Highlights

[HEROLT, Johannes], edited by Guillermus PARISIENSIS. Postilla super Epistolas et Evangelia.
[Cologne, Ulrich Zell, 1483/87]. Small folio. Printed in 2 columns, each with 49 lines to the page. Set in a late example of a hybrid form type, with lombardic initials in red gouache. Rubricated on c4v-d2r. Mid- or late-18th-century gold-tooled French(?) red goatskin morocco, the spine with a dark green gold-tooled morocco label in the 2nd of 6 compartments, gold fillets on the board edges, gold-tooled turn-ins, gilt edges, French marbled endpapers. With the first page (the only preliminary page) in facsimile, but further complete. [130] ll. Full description

HULSIUS, Bartholomaeus. Den onderganck des Roomschen Arents, door den Noordschen Leeuw ...
Amsterdam, Crispijn vande Passe, 1642. 4to. Engraved allegorical title page with engraved title in a central panel below Fame sitting on a swan. Beautifully bound in 19th-century light brown gold-tooled calf (1850s or 1860s?), each board with triple along the edges, decorated spine with red and green labels lettered in gold, gold-tooled board edges and turn-ins, marbled endpapers, signed "PETIT SUCCr DE SIMIER": Charles Petit operated a Paris bindery from 1848 to 1873 as successor to René Simier (1772-1843), relieur du roi from 1815, and his son. [12], 91, [1 blank] pp. plus engraved title page. Full description

[ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPT - ALTAR CANON]. Accipiendo in manibus hostiam dicat[!].... Initium Sancti Evangelii secundum Joannem. ... Cibavit illum dominus pane vitæ et intellectus.
[Belgium?], [ca. 1790?]. Three illuminated manuscript wall panels in matching style, forming a three-part altar canon lettered in blue and red ink on parchment (one 47.5 x 57 cm & two 31 x 22 cm; image sizes 46 x 54.5 cm & 29.5 x 21 cm), the larger stretched over a wooden frame and each of the smaller two over a wooden panel. All three panels meticulously and finely lettered in the style of roman printing types with 1 line in italic capitals, all 12 initials and some of their decoration in gold. All three panels richly illuminated around and between the text blocks with a gold background and extensive gold highlights, the illumination including decorated cartouches. The principal scenes at the head (miniatures in a wide variety of colours) show the Last Supper, Saint John the Evangelist and Christ washing his apostles' feet; the central scenes at the foot (ink and ink wash drawings, probably emblematic, that on the large panel in grey and those on the small panels in red) show a lamb and cross on an altar, 4 standing figures with long staffs around a table with a platter (of bread?: some of the figures are eating something) and herald angels before a kneeling figure (it doesn't look like a shepherd or the Virgin Mary). Full description

[INCUNABLE - COLOGNE EDITION OF THE ARS MORIENDI]. Speculu[m] artis bene morie[n]di [= Ars moriendi].
[Cologne, Heinrich Quentell, ca. 1493/97]. Small (Chancery) 4to (20.5 x 14.5 cm). With a large woodcut on the title page. Set in a single column, with 36 lines to the page, in a rotunda gothic type, with a larger textura gothic for the first line of the title. With spaces left for manuscript initials with manuscript guide letters in black ink. Most pages with a few words underscored in black ink. Recent marbled paper over boards by the Geneva bookbinder Jean-Luc Honegger (signed with his "honegger" stamp in blue ink at the foot of the back paste-down), the marbled paper in an antique spot pattern, black morocco spine label with the title in gold roman capitals, reading up the spine. [31], [1 blank] pp. Full description

JEROME (HIERONYMUS), Saint. Explanationum in Esaiam prophetam libri IX-XVI
[Southwestern Germany, 825-850 CE]. Folio (34.2 x 26.3 cm). Latin manuscript on vellum, written in an admirably elegant, clear Caroline minuscule in brown, black, and red ink, with large initials. Leaf dimensions 32.7 x 25.1 cm., written in 2 columes (9.4 x 25.5 cm.) of 30 lines each, ruled in drypoint. 15th-century half-calf and wooden boards, manuscript-waste pastedowns, with text written in a Caroline minuscule. Stored in a custom-made half morocco case. [101 (of 139)] ll. Full description

LA SERRE, Jean-Puget de. Le breviere des courtisans, enrichy d'un grand nombre de figures.
Paris, Jeremie Boüillerot, 1642. 8vo. With woodcut vignette on title page and 7 engraved plates depicting contrasting double-scenes, after designs by Nicolaas van der Horst. Gold-tooled red morocco attributed to Henry Gaillard (active in the third quarter of the 19th century), richly gold-tooled turn-ins, gilt edges. [6], 304 pp. Full description

MAJORICA, Girolamo, Nicolas TRIGAULT and Alvaro SEMEDO. Lettere annue del Giappone dell'anno MDCXXII e della Cina del 1621 & 1622 al molto Reu. in Christo P. Mutio Vitelleschi preposito generale della Compagnia di Giesu.
Roma, Francesco Corbelletti, [1627?]. 8vo. With a woodcut "IHS" Jesuit device on title-page, woodcut headpiece, tailpiece and decorated initials. 18th-century flexible boards. 312 pp. Full description

[MANUSCRIPT - SERVICE BOOK - DIVINE OFFICES]. Ordine da osservarsi nell'oratorio di Santa Maria di Passione, circa gli Essercicii Spirituali delle feste cavato dalla Regola maggiore.
[Milan], [18th-century]. Folio (27,5 x 18,5 cm). With 5 full-page and 2 half-page, hand-painted religious illustrations and 9 hand-painted initials on a blue background, heightened with gold and silver. 18th-century gold- and blind-tooled parchment, each board with a blind ornamental centre-piece ornament in a blind-tooled frame, in a larger frame of gold fillets, with a gold flower in each of the 6 spine compartments. [1 blank], [1], 66 pp. Full description

[MANUSCRIPT - NEWS REPORT - SECOND ANGLO-DUTCH WAR]. [News report in French on the Raid on the Medway in 1667].
London, 24 June 1667. Double leaf (ca. 32.5 x 21 cm). The document is written in French on in a neat and clear hand in black ink on paper with the watermark of the coat-of-arms of Amsterdam. [2] ll. Full description

[MANUSCRIPT - PRAYER AND HYMN BOOK - LATIN]. [Devotionarium].[Incipit leaf 2r:] Or[ati]o deuota q[ue] debet dici[t] i[n] ficem diei ante dormitione[m].
[Northern Germany(?), 15th century]. 8vo. Written in Latin on relatively thin parchment (leaf 11.5 x 8.5 cm, text block 7.8 x 5.2 cm), in a gothic hand in one column of 17 lines per page using black/dark brown ink. The manuscript is rubricated throughout, with a 3-line red and blue initial at the start of each part, and 2- or 1-line lombards, alternating in red and blue, at the start of each smaller section, ruled in pencil. Early 19th-century(?) gold-tooled vellum showing a gold-tooled floral frame on both boards, with a leather closing tie on the front, gold-tooled board eges, gilt edges. [131] ll. Full description