Rare illustrated first edition (1510) of the Statua ordinis cartusiensis, “an exceptional case of a limited printing not available for public sale” (Elie, p. 38), here in an example with its fine woodcuts in excellent contemporary hand-color. These collected statutes and privileges of the Carthusian Order – part of the...
Very rare first German-language edition (1515) of Raymond of Capua’s (c. 1330-99) Life of St. Catherine of Siena (1337-80), finely illustrated with 49 woodcuts (7 of which are repeated) by Hans Schäufelein (c. 1480-1540), one of Albrecht Dürer’s most gifted pupils and a key inheritor of the master’s innovative graphic.....
Rare early edition of this famous work on sculpture, perspective and the aesthetic theory of the plastic arts, of particular importance for the diffusion of perspective theory to the north of Florence according to Kemp, who characterises the work’s technical innovations as “a curious mélange of the Albertian method, using.....
Rare second edition (first 1529) of this discursive and illustrated survey of all ranks of society by the Lyonnais jurist Chasseneux. The present edition utilizes the original woodblocks of the 1529 edition, and this is evidently their only other appearance. Divided into 12 books, each is preceded by a large...
Rare first edition of this Venetian ‘take’ on the painting of the middle of the Cinquecento, when according to the conventional periodizing view, Venetian painting hovered between High Renaissance and Mannerism: Titian was in the process of altering his style in the direction of emotionalism, the younger generation (Tintoretto, Paris.....
First edition of this potted version of Venetian history as seen through the portraits and other paintings hanging in or decorating some of the public rooms of the Palazzo Ducale after the fire of 1577, of art historical interest for the disposition of numerous famous Venetian paintings during the 16th...
Rare suite of prints depicting the twelve Apostles, designed by Ambrosius Francken (1544-1618) and engraved by Antonius Wierix, including two additional images of Christ and Paul by Maarten de Vos (nos. 1 and 14) which at one time occupied a single copper plate. The series gives an engraving to each...
Very rare first edition of a set of engravings by the Antwerp printmaker Jean-Baptiste Barbé (1578-1649) after the designs of Theodoor van Loon (c.1581-1649), a Flemish painter noted as an early stylistic follower of Caravaggio (1571-1610). The work presents bust-length portraits of the Holy Family, the Four Evangelists, and the.....
Rare first and only edition of this illustrated funeral book recording the ceremonies for Pope Paul V (1550-1621) held in Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome, with a fine suite of full-page engravings of ephemeral sculpture and architecture, including a series of 16 sculptures of Virtues by the great Gian Lorenzo...
Rare first French edition (original Spanish 1585) of Diego de Torres's history of north Africa, a detailed account of the on-going conflict between the Xarifes (the Saadian dynasty), the king of Fez, and the Turks, augmented with his own first-hand observations. Following the expulsion of the Moors from Europe...
Rare first edition Olivier de Vrée’s (1596-1652) compendium of seals of the Counts of Flanders, a volume notable both for its antiquarian rigor – the work remains a standard reference on the subject – and for its some 300 copperplate engravings meticulously cataloguing the development of seals from the establishment.....
Elaborate manuscript notebook by a mid-seventeenth-century priest from Milan containing his own aphorisms, observations and quotations modeled after contemporary calligraphy manuals with unusually elaborate and well-executed figurative borders drawn in his hand, and interspersed with anguished outbursts on love’s torment in a later hand. Chiassi’s drawings, modelled from Antonio Tempesta’s.....
Scarce first edition of this 17th-century survey of Italian painting, and a valuable document for developing Baroque gusto by a cultivated amateur. Scannelli follows Mancini's tripartite division of Italian schools Roman, Venetian and Lombard, and in an age in which microcosms were everywhere, he compared the whole of Italian painting...
First edition and much scarcer than the second edition of 1683. "Troili, a pupil of the quadratura painter Michelangelo Colonna, became scene painter for the Farnese theatre at Parma. Ferdinando Bibiena saw his work there (probably after the artist's death) and absorbed its influence. This original edition of Troili's exceptionally...
Very rare Spanish legal document concerning tithes certified between the Archbishop of Granada, Alonso Bernardo de los Rios y Guzman (served 1677-92), and the Prior of the Carthusian monastery of Granada. While the text offers a fascinating and surprisingly detailed account of this ecclesiastical suit and is especially rich in...
Two rare suites of engravings depicting Pietro da Cortona’s celebrated frescoes in the salone of Palazzo Barberini and the Pitti Palace, then the residence of the Duke of Etro. Cortona was commissioned by Cardinal Francesco to create the artistic centerpiece of the Barberini palace, a fresco which is now recognized.....
First edition of this handsomely illustrated perspective textbook. Traité de Perspective, the final work published during the lifetime of the controversial and prolific philosopher Bernard Lamy, is notable for its “interesting discussion of perception, etc.” – Kemp, p. 356. Lamy, whose interest in art stemmed from his work on geometry.....
A fine pen-and-ink drawing and a very rare letterpress broadside, both relating to the baker’s trade in 18th-century Brussels. The drawing depicts St. Honoratus of Amiens (d. c. 600), a bishop saint who came to be especially venerated by bakers in France following the donation of land by the Parisian.....
An intriguing collection of 8 very rare early English astronomical charts by the London cartographers and instrument makers John Seller (c. 1630-1697) and John Senex (c. 1678-1740), offering the most up-to-date celestial information then available, with several of the charts based on the recent groundbreaking observations of the English astronomers...
Rare first and only edition of one of the first, if not the first Western monograph devoted to a Russian work of art, namely the icon of the 4th-century warrior saint Theodore Straelates housed in the Rieterkirche St. Marien und Christophorus in Kalbensteinberg, Bavaria, an important pilgrimage church located on...
First edition of this polemical work attacking the highly controversial Réflexions critiques sur les différentes écoles de Peinture (1751), by the Marquis d’Argens, the polymath chamberlain of Frederic II, who advised the latter on a number of topics, among them art. He introduced Frederic to a number of French painters.....
An unusually fresh example of the rare first edition of a Baroque German penmanship textbook self-published by this “Schul-, Schreib- und Rechnenmeister” from Frankfurt am Main, with 54 engraved plates. After assuring his readers that these methods have been honed throughout his tenure as a teacher of penmanship, Schirmer begins.....
A handsomely bound copy in contemporary gilt calf of the rare first edition of an illustrated treatise on the two famous Marian icons housed at the church of Santa Maria presso San Celso in Milan. The Notizie istoriche intorno alla miracolosa imagine at once stresses the miraculous nature of these...
Very rare example of a bespoke (and nearly) blank album amicorum from 18th-century Holland, preserved in entirely contemporary condition and complete with its original, elaborately decorated binding. The only entry in the book is its watercolor frontispiece of a putto as an emblem of painting: The cupid is posed as...
Only edition of this unusual volume surveying the wooded holdings of the Count of Eu, in Upper Normandy, a work comprised entirely of 40 fine, single-sided engravings, including a pictorial title page, 13 calligraphic plates of text, charts and tables, 5 botanical and industrial images, and 21 handsome, precise maps...
![Stelleri Zodiacus Stellatus [manuscript title on spine]. John / SENEX SELLER, John, Edmund /...](/pictures/thumb/5560.jpg?v=1508791178)
![[Album Amicorum]. J. A. H. WASSENAER VAN STADT.](/pictures/thumb/5547.jpg?v=1508791177)
