Highlights

[ALBUM - ITALY - TRAJAN'S COLUMN]. [Album with 72 illustrations of scenes depicted on Trajan's Column].
[Italy, late 16th- to 18th-century]. Oblong folio (ca. 54 x 39 cm). With 72 drawings on paper, in pen, ink, and ink wash. Probably early 18th-century gold-tooled red morocco with the elaborate coat of arms of King Philip V of Spain as a centre piece on both boards, within a double frame with floral corner pieces in the inside corners of the inner frame; gold-tooled board edges, marbled endpapers. [74] ll. Full description

[AUTOGRAPH]. MELANCHTHON, Philipp. [Autograph letter, signed, from Philipp Melanchthon to Sebastian Boetius].
[Wittenberg], Easter [14 April 1555]. Folio (19.5 x 32 cm). In Latin. [2] pp. Full description

AVILA Y ZUÑIGA, Luis de, and Willem van MALE (translator). Commentariorum de bello Germanico, à Carolo V. ... gesto, libri duo à Gulielmo Malinaeo Brugensi latinè redditi, & iconibus ad historiam accommodis illustrati.
Antwerp, In aedibus Joannes Steelsius, 1550. 8vo. With the printers device of Joannes Steelsius on the title page, 4 woodcut illustrations (a folding view, a double-page map, a double-page view, and a full-page view), and a full-page woodcut coat of arms of Emperor Charles V on the final page. Contemporary blind-tooled brown calf, sewn on 3 supports with the corresponding raised bands on the spine, a paper shelfmark label ("P) in the top compartment and the manuscript number "4" in white ink in the compartment below, the coat of arms of Christopher Popel the elder of Lobcowicz (1513-1590) in the centre of the front board with the initials "C. B. A. L. Ae. A" and the motto "Insigniae" above, and the date "MDLIII" below, surrounded by an ornamental and triple fillet border, on the back a cross built up from four fleur-de-lis ornaments framed by the same border, 4 green closing ties. [8], 144 ll. Full description

BARLAEUS, Caspar (BAERLE, Kasper van). Rerum per octennium in Brasilia et alibi nuper gestarum, sub praefectura illustrissimi Comitis. I. Mauritii Nassau ... Historia.
Amsterdam, Joan Blaeu, 1647. Folio (42.5 x 30.2 cm). With 56 finely engraved double-page maps, plans and views, all hand-coloured, 50 heightened with gold, 2 double-folding, 4 without gold, an engraved frontispiece heightened with gold, a full-page engraved portrait of Johan Maurits van Nassau heightened with gold, a hand-coloured woodcut printers device on the title page, a woodcut diagram of a solar eclipse on p. 197, and some woodcut initials and tailpieces. Contemporary richly gold roll-stamped vellum, bound in the publisher's binding. [12, including title page, frontispiece and portrait], 340, [8] pp. Full description

[BINDING - ENGLISH - EMBROIDERY]. [Embroidered bookbinding].
[England (London?), second quarter of the 17th century]. Size when opened: 17 x 25 cm. Ivory silk satin, richly decorated in a colourful floral design with goldwork, metal sequins, and clusters of seed pearls, the text "voir nostre do[min]e" embroidered on the front and back. Full description

BLAEU, Willem Jansz. Zeespiegel, inhoudende een korte onderwijsinghe inde konst der zeevaert, en beschryvinghe der seen en kusten van de Oostersche, Noordsche, en Westersche schipvaert. ...
Amsterdam, Willem Jansz. Blaeu, 1627. 3 parts in 1 volume, parts 2 and 3 consist of 6 books each. Folio. With 108 numbered engraved charts, 2 half-page engraved charts, 2 volvelles, a woodcut vignette on the divisional title page of each part, and numerous woodcut illustrations in the text. Contemporary overlapping vellum. The work is preserved in a gold-tooled half red morocco clamshell box, with two green morocco title labels, lettered in gold, red buckram sides, and a green felt lining. [16], 64; 39, [1], 43, [1], 48, 32, 28, 24; 32, 52, 46, 43, [1], 40, 23, [1 blank] pp. Full description

[BROADSIDE - MEXICO]. [Drop title:] Don Juan Maria de Azcarate, Sargento mayor del Batallon ...
Mexico, 26 February 1822. Ca. 31.5 x 22 cm. [1] l. Full description

[CARDUCCI, Alessandro, Giovanni Andrea MONIGLIA, and Stefano DELLA BELLA]. Il mondo festeggiante balletto a cav allo fatto nel teatro congiunto al palazzo del sereniss. gran duca, per le reali nozze de' serenissimi principi Cosimo terzo di Toscana, e Margherita Luisa d'Orleans.
Florence, Nella stamperia di S.A.S., 1661. 4to. With 3 fold-out engravings, 1 woodcut initial, and 2 woodcut headpieces. Contemporary gold-tooled vellum. [1], [1 blank], 7-66, [2 blank] pp. Full description

[CASANOVA, Giacomo]. Scrutinio del libro eloges de M. de Voltaire par differens auteurs.
Venice, Presso Modesto Fenzo, 1779. 8vo. With a woodcut illustration on the title page, and 1 woodcut initial. Later gold-tooled brown morocco with the title lettered in gold on the spine, gold-tooled board edges and turn-ins, gilt edges, marbled endpapers. 96 pp. Full description

CERVANTES SAAVEDRA, Miguel de (Jacob Campo WEYERMAN translator; Antoine COYPEL illustrator). De voornaamste gevallen van den wonderlyken Don Quichot, door den beroemden Picart den Romein ... in XXXI kunstplaaten, na de uitmuntende schilderyen van Coypel in't koper gebragt ...
The Hague, Pieter de Hondt, 1746. Large folio (42 x 27 cm). Title in red and black with an engraved vignette (Quixote and the windmill), and 31 engraved illustration plates, all coloured by a contemporary hand, heightened with gold and set in in a gilt frame. Further with large woodcut initials and tailpieces, and each text page in an ornamental frame built up from typographic ornaments (the frames not in the 4to issue). Contemporary, richly gold-tooled dark red morocco by the so-called Van Damme bindery in Amsterdam, sewn on 7 supports, each board with Van Dammes typical hourglass- or vase- or flask-shaped central cartouche with a starry sky on a black ground, here showing a short-stemmed chalice or goblet with fire or flame-like leaves (like a snake plant, Dracaena trifasciata) in the cartouche and a basket of flowers topping the cartouche, the whole in an elaborate frame built up from hundreds of impressions of numerous small tools, the spine-title in gold on a black ground in the 2nd of 8 compartments, each of the other 7 with flowers, other decorations and a small flower in a pot, gilt edges. With a tissue guard-leaf before each plate. [2], XXVI, 420 pp. Full description