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

Two 1696 German broadsides, apparently unrecorded, addressing the regulation of “foreign” merchants of brass and copper wares at the yearly fair (Jahrmarkt) of Celle (“Zelle”) in Lower Saxony, a town at that time subject to the Electorate of Braunschweig-Lüneburg. These sheets are rare survivals of printed legal ephemera dispatched to..... More

Rare 2-sheet etching/engraving (here complete with its third sheet of engraved text in Dutch and French) depicting a winter festival celebrating the running of the “Brewers’ Icebreaker” to clear the Amstel River at Amsterdam during the first years of the 18th century. This large print, with its hundreds of lively..... More

Two engravings of melon plants plant from Johann Wilhelm Weinmann’s Phytanthoza Iconographia, “the first botanical book to use color printed mezzotint successfully” (Hunt). Johann Wilhelm Weinmann (1683-1741) was a German botanist and apothecary in Regensburg, and his monumental series represents the most innovative achievement in botanical illustration of its time. “The mezzotint process..... More

Rare 18th-century Venetian engraving of a kitchen scene after a genre painting by Francesco Maggiotto (1738-1805), son and pupil of the painter Domenico Fedeli (1713-94), himself a student of Giambattista Piazzetta (1682-1754). The print depicts a peasant family preparing their repast, a humble meal of polenta and grated cheese. Intent..... More

Rare, separately issued etching, here in contemporary hand-color, by the celebrated printmaker Sébastien Le Clerc (1637-1714) depicting the cabinet of the Académie des Sciences at the Louvre with its fascinating assortment of more than 100 instruments and objects relating to the study of astronomy, optics, perspective, architecture, physics, painting, sculpture..... More

Copper engraving (44.6 x 30.6 cm, platemark 28.9 x 20.1 cm). Splendid contemporary hand-color in green, blue, pink, light brown and grey. Number “VII.” engraved on upper right, signed “G. Piattoli inv.” on lower left, with Tuscan proverb below image as follows: “Le Donne per parer belle, si fanno brutte..... More

A full-sheet Oxford Almanack for the year 1800 with lists of the kings of England starting from William the Conqueror and of the officers of the university. It is illustrated with an etching designed by Edward Dayes (1763-1804) and executed by James Basire (1730-1802). The text was engraved by James..... 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 early 19th-century French popular broadside, here in fine contemporary hand-color, depicting the legendary Juif-Errant, or ‘Wandering Jew,’ the mythical immortal man said to have been present at the Crucifixion who was cursed thereafter to walk the earth ceaselessly until the Second Coming. The broadside has at its center a...... More

Unusual royal souvenir printed on silk and commemorating the death of the infant Princess Elizabeth of Clarence (1820-1821), daughter of Prince William (the future William IV) and Adelaide of Saxe-Meiningen, who at the date of her passing was ahead of the future Queen Victoria (1819-1901), her cousin, in the line..... More

Rare mid-19th-century printed textile illustrating an archetypal story of the ideal French mariner, a fisherman’s son named Jacques, who left home as a boy to sail to the Antilles with the merchant marines, met with many adventures on the high seas (shipwreck, pitched battle on deck, encounters with natives), and..... More

This auca of a lottery game for children features 52 wood-engraved vignettes of angels, flag bearers, Lords, Ladies, and laborers. Beneath the vignettes are detailed instructions of how to play this children’s game. The auca, a unique visual storytelling format, originated in Catalonia. They are separately printed sheets which were..... More