorical figure within the text, several headpieces and tailpieces.

Contemporary mottled brown sheepskin binding, spine with five raised bands decorated with gilt motifs, red morocco title label, gilt roulette to the board edges, marbled paper pastedowns, red edges. Corners and headcap rubbed, some scuffing and losses at the joints, trifling soiling to a few leaves. Manuscript ex-libris "Messieurs Falconet et Lancelot" and ink date "8bre [October] 1785" on the title page. Manuscript note in ink on a front...

New Elzevirian edition of these two works brought together in a single volume.

Two title-pages printed in red and black with the printer’s mark, five headpieces, five initials and three ornamental tailpieces.

Contemporary full vellum binding with small flaps, flat spine with manuscript author, titles and year of publication, traces of ties.

Binding slightly warped and soiled, the second title on the spine rubbed away, occasional very light spotting to the leaves.

Rare new edition based on the first French translation, produced in 1699 by William Popple and published by the Widow of J. van Dyck. A major work by Martin Clifford, originally published anonymously in 1674 under the title A Treatise of Humane Reason, which provoked immediate controversy within the Anglican Church; in the tradition of Spinoza and anticipating Locke, the author assigns a prominent role to reason in the practice of Christian faith. Clifford's more radical positions are thought to have been moderated in the French translation.

Third edition, revised and augmented by the author, published during his lifetime. The copy is complete with the title-frontispiece depicting a "portico of Tuscan architectural order" according to the description of the 1805 edition, whose terrace shows a man ploughing the fields, indicating the content of the book. It is likewise complete with the folding plate and the eight elaborate vignettes. The first edition of this major text was issued from the press only five years earlier, in 1600.

A fine large-paper copy on vellum of the 1796 edition, which contains several previously unpublished texts by the author, a frontispiece portrait, 13 illustrations and 2 maps, engraved by Pierre-Alexandre Tardieu, Claude-Nicolas Malapeau, P. F. Tardieu, A. Girardet, Jean Louis Charles Pauquet, François Denis Née, Emmanuel-Jean-Népomucène de Ghendt, Charles Emmanuel Patas, Noël Le Mire and Vincent-Marie Langlois (in order of appearance).

Contemporary half long-grain red morocco bindings, smooth spines divided by...

A complete set of the astronomical writings of Jean Sylvain Bailly, partly in first edition. This is the main work of the author,  first Mayor of Paris, elected during his lifetime to three French academies, a distinction previously achieved only by Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle.

The present set comprises the second edition of the Histoire de l'astronomie ancienne, the new edition of the Histoire de l'astronomie moderne, and the first edition of the Traité de l'astronomie indienne et...

First edition of this dictionary compiled by the Reverend Magnus Swederus, who in the first part of his life was a leading figure in the Swedish book trade, with several important works of chemistry among his publications, notably Carl Wilhelm Scheele's Chemische Abhandlung von der Luft und dem Feuer and Torbern Olof Bergman's Opuscula physica et chemica, published in 1777 and 1779 respectively. Swederus was also behind a considerable number of periodicals, as well as lending libraries.

Brown...

Second edition, the "most complete of this work" (baron Pichon sales catalogue, 3rd part, no. 5531) containing a map of Dauphiné, an engraving by Berey fils, and six plates depicting seals.

Full marbled brown sheep bindings, spines with six raised bands framed by gilt fillets and compartments richly decorated with gilt floral motifs, red morocco title labels, green morocco volume labels, blind fillets on the board edges, red edges; contemporary bindings.

First edition, first printing, complete with its engraved title page and dedication page, as well as its 59 maps, most of them multicoloured, all mounted on guards. Our copy is bound with the "Catalogue des ouvrages, tant anciens que modernes, du fonds du Sr Desnos, Ingénieur-Géographe pour les Globes & Sphères" for the year 1765.

Contemporary binding in full tree-calf, spine with five raised bands and gilt-tooled compartments decorated with pomegranate fleurons, red morocco lettering-piece, triple blind-ruled...

Rare first edition of a work by the "German Beccaria," unrecorded in French libraries according to WorldCat, composed while the author held the chair of feudal law at the University of Leipzig, a position obtained at the age of thirty, three years prior.

Contemporary full brown sheep, smooth spine gilt with fleurons, light brown morocco lettering-piece, red edges. Bookplate of Count Giacomo Manzoni, former Finance Minister of the Roman Republic, concealing an ownership inscription written in...

Duodecimo edition, published in the same year as the first edition, setting out a key episode in the Chinese Rites Controversy, a dispute still ongoing at the time of publication, pitting the Jesuits against the Franciscans and Dominicans.

Contemporary mottled brown sheep, spine with five raised bands and gilt compartments, gilt board edges, red mottled edges. Two early ownership inscriptions, the first on the upper pastedown and the second on the title page, both in brown ink.

First edition of an important work by Charles Sorel, historiographer of France and novelist, in which he surveys with severity and wit the literary production of his time, which he considered overly given to fiction.

 Complete with its eagle headpieces.

Contemporary full mottled brown calf, spine with five raised bands decorated with gilt compartments and gilt title, gilt roll on the board edges, red mottled...

First edition of this ambitious work recounting the history of power in France from Clovis, by a man of letters who two years later would be elected to the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres.

Contemporary bindings in marbled brown calf, spines with five raised bands framed by a gilt roulette, further decorated with compartments of gilt fleurons in the form of pomegranates, light brown morocco title and numbering pieces, gilt fillet on the board edges, red edges, pastedowns and endpapers of shell-pattern...

First edition, decorated with provincial coats of arms, as well as elaborately engraved headpieces, initials and tailpieces. 

Contemporary mottled brown calf, spine richly gilt with fleur-de-lys tools, red morocco title and numbering pieces, gilt roll to the board edges, red mottled edges, marbled endpapers and pastedowns.

Spine headcaps lacking, wear to the hinges, boards slightly warped, gilding rubbed to the board edges, scuffing and scratching to the boards, corners and board edges rubbed. 

Occasional light foxing throughout.

Likely first edition of a theological and juridical work, unrecorded on WorldCat, complete with its woodcut title-page bearing multiple allusions to the Franciscan Order, including the cord and the arms of the Order. The lay members of the Confraternity of the Cord of Saint Francis, to whom the papal indulgences confirmed herein are addressed, were thereby enabled to associate themselves spiritually with the Franciscan Order without taking religious vows. Several preliminary pieces accompany the treatise, attractively embellished throughout with foliate, zoomorphic, and figural headpieces and...

Second edition, partly original, notably augmented with several additional pieces, complete with the caricature  woodcut portrait of the widow Oudot as frontispiece, printed in green, as is the title. According to Barbier, the burlesque portrait was engraved by one of the authors, the comte de Caylus himself.

Contemporary full mottled brown calf, smooth spine richly gilt with fleurons, palms and scrollwork, brown-red morocco lettering-piece, triple gilt fillet bordering the boards with fleurons at corners, gilt...

First edition of this work published by the Société du Bout-du-Banc, the celebrated literary salon presided over by Mademoiselle Jeanne-Françoise Quinault and the Comte de Caylus. This intimate circle, originally comprising eight members, would gather on Mondays at dinner to exchange ideas and to write; at the close of each meal, every distinguished guest was required to set down a few lines (whether in the coarse poissard style or in a more refined vein) on paper. It was in this context that Les Fêtes roulantes, ou les regrets des petites rues came into being, in the wake of the celebrations...

First edition of a play regarded as historically significant, performed for the first time nineteen days before the execution of Louis XVI, which set all of Paris and then France ablaze to the point of interrupting the King's trial, by a constitutional monarchist playwright.

Nineteenth-century Bradel binding in half brown percaline, smooth spine decorated with a gilt fleuron, red morocco lettering-piece, pebble-pattern marbled paper boards, edges lightly red-speckled.

First edition, at one time attributed to Bernard Le Bouyer de Fontenelle, on the loves of a shepherd of illustrious lineage: Mirtil, son of Venus and Adonis. Complete copy with its engraved title page by Louis Legrand and its six plates drawn by Hubert François Gravelot and engraved by Louis Legrand.

Half marbled calf binding, spine with five raised bands decorated with dotted gilt fillets, five compartments richly gilt with fillets and fleurons, pebble-pattern marbled paper boards, red edges, pastedowns and...

First edition of a work by an Illuminist author, also a barrister at the Parlement, known for his licentious and libertine writings, including L'Histoire de Dom Bougre, portier des Chartreux. This work was also at one time attributed to Pierre Lambert de Saumery, who published under the pseudonym "de Mirone."

Midnight blue half morocco with corners, spine with five gilt raised bands decorated with compartments richly gilt with arabesques, fillets and small stars, marbled paper boards framed with gilt...

Third edition, the second issued by Simon de Colines (cf. Renouard, Bibliogr. de Finé, 357-358. Brun, 189. Mortimer, French, 228 (not this ed.). Schreiber, 188. Not in Fairfax Murray.)

This edition constitutes a revised and improved reissue of the 1535 edition, with a newly cut woodcut architectural border to the title ("Quadrivium II").

Full vellum binding, smooth spine, manuscript title at the head of the spine, modern binding in the style of early vellum bindings,

A small tear to the title-page restored, a date inscribed in ink beside the printed date of publication.

A pleasing copy of one of Simon de Colines’ typographical masterpieces.

Illustrated first edition, lacking the frontispiece portrait of Hippocrates, but complete with its five plates, fine decorative initials and large tailpieces.

Contemporary full tree calf, smooth spine richly gilt with, among other decorations, a palmette roll, tan morocco lettering piece, gilt roll on board edges. Ink ownership inscription on the front pastedown: "J. E. Petrequin \ lyon, nov. 1856," in the hand of Joseph Pierre Eléonor Pétrequin, chief surgeon at the Hôtel-Dieu de Lyon, who received the...

One of the first collected editions of these seven comic novellas, initially printed separately, by the Sieur de Préfontaine, regarded as a first-rate author by Charles Louandre: "without seeking to diminish in any way the merit of Boileau, without disputing his title as legislator of taste, one may say that Charles Sorel, Furetière, Préfontaine, [...] contributed alongside him and before him to cleansing the French Parnassus."

The first edition of one of the short stories contained in this volume...

First edition by a forgotten Ferrarese polygraph and historian, which nevertheless enjoyed considerable success upon publication and was followed by two subsequent editions in 1577 and 1599. According to Marc Adam Kolakowski, Alessandro Sardi, together with Johannes Boemus, pioneered the use of "antiquarian and ethnographic perspectives" in the study of ancient religions.

Fine historiated initials depicting various Greco-Roman deities.

New edition of the translation by Alain-René Le Sage, revised by Pons-Auguste Alletz, some forty years after its initial publication. Two frontispieces decorate each volume. As we learn from the Avertissement, this classic, which flowed from the pen of the author nicknamed the "Divine Spaniard" by his compatriots, was then, in the 1770s, unknown to a large part of the French youth.

Contemporary binding in full brown tree calf, smooth gilt spine with four compartments separated by traditional and dotted...

First edition limited to only 250 copies, which were not offered for sale but given to the author's close circle. This former minister under Louis XV composed these essays in 1736, and his son, the Marquis de Paulmy, had them published nearly fifty years later.

Contemporary half brown calf, grained paper boards, spine with five raised bands decorated with five compartments featuring double gilt fillets, red morocco lettering piece, red speckled edges.

First editions of two works by Baron Jean-Baptiste de Cloots, known as Anacharsis Cloots.

Contemporary half green basane bindings, green paper boards, smooth spines decorated with gilt fillets and dotted rolls, red basane title-labels, yellow edges. Bindings rubbed, some scuffing and losses, a few light corner creases. The "Lettres d'un jeune philosophe à un jeune théologien," a text intended to close La Certitude des preuves du Mahométisme, is bound in the first volume after the first part of the work. It is followed by the "Supplément à la certitude des preuves du mahométisme," and, also in the first volume, by another work by Cloots, the Lettre sur...

Celebrated edition entirely engraved both images and text, richly illustrated with 6 engraved titles, a frontispiece and an engraved half-title for volume I, together with 243 figures, 473 vignettes and tail-pieces engraved by Fessard.

The illustration of the first three volumes is the work of Monnet, and in the last three by Fessard after Bardin, Bidauld, Caresme, Desrais, Houel, Kobell, Le Clerc, Leprince, Loutherbourg, and Meyer. The text is entirely engraved by Montulay and Drouet within decorative borders.

First complete collected edition, published in Paris in 1781 in twelve volumes. For the first time, it brings together in a single set Marivaux’s plays, novels, periodical writings, and a number of prose works previously scattered across separate publications. Portrait of Marivaux as frontispiece, painted by Pougin de Saint-Aubin, within an ornamental frame designed by Clément-Pierre Marillier and engraved by François-Robert Ingouf, known as Ingouf le Jeune.

Uniform contemporary full mottled tan calf. Spines with raised bands, gilt compartments and rolls at foot; tan...

"Vous avez été leurs maîtres, et vous en avez mal agi ; ils sont devenus les vôtres, et ils vous pardonnent ; faites vos réflexions là-dessus." ["You have been their masters, and you have acted badly; they have become yours, and they forgive you; reflect upon this."] (Trivelin, final scene)

First edition of the French translation. First published in English in 1712 under the title A cruising voyage round the world. Illustrated with 2 engraved titles, 14 engraved plates and 7 maps including 2 large format (Paraguay and Chile - mainland Peru and Brazil and the Land of the Amazons) and a world map.
Bound in full brown sprinkled calf, spine elaborately gilt, gilt roulettes on the edges, all red speckled edges. Expertly restored (corners, upper and lower part of joints). Two small restored tears on the world map, not affecting the image.
Ex-libris in ink "Sr Remy" to the upper left margin of the title-page.
A tear to the world map, not affecting the...

Second collective first edition, with continuous pagination, containing for the first time Phèdre, the Discours prononcé à l'Académie françoise à la réception de Messieurs de Corneille et de Bergeret and the Idylle sur la paix.(Brunet, IV, 1077). Work illustrated with 12 figures including 2 frontispieces, most signed by François Chauveau; the frontispiece of the first volume engraved by Le Brun. 
Edition shared between Barbin, Denys Thierry and Pierre Trabouillet.
Full midnight blue morocco binding from the late 19th century signed at the foot of the pastedown Thibaron-Joly (Former worker of Trautz, Thibaron partnered with the gilder Joly in 1874). Spine with raised bands decorated...

Lyon edition of 1609, published at the expense of Jean Pillehotte, the second edition of Busaeus’s Panarion after the original edition issued in Mainz in 1608, and the first known French edition of the text, still in Latin.

Engraved frontispiece-title, presenting an allegory of the seven deadly sins figured as monsters surrounding the risen Christ, his feet set upon a seven-headed dragon, with the motto Vincenti dabo manna absconditum from the Book of Revelation. A few faint spots of foxing and traces of rubbing, a brown stain of approximately one centimetre on the lower board, and a small hole in the lower margin of leaf 553.

Rich...

Rare first edition decorated with ornamental headpieces, letterheads and culs-de-lampe.

Posterior binding in full red morocco, Jansenist spine, gilt date at the foot, marbled endpapers, frame of gilt roll-tooling on the pastedown endpapers, all edges gilt.
A very beautiful copy of one of the most famous plays in the French repertoire. It was played for the first time on 13 December 1669 at the Hôtel de Bourgogne and received a mixed reception. At the head of this edition is a preface by the playwright responding to his critics:

“Of all the works that I have given to the public, there is none
that attracted more applause and nor...

Rare and genuine posthumous first edition of the first six books of the Confessions, the remaining volumes not appearing until 1789. Several other editions were issued shortly thereafter, but the evidence provided by the commentary published in the June 1782 issue of the Journal Helvétique clearly establishes that this separately printed edition, known as the "large type" issue, is indeed the very first (F. Michaux, "L'Édition originale de la première partie des 'Confessions' de J.-J. Rousseau" in Revue d'Histoire littéraire de la France, 35th Year, No. 2 (1928), pp. 250-253).
Contemporary half calf bindings, flat spines tooled with gilt fillets and decorated...

Antwerp, Ex officina Plantiniana, apud Ioannem Moretum, 1602. Small duodecimo, 8.2 x 12.6 cm. Three works bound in one volume.

A collection of three portable editions issued by the Plantin Press under the imprint of Jan Moretus: Cl. Claudianus, Theod. Pulmanni Craneburgii diligentia, & fide summa, è vetustis codicibus restitutus. Unà cum Del-Rio notis, 351 pages and 1 unnumbered leaf; Aviani Aesopicarum fabularum liber. A Theod. Pulmanno Craneburgio ex membranis in lucem editus, 29 pages and 3 unnumbered leaves; and Ad Cl. Claudiani V. C. Opera Martini Antonii Del-Rio notae, 90 pages and 3 unnumbered leaves...

Third edition after the original published in Bordeaux in 1593 and a second Parisian edition in 1594. The copy mentions the second edition because it is the second to be published in Bordeaux.
Extremely rare handwritten presentation signed by the author on the page of the endpaper: “Pour Monsieur de Rives en memoire de moy. A Caors ce iiij [4] may 1595. Charron.” “For Monseiur de Rives in memory of me. In Caors this iiij [4] May 1595. Charron.” It is, without doubt, about Jean III de Rieu, Lord of Rives, who belonged to the family of Antoine Hébrard de Saint-Sulpice, bishop of Cahors. Pierre Charron had been called theological by this same bishop of Cahors and became his curate...

First edition of the Marcello Virgilio translation in Latin, dedicated to Leo X. The princeps edition was based on an old translation by Petrus de Abano (ca. 1250-1316), and published in 1478 in Colle di Val d'Elsa. The original text was written in Greek around 60 AD.
Title page in red and black. 45 lines per page. Colophon : "Florentiæ per hæredes Philippi Iuntæ Florentini. Anno ab incarnatione Domini.1518. Idibus Octobris. Leone decimo Christiana[m] Rempub. gerente." Superb Filippo Giunta printer's mark on verso of last leaf. Bibliographical note in French opposite the title page.
Full modern limp vellum binding, all edges faintly bluish.
A lack of a small piece of paper...

First edition displaying all the distinctive features of its publication: it presents no capital letters except at the beginning of paragraphs and it is the very first work to have been printed with Voltaire's spelling. Our copy is complete with its errata leaf, which is often missing.
Later bindings (19th century) in full red morocco, Jansenist spines with five raised bands, dates and places gilt at foot, boards struck at center with large gilt typographical fleurons, double gilt fillets on leading edges and headcaps, pastedowns lined with blue morocco presenting a wide gilt decorative border, monogrammed bookplates mounted on the pastedowns of each volume, following endpapers of...

Rare edition of this bawdy tale, complete in two parts published separately. It is illustrated with four wood-engraved vignettes, borrowed from Decameron of Boccace (Venice, 1531) and ingeniously twisted to suit their context. This edition is the first text of the author and is unique in that it has not been corrected. The book will be translated in French only in 1792.
Modern binding in full red morocco, the spine in five compartments, gilt date and title, golden fillets surround the cover, the endpaper and pastedown of vellum.
Provenance: Library of Gianni de Marco with its book plate and itsseal.
No copies in an American Library, one in the British...

Rare Collection of Three Theological Commentaries: 

-In libros Paralipomenon, sive Chronicorum Commentarius. Ludwig Lavater. Printed by Christophorus Froschoverus, Zurich, 1573. First edition, with the printer’s mark on the title-page. Preface by Ludwig Lavater dated February 1573. Numerous genealogical tables.

- Praelectiones Ioannis Calvini in librum prophetiarum Danielis. Jean Calvin. Edited by Jean Budée and Charles de Jonvilliers. Apud Bartholomaeum Vincentium, 1571. Place not indicated, but almost certainly Geneva, based on typographical evidence and the preface dated 14 September 1571. Hebrew text in bold, with translation to the...

Seventh edition, first to illustrate Zimeo, adorned with 7 plates by Moreau le Jeune: a frontispiece and 4 plates for Les Saisons, engraved by Delaunay, Duclos, Prévost and Simonet, and 2 plates for the Contes, Poésies fugitives and Fables orientales, together with 4 headpiece vignettes by Choffard. Our copy is further enriched with separate pulls of the title-page ornament and Choffard's vignettes.
Nineteenth-century binding in full midnight-blue morocco. Five-raised-band spine decorated with pastoral flowers (vine, wheat and billhook, game and hunting horn...) and gilt compartments. Triple gilt fillet and...