BASELIUS, Jacobus.
Historisch verhael inhoudende sekere notable explooten van oorloge in de Nederlanden, sedert het oprechten van de companien der heeren gouverneurs ende ritmeesteren van Paulus ende Marcelis Bax.
Breda, Isaac Schilders, 1615. 4to. With a richly engraved allegorical title with portraits of Paulus and Marcelis Bax on horseback, a decorated woodcut initial, and a woodcut headpiece. Contemporary gold-tooled sprinkled calf, sewn on 5 supports with the corresponding raised bands on the spine, the title lettered in gold on the spine, red sprinkled edges. [8], 149, [3 blank] pp.
€ 1,850
Rare first edition of this posthumously published history of the wars in the Low Countries. Dedicated to Prince Maurice of Orange, it gives a detailed account of notable military exploits during the Dutch Revolt, concentrating on the campaigns of the brothers Paulus (d. 1606) and Marcelis Bax (d. 1617), two of the most celebrated cavalry commanders of the States army during the Dutch Revolt. The brothers became particularly famous for their role in the successful defence of Bergen op Zoom against the Duke of Parma in 1588. The present work is an important source for the military careers of the Bax brothers and formed the basis for much of the later literature on their lives and deeds.
Jacobus Baselius (ca. 1563-1604) studied at Leiden from 1579 to 1581 and became a minister in Bruges around 1582. After the city was captured by the Duke of Parma in 1584, he fled first to Brussels and subsequently to Bergen op Zoom, where he served as a minister from 1586 until his death. Baselius was a friend of Marcelis Bax and may have learned about some of the events directly from him. The present work was often bound with Johannes Gysius's Oorsprong en voortgang der Neder-Landtscher beroerten, but is here issued separately.
The printer, Isaac Schilders, came from Middelburg and was the son of the well-known printer Richard Schilders. On 26 November 1613 he received permission from the magistrates of Breda to establish himself as a printer in the city. This was one of his earliest productions there and is also one of the first books printed at Breda.
The boards are somewhat rubbed, with some loss of material. The leaves are occasionally slightly browned, wormholes in the gutter and upper margin of the second half of the work. Otherwise in good condition. Haitsma Mulier & van der Lem, 30b; NNBW III, cols. 67-8; STCN 831247150 (6 copies); USTC 1026827 (6 copies); cf. Hallema, 'Drukkers en uitgevers te Breda tot de aanvang der 19de eeuw', in: Jaarboek van de geschied- en oudheidkundige kring van stad en land van Breda 'De Oranjeboom' III (Breda, 1950), pp. 89-91.
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