16th-18th centuries: humanism, religious wars, Renaissance to Enlightenment society, history, letters and arts of the Ancien Régime

Second Elzevir edition of Milton's first text, which was originally published in 1651 in Amsterdam. First edition of Milton's Second and Third Defences.
Full polished tobacco calf bindings, ca. 1820. Spines with raised bands, decorated with four floral tools, fillets and rolls. Chocolate morocco title and volume labels. Cold-stamped border on the boards with small corner fleurons. Inner roll-tooled border. All edges gilt. A handsome copy.


NB: This volume is available at the bookshop on request within 48 hours.

First edition, one of 95 copies on pur fil, the only deluxe issue after 45 copies on Hollande.
A slight vertical crease on the front cover.
A handsome copy.

First edition, one of 220 numbered copies on vergé d'Arches paper, this copy one of 100 reserved for the "sélections Lardanchet".
A good, well-margined copy.

First edition, rare.
Half blond sheep bindings. Smooth spines decorated in the grotesque style. Red morocco title labels and beige morocco volume labels. Library labels at foot. Two small wormholes along the lower joint of volume I. A split with loss at the lower joint of volume II. A good, decorative copy.

First edition.
Contemporary full bronze calf, spine with four raised bands lavishly decorated in gilt with fillets and dentelles and with blind-stamped tools in the compartments, sides with large blind-stamped panels composed of an elaborate frame of dentelles and fillets, four corner rosettes, and a central lozenge-shaped cartouche ornamented with gilt arabesques and rosettes, corners bumped, gilt rolls to the edges and turn-ins, gilt dentelle border to the pastedowns, a few scuffs, all edges gilt, strictly contemporary binding, signed Martin.

Our copy is complete with the frontispiece and the facsimile of the signatures of Molière and his daughter.
Some foxing.
A handsome...