Early Printing & Manuscripts (15th & 16th Century)

PORTA, Giambattista della. Magiae naturalis, sive de miraculis rerum naturalium libri IIII. Cum indice.
Antwerp, Christophe Plantin, 1585. 12mo. With Plantin's woodcut printer's device on the title page, and 9 decorated woodcut initials. Slightly later vellum, dark blue edges. 296, [7], [1 blank] pp. Full description

PORTA, Giovanni Battista della. De hum. Physiognomonia … De humana physiognomonia libri IIII …
Vico Equense, Giuseppe Cacchi, 1586. Folio (32.5 x 23 cm). With a full-page engraved portrait of the author on the title page, set within an architectural frame incorporating animal and human heads, a full-page engraved portrait of the dedicatee, 85 engraved illustrations throughout, including four full-page plates, a woodcut diagram of a syllogism, and numerous woodcut historiated initials, headpieces, and tailpieces throughout. Contemporary vellum. [4], 265 (=272) pp. Full description

PORZIO, Simone. De coloribus oculorum.
Florence, Lorenzo Torrentino, 1550. 4to. With 2 large historiated engraved initials. Half vellum (ca. 1900). 57, [3 blank] pp. Full description

[PROCLAMATION]. Placcaet van … den Staten Generael ... daer by de Spaigniaerts ende alle heure goederen, voor goede prinse verclaert worden.
The Hague, Aelbrecht Hendricksz, 1599. 4to. With the woodcut arms of the States General on the title-page. 19th-century blue paper wrappers. [11], [1 blank] pp. Full description

[PROCLAMATION - NETHERLANDS - ZEELAND]. Placcaet ende ordonnantie vanden Staten van Zeelandt, teghens den opcoop ende uuytvoer vande inlandtsche granen.
Middelburg, Richard Schilders, 1595. 4to. With the woodcut coat of arms of Zeeland on title-page. Disbound. [7], [1 blank] pp. Full description

PROCOPIUS OF CAESAREA. De bello Persico. Liber primus-secundus.
Including: De bello Vandilico. Liber tertius-quartus.
Rome, Eugarius Silber alias Franck, 1509. Folio. With numerous decorative woodcut initials of 4 to 8 lines. 18th-century paper boards. [90] ll. Full description

PRUDENTIUS CLEMENS, Aurelius; Johannes SICHARD and Elio Antonio de NEBRIJA (editors). Opera multo quam antea castigatiora, praeterea et Aelij Antonij Nebrissensis commentarijs haud poenitendis illustrata, quibus insuper adglutinata sunt scholia Joannis Sichardi, quae omnia nunc primum in philomusorum gratiam excusa sunt ...
Antwerp, Merten de Keyser, 1536 (preface dated march 1537). 8vo (14.9 x 9.5 cm). With some woodcut decorated initials throughout. Later overlapping vellum. [16], 563 [=576] pp. Full description

PÜRSTINGER, Berthold. Theologia Germanica in qua continentur articuli de fide, evangelio, virtutibus et sacramentis: quorum materia iam nostra tempestate controversi solet.
(Colophon:) Augsburg, Alexander Weissenhorn for Martin Silbereysen, 1531. Folio (30.4 x 19.6 cm). With a woodcut title frame by Jörg Breu the Elder, the title is printed in red and black, and with small woodcut initials throughout. Modern white half calf. [222] ll. Full description

QUINTILIANUS, Marcus Fabius. [De institutione oratoria].
(Colophon: Florence, Filippo I Giunta, October 1515). Small 8vo (14.5 x 10 cm). With a title-page containing only the author's name, but with the title in the heading to liber I, and Giunti's woodcut device on the verso of the otherwise blank final leaf. Set entirely in an Aldine-style italic (with upright capitals). Vellum (ca. 1850?). [4], "269" [= 367], [1] ll. Full description

QUINTILIANUS, Marcus Fabius. [Institutiones oratoriae].
(Colophon: Venice, "aedibus Aldi et Andreae soceri" [= Aldus Manutius & Andre Torresani d'Asola], August 1514). 4to. With Aldus's famous woodcut anchor device on the title-page, repeated on the back of the last text page. Gold-tooled red morocco (ca. 1700), rebacked and given a black morocco spine label in the 19th century. [4], 230 ll. Full description