Book History, Education, Learning & Printing / Bindings

MELON, Jean-François. Mahmoud le Gasnevide, histoire orientale. Fragment traduit de l'Arabe, avec des notes.
Rotterdam, Jean Hofhoudt, 1730. 8vo. Contemporary marbled calf, gold-tooled spine, boards, board edges and turn-ins, both boards with the gold-tooled coat of arms of Louis Marie Alexandre, Duc d'Aumont, gilt edges. [2], VI, 162, [4] pp. Full description

MESA, Sebastian de. Jornada de Africa por el Rey Don Sebastian y union del reyno de Portugal a la corona de Castilla.
Barcelona, Pedro Lacavalleria, 1630. 4to. Each page framed with thin printed rules. Contemporary gold-tooled leather (blackened and flaking), each board with the helmed and mantled arms of the Mazarin family in the centre. [2], 169, [1] ll. Full description

MEXIA, Pedro. Coloquios o dialogos compuestos por el magnifico cavallero Pero Mexia, vezino de Sevilla, en los quales se disputan y tratan varias y diversas cosas de mucha erudicion y doctrina. Al illustrissimo senor don Perasan de Ribera Marques de Tarisa &c.
Antwerp, widow of Martinus Nutius, 1561. Small agenda 12mo (14 x 6.5 cm). With Nutius's woodcut device on the title-page. 17th-century(?) blind-tooled overlapping vellum, each board with the coat of arms of the Landgrave of Hesse, gilt edges. 165, [3 blank] ll. Full description

MEZERAY, Francois Eudes de. Abregé chronologique de l'histoire de France. ... Divisé en six tomes.
Amsterdam, Abraham Wolfgang, 1673-1674.
With: (2) MEZERAY, Francois Eudes de. Histoire de France avant Clovis.
Amsterdam, Abraham Wolfgang, 1688.
2 works in 7 volumes. 12mo. Ad 1 with woodcut publisher's device on each of the 6 title-pages, engraved frontispiece-title in the style of Romeyn de Hooghe and full-page engraved portrait of Louis XIV by A. Zylevelt in volume 1, 61 engraved portraits of French rulers in text, woodcut head- and tailpieces, woodcut initials. Ad 2: with engraved frontispiece-title in the style of Romeyn de Hooghe, title-page with woodcut publisher's device, woodcut head- and tailpieces, woodcut initials. Uniform polished, crushed red morocco, gold-tooled boards, spines and wide turn-ins, fillets on board edges, edges gilt over marbling, marbled endpapers. Each volume signed and dated 1913 on the turn-in by the leading Brussels bookbinder Charles DE SAMBLANX (1855-1943). Full description

[MINIATURE BOOK - ALMANACK - LONDON]. London Almanack for the Year of Christ 1788.
London, T. Carnan, [1788]. 24mo(?) (5.7 x 3.3 cm). With an engraved armorial title-page, 4 full-page engraved portraits, and a half-page engraved view. Contemporary elaborately gold-tooled red morocco, the gold-tooled boards are beautifully decorated with a white morocco trellis-like (mosaic) pattern with red and green lozenge shaped morocco inlays, gilt edges, marbled endpapers. [24] pp. Full description

[MINIATURE BOOK - ALMANACK - LONDON]. London Almanack for the Year of Christ 1851.
[London, Company of Stationers, 1851]. 24mo(?) (5.8 x 3.3 cm). With a steel-engraved armorial title-page, a four-page steel-engraved view, and a steel-engraved half-page armorial vignette. Contemporary elaborately gold-tooled black morocco, both boards show a beautiful geometrical design of gold-tooled black, white, and green morocco, gilt edges, in a matching slipcase. [24] pp. Full description

[MOSAIC BINDING - BIBLE]. LEEMPUTTE, Henricus van den (editor). Het nieuwe testament ons salighmaeckers Jesu Christi, mitsgaders: d'epistelen uit het oude testament, soo die door 't jaer in den dienst der H. Kercke gelesen worden.
Antwerp, Hieronymus Verdussen (for Niclaes Braau in Haarlem), 1696. 8vo. With 39 detailed woodcut illustrations in the text, and woodcut decorated initials and small printed manicules. The text is set in a Gothic letter, with incidental use of Roman type. Exquisite 18th-century gold-tooled multi-colour morocco mosaic binding. Gilt edges and green silk covered end papers. [1], [1 blank], [14], 837, [27] pp. Full description

[PEIKHART, Franz (original compiler)]. Andachtsübungen eines Christen vor die Morgens- und Abendszeit, Heilige Mess, Beicht und Communion: mehrentheils aus denen Psalmen Davidis gezogen.
[Vienna?, ca. 1800]. 8vo. Manuscript in German on laid paper. 19th-century elaborately gold-tooled green morocco, spine with raised bands and red morocco label lettered "A.M.C.Z." in gold, gold-tooled turn-ins, paste-paper endleaves, gilt edges. [62] ll. Full description

PERRENOT, Abraham. Bedenkingen over de beoeffening der rechtsgeleerdheid, benevens vier verhandelingen over wysgeerige stoffen.
Dordrecht, Abraham Blussé and son (colophon: printed by Johan Joseph Besseling, [Utrecht]), 1781.
With: (2) PERRENOT, Abraham. Considérations sur l'étude de la jurisprudence, ... Nouvelle edition. Berlin, G.J. Decker; Utrecht, Henrikus Spruit, 1776. 8vo. 2 works in 1 volume. Contemporary red morocco, richly gold-tooled spine, gold-tooled boards (triple fillets, with floral ornaments in each corner), board edges and turn-ins, gilt edges. Bound by the Dutch court bookbinder Abraham van Rossum (active in Amsterdam 1812-1854), one of the "major binders" (Storm van Leeuwen) of that period. 5, [1], 339, 5; 68 pp. Full description

PLUTARCHUS. Moralia, quae usurpantur. sunt autem omnis elegantis doctrinae penus: id est, varij libri: morales, historici, physici, mathematici, deniq; ad politiorem litteraturam pertinentes & humanitatem: omnes de Graeca in Latinam linguam transscripti.
Basel, Thomas Guarini, 1570. Folio. With woodcut printer's device on title-page and repeated on last page, some mathematical woodcuts in text and numerous historiated woodcut initials. Early 17th-century Jesuit prize binding in richly gold-tooled light brown calf, sides with arabesques in the style of Gascon, richly gold-tooled double borders and inner panel with small bands in a geometrical pattern. [12], 857, [91] pp. Full description