The first edition of a rare suite of 23 splendidly engraved plates of drawing models for art students by the Bolognese artist Lodovico Mattioli (1662-1747). The models were adopted from works by Agostino Carracci, Jusepe de Ribera, Federico Barocci, and Carlo Maratti. The 23 finely executed plates represent a variety..... More

Scarce first edition of the first Italian-language Sacrobosco, composed by the Servite monk Mauro and containing an unusually rich program of illustrations. The work is further augmented by Mauro’s ‘additioni’ to the basic text of Sacrobosco and several appendices for the benefit of his vernacular reader, including the ‘secrets of..... More

An exceedingly rare (with no copies recorded in OCLC) pocket-sized booklet, published in 1580 for the Franciscan-observant Confraternity of the Immaculate Conception of the Church of San Francesco in Brescia. It details the indulgences and privileges, granted under unification with the Archconfraternity of the Immaculate Conception of San Lorenzo in..... More

The second posthumous edition of Tullia d’Aragona’s collection of poetry, published by Antoine Bulifon, who was “fundamentally important for the diffusion of women’s poetry” (Rabitti, p. 50). One of the most famous Italian sixteenth-century female poet-courtesans, Tullia d’Aragona (1501/1505-1556) has received considerable scholarly attention in the last decades, resulting in..... More

The second edition of a very rare work on military architecture by Giusto Emilio Alberghetti (1666-1755), a member of the famous Alberghetti family, the chief suppliers of guns and cannons to the Venetian Arsenal from 1487 to 1793. The work provides a copiously illustrated survey of defensive and offensive architecture..... More

Very rare first edition of this eyewitness account: “the first European book devoted exclusively to China” (Lach, I.1, p. 330). This highly important work, the first printed book published in the West on the subject, served as the primary source on China for European authors and their readers - most..... More

An important map in a striking example that provides one of the finest specimens of Coronelli’s robust engraving style. In addition to being a state-of-the-art depiction of China, it also serves a visual compendium of the tools of a seventeenth-century surveyor and cartographer. The precisely engraved instruments decorating the map..... More

A very attractive large bird’s eye-view of Venice derived from Merian’s 1638 version, updated with the new addition of the Basilica della Salute, which was completed only in 1687. The view is “considered one of the most beautiful and appreciated Venetian maps” (Moretto, 114), and is set within a laurel..... More

A fine late-18th-century printed écran à main, or hand-held fire screen, charmingly decorated with a Neoclassical color stipple engraving of “The Childhood of Socrates,” a sepia stipple engraving of a putto, and elaborate engraved borders on color paper printed expressly to conform to the idiosyncratic polygonal shape of this item..... More

Rare first edition of this deluxe, illustrated atlas folio published in 1939 as an advance prospectus showcasing the architecture of the Esposizione Universale di Roma, the world’s fair planned for 1942 to celebrate twenty years of Fascism under Benito Mussolini. Because of the outbreak of World War II the fair..... More

A stipple engraving and a related print in outline technique by Alexandre Clément (c. 1775 - c. 1808), after Réunion d'artistes dans l'atelier d'Isabey ("A Reunion of Artists in Isabey’s Studio"), a painting by Louis Léopold Boilly (1761-1845), which enjoyed great popularity at the time. Shown for the first time..... More

A very rare separately published illustrated broadside on the disease of podagra or gout, a form of arthritis, by Gottfried Rogg (1669-1742), a draughtsman, engraver, and publisher in Augsburg. The central image depicts a well-dressed nobleman with legs wrapped in special gout stockings in front of a table covered with..... More

A rare series of three consecutively printed dissertations (2 of them illustrated) on the flora of Brazil, diligently recorded in standard Linnaean form by Carl Thunberg, Linnaeus’ foremost disciple and the greatest botanical explorer and collector of his day. The specimens were collected by Georg Wilhelm Freyreiss in his travels..... More