Forum Rare Books

Attractive coloured views of the Pyrenees, including several panoramas

PETIT, Victor Jean-Baptiste. Bagneres de Luchon et ses environs.
Paris, Charles Boivin; Pau, Auguste Bassy, [ca. 1850]. Oblong folio (26.5 x 37.5 cm). With a lithographed title-page with a hand-coloured vignette, and 29 numbered lithographed plates, all coloured by hand and some double-page (including 1 folding out vertically) or folding panoramas. All plates mounted on thick wove paper with letterpress captions. Contemporary gold- and blind-blocked dark green cloth, gilt edges. Full description

€ 1,250

City Plans, Topography & Views France Spain

Among Le Pautre’s earliest work

PHILIPPON, Adam. Curieuses recherches de plusieurs beaus morceaus d'ornemens antiques, et modernes, tant dans la ville de Rome, ques autres villes et lieux d'Italie.
Croissant, Adam Philippon, 1645. Wholly engraved print series consisting of a title-page, dedication, privilege, and 50 plates. The leaves are numbered 1-42, followed by 10 plates with their numbers changed by hand, and the privilege.
With: (2) LE PAUTRE, Jean. Frizes feuillages ou Tritons marins antiques et modernes.Paris, P. Mariette, [ca. 1664]. Series of 6 numbered engraved plates, each with two friezes . 2 series in 1 volume. Small folio (26.5 x 18.5 cm). Contemporary limp sheepskin parchment. [59] ll. Full description

€ 7,000

Architecture Art & Art History Classical Antiquity Italy Prints & Print Series

Papal bull elevating Cosimo I de’ Medici to become first Grand Duke of Tuscany

PIUS V, Pope. Freiheit und Bulla des allerheiligsten in Gott vatters und Herren, Herren Pii, des namens fünfften Bapsts, uber die Erhoehung und Schoepffung des durchleüchtigsten Fürsten und Herren, Herren Cosmi Medices, Hertzogen zu Florentz, &c. Zu einem Groszhertzoge und koenigmässigem, der provintz Ethrurien, ime underworffen. Geschehen zu Rom, den 27. Augusti. Anno M.D. LXIX.
[Germany], 1570. Small 4to (20 x 15 cm). With a woodcut figure of the Pope on the title-page. Set in Schwabacher gothic type with fraktur headings and incidental roman. Half maroon goatskin morocco (1930s?), gold-tooled spine. [12] pp. Full description

€ 1,950

Catholicism & Eastern Orthodox Church Early Printing - 16th century Italy Law & Politics Religion (16th Century)

Rare first edition of an important treatise on opera

PLANELLI, Antonio. Dell'opera in musica trattato del cavaliere Antonio Planelli dell'ordine Gerosolimitano.
Napels, Donato Campo, 1772. 8vo. Contemporary half vellum with a 19th-century spine label. 15, [5], 272 pp. Full description

€ 3,750

Italy Music, Theatre & Dance

An important source of knowledge of the Near East

POCOCKE, Richard. Beschryving van het Oosten, en van eenige andere landen. Uit het Engelsch overgezet en met aantekeningen voorzien, door Ernst Willem Cramer.
Utrecht, Rotterdam and Amsterdam, G.T. en A. van Paddenburg, J. Bosch, R. Arrenberg, and M. de Bruyn, 1776-1786. 3 volumes (in 6 parts) bound as 6. 4to. With 205 folding engraved maps, plans, views and plates. Contemporary half calf. Full description

€ 12,000

Balkan & Greece Eastern Mediterranean & Cyprus Islamic Art, Culture & Science North Africa & Egypt Travel & Voyages Europe Travel & Voyages Middle East Turkey & Ottoman Empire West Asia

Bound by one of the best French binders of the 19th-century, for William I, the first King of the Netherlands

POISSONNIER-DESPERRIERES, Gabriel Adrien Marie. Vie politique et militaire du général A.M.G. Poissonnier-Desperrières ..., écrite par lui-même, et publiée de son vivant.
Paris, C.J. Trouvé, 1824. 8vo. With lithographed frontispiece-portrait of Dapuhin by Constans after a drawing by Eugénie Lebrun. Contemporary richly gold-tooled straight grained orange/brown morocco, gold- and blind-tooled boards with the arms of William I on each side, gold-tooled spine with plumed helmets, a dark-brown title-label and the name of the binder ("SIMIER.R.DU.ROI"), gold-tooled board edges and turn-ins, gilt edges. XII, 512 pp. Full description

€ 3,000

Bindings France Law & Politics Military History (19th Century)

A 20th-century patinated bronze portrait bust of Napoleon Bonaparte

[PORTRAIT BUST - NAPOLEON BONAPARTE]. [Bust of Napoleon Bonaparte].
[Early 20th century]. Ca. 15 x 9.5 x 6 cm (base ca. 4.5 x 4.5 cm). Patinated bronze portrait bust. Full description

€ 1,500

Art & Art History France

Second located copy of prayerbook in magnificent roman baroque fanfare binding
attributed to the Soresini family

[PRAYER BOOK]. Piae precationes ad missas devote celebrandas, et sacrosanctam eucharistiam sumendam. Cum variis orationibus ex bonis & probatis authoribus collectis.
Rome, Aloysius Zannettus, 1604. 8vo. With woodcut title-page and some ornamented woodcut initials in the text. Contemporary richly gold-tooled brown morocco, with gauffered edges; both sided with 2 pairs of fillets along the edges with little flowers at the corners and a floral border in between; a pattern of loose gilt stamps of flowers in a spiral line, vases with flowers, lions, stars and so-called "foglia accartocciata" ("feuilles mortes") and a crucifixion in an oval border in the centre of the front cover and the Virgin with child in an oval border in the centre of the back board. 272 pp. Full description

€ 27,500

Bindings Book of Hours, Missals & Prayerbooks Catholicism & Eastern Orthodox Church Italy

Promoting Catholicism through missionary work as the Jesuits lost power:
a manuscript from the Sir Thomas Phillipps collection

[PROPAGANDA FIDE]. Africa [-] Greci - Italo Greci [-] Armeni di Venezia [-] varie.
[Rome and perhaps elsewhere, ca. 1758-1764 (transcribing original documents going back to at least 1664)]. 4to. Collection of manuscript transcriptions of about 30 letters and other documents. Contemporary Italian sheepskin parchment over flexible boards. [416] pp., including about 15 blank leaves. Full description

€ 39,500

Balkan & Greece Church History & Missions Italy Japan & Far East Jesuits Manuscripts & Documents North Africa & Egypt

Short play against stricter prostitution regulations in Paris

[PROSTITUTION]. Les filles en cage, ou Déguerpissons! Par un abonné au cachet des maisons de plaisir de la capitale.
Paris, Peytieux (colophon: Sétier), 1830. 8vo. With a lithographed title-page with an illustration and a small woodcut decoration on the letterpress title-page. Later black half morocco. 14, [2] pp. Full description