Extraordinary, very rare portfolio of 58 fine, original photographs of dredges taken by the noted Dutch photographer Johannes Henk Tollens (1864-1936) during the first years of the 20th century. Apparently produced to commemorate the merger which formed the A. Bos & J. P. Heijblom dredging company of Dordrecht, Holland, the..... More
A brilliant example in rich original hand color of the rare (and only) English language edition of the earliest printed, folio-size western map specifically of China by Ortelius and “the first to show the Great Wall” (Nebenzahl). “This map remained the standard type for the interior of China for over..... More
An exquisitely engraved rarity, the earliest printed chart of the Northeast that was published in the first sea atlas produced by an Englishman (though published in Florence), the Arcano del Mare (Secrets of the Sea). One of the jewels of early cartography, the atlas’s elegant Florentine engraving formed a link..... More
First German language edition (also the first to be translated from the original Italian of 1611) of one of the earliest printed western works solely devoted to the Philippines by the Jesuit Gregorio Lopez, active in the Philippines from his arrival in May of 1601 until his death (in Manila)..... More
Very rare, with one recorded copy (in Bordeaux), of a detailed and lively account of this French expedition against Jamaica during the Nine Years War, comprising a string of brutal attacks over the summer of 1694 led by Jean-Baptiste Du Casse. Appointed Governor of Saint-Domingue in 1691, Du Casse had..... More
First edition of one of the great intellectual debates of the 16th century, the Elder Scaliger’s wide-ranging critique of Cardano’s de Subtilitate. The work provides a capital example of the amorphous and disputatious nature of Renaissance intellectual life just before the scientific revolution would constrict knowledge to the preserve of..... More
An unusual, large-scale, 18th-century map providing a striking visual record of a remarkable number of important exploratory voyages of both the Pacific and the Arctic undertaken between the 16th and 18th centuries. Published at the dawn of the great age of transoceanic exploration, Sayer & Bennett’s 6-sheet Chart is an..... More
A fine, separately published, French engraving of Webber's iconic scene of the tragic death of Captain James Cook in Hawaii. The edition was dedicated to Louis-Antoine Bougainville, the French explorer and circumnavigator, who is herein identified as a member of the Society of the Cincinnati. The official account of Cook's..... More
Rare, large-format, separately issued etching on three-sheets by Giuseppe Vasi (1710-82) depicting the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome as seen from the Quattro Fontane. The work is one of four large vedute etchings – two published in 1765 and two in 1771 – incorporating the four patriarchal basilicas..... More
Very rare separately issued view of Castel Sant’Angelo in Rome, etched by Giovanni Maggi (1566-1618) and printed in 1600 by Andrea Vaccari (d. 1627) in honor of a certain Manilio Orlandi (fl. c. 1550s-c. 1602), captain of munitions (capitano di bombardieri) at Castel Sant’Angelo. The etching is unusual among printed..... More
Rare, separately issued etching depicting the architect-engineer Domenico Fontana’s (1543-1607) technical plan for the 30 April 1586 lowering of the Vatican Obelisk from its ancient placement on the south flank of Saint Peter’s, whence it soon would be moved to its current location as the centerpiece of the Piazza di..... More
A fresh and bright example of this rare separately issued version of Giovanni Battista Falda’s (1643-78) important 1667 two-sheet plan of Rome (called the pianta piccola), republished during the first half of the 18th century by the Amsterdam publishers Johannes Covens (1697-1774) and Cornelis Mortier (1699-1783). “Falda’s pianta piccola was..... More
Very rare first and only edition of this extraordinary 18th-century folio atlas – entirely engraved and consisting of 26 folding and 2-full-page plates – devoted to the practice of carpentry in the construction of civic, commercial, domestic and princely architecture using the latest “German, French and Italian methods” (f. 1)..... More
Rare first and only edition, only state, of a suite of 14 full-page, 16th-century engravings which ingeniously refigure the traditional subjects of Christ’s Passion in a manner at once timely/fashionable and archaizing/antique: The Passio verbigenae, published by Jan Sadeler I (1550-1600) after the designs of Marcus Gheeraerts the Elder (c..... More
One of Des Barres's rarest works, much less often seen on the market than his chart of New York Harbor. A superb example of Des Barres's five profile recognition views that realistically portray what an 18th-century pilot would have seen at various points in sailing into New York Harbor..... More
A rare survival of such an ephemeral piece (unrecorded on ICCU): a large broadside issued during the nine-month occupation of Rome following the fall of the Roman Republic, and proclaiming a complete revision of the running of the city’s public market to prevent “hoarders and scalpers” from inflating food prices..... More
Rare first edition of one of the earliest works on the subject of scurvy by the well-known anatomist, undertaken to survey the incidence of the disease in the ducal territories around Wittenberg, and consequently qualifying as an example of public health medicine. According to O’Malley, its positive result was the..... More
First edition of Galileo’s most important work, the foundation of modern physics. This work was Galileo’s ‘greatest scientific achievement … Mathematicians and physicists of the later seventeenth century, Isaac Newton among them, rightly supposed that Galileo had begun a new era in the science of mechanics. It was upon his..... More
Very large, 4-sheet wall map, published for the Imperial Military Reserve Association, which presents a comprehensive (and graphically attractive) overview of the South Manchurian Railway (Mantetsu) as it stood in late 1931. Intended for ephemeral, official use and not as a decorative object, the map is remarkable for having survived..... More
Extremely rare first edition of the first French account of the East Indies to appear in print (cf. Lach & van Kley, III: 373), here in an impeccable copy bound in contemporary vellum. The work is that of the French adventurer François Martin de Vitré (c. 1575-c. 1631), who, upon..... More
An attractive and genuine copy of the scarce first edition of the “ most important” of Louis Hennepin’s writings (Howes), his first published work, the first book to print the name “Louisiane,” and the earliest printed account of La Salle’s 1678-9 journey to what is now Illinois. The word “Louisiane”..... More
Extremely rare early 18th-century Italian handbook offering advice to husbands, wives and their priests about how to maintain a happy marriage (or at least how to keep the peace). Il marito e la moglie is the work of the Jesuit Fulvio Fontana (1649-1723), who shaped the manual for the use..... More
Rare first illustrated edition (1603) of Cesare Ripa’s (c. 1560-c. 1622) emblem book. A landmark compendium of allegorical personifications, his Iconologia, is a summa of ancient, medieval and early modern information on such images and a sourcebook of unparalleled richness which continues to guide artists and scholars more than four..... More
Rare; a superb example of the best executed and most beautiful, printed map one can acquire of early New York, and arguably also the masterpiece of 18th-century urban cartography of an American city. In addition to a plan of the city itself, the work provides a remarkable evocation of the pre-development..... More
A gorgeous example, in vibrant original color, of the first full folio-size map specifically of North America and the first overall produced in the Netherlands. It was preceded only by the smaller but very rare Forlani map of 1565 and the yet much smaller derivative of it by Porcacchi, published..... More