Book History, Education, Learning & Printing / Bindings

[BIBLE - LATIN - VULGATE]. Biblia Sacra vulgatae editionis Sixti Quinti Pont. Max. jussu recognita atque edita.
Including: Novum Jesu Christi Testamentum, vulgatae editiones, Sixti V. Pont, Max jussu recognitum atque edititum.
Antwerp, "Officina Plantiniana" [= Balthasar I Moretus, grandson of Christoffel Plantin], 1629. 7 volumes bound as 9 (Old Testament I-VII & New Testament I-II). 24mo in 8s (11.5 x 7 cm). With a richly engraved general title-page, 6 volume title-pages (each with the same Plantin-Moretus woodcut compasses device), a smaller woodcut compasses device plus 3 (of 4) repeats (2 appear on the back of the colophon; each of the others on an otherwise blank leaf), woodcut tailpieces, woodcut decorated initials. Set in roman and italic types. The present copy with 3 extra letterpress divisional title-pages, perhaps specially printed for this copy when it was bound. Uniform gold-tooled goatskin morocco (ca. 1700), sewn on 4 supports, richly gold-tooled spines, gold-tooled turn-ins and board edges. Seven volumes with the ca. 1711 engraved armorial bookplate of Jean Le Normand (1662-1733), Bishop of Evreau, and probably bound for him (his bookplate probably removed from volumes II and III as bound). 574; [2], 575-729, [2], [5 blank]; “637” [= 635], [1], [1 blank], [4 blank] (in place of [1], [3 blank]); 192; 479, [1 blank]; 861, [2], [1 blank]; 128, [186], [6 blank]; 336, [2], 337-758, [2], [8 blank] pp. Full description

[BIBLE - LUTHER - DUTCH]. VISSCHER, Adolf (translator). Biblia, dat is, de gantsche H. Schrifture vervattende alle de boecken des Ouden ende Nieuwen Testaments.
Including:
(2) De Propheten.
(3) De Apocryphe boecken: dat zijn boecken die der heylige schrifture niet en worden gelijck gehouden ende nochtans nut ende goet zijn om te lezen.
Amsterdam, Rieuwert Dircksz. van Baardt (and his widow), printed on the presses of Lodewijk III Elsevier in Amsterdam, [1648]. 4 parts in 1 volume. Folio. With a full-page portrait of Martin Luther as a frontispiece, an engraved general title-page, a full-page portrait of Adolf Visscher, 6 folding double-page engraved maps, 6 double-page engraved plates showing a total of 96 biblical scenes (16 scenes per plate) printed by Frederick de Witt, and an elaborate engraved tail-piece. With three divisional typographical title-pages for the prophets, Biblical apocrypha and the New Testament, including Van Baardt's detailed woodcut vignette, decorated woodcut initials (at least 3 series) and ornamental woodcut tail-pieces.
Contemporary richly blind-tooled calf over wooden boards, with large brass clasps, catch plates and corner-pieces on both boards, red edges. [18], 278; 112; 70; 132 ll. Full description

[BINDING - EMBROIDERED]. Esercizio da premettersi dalle donne in stato di gravidanza per conseguire da dio per l'intercessione del glorioso San Torello protettore insigne l'essenzione da tutti i pericoli e felicità nel prossimo parto.
Florence, Stamperià Arcivescovile alla Croce Rossa, 1822. 8vo. Beautifully embroidered contemporary pink silk over paperboards, with flowers and a border along the edges of both sides, and the initials "CM" in centre of front cover, preserved in a modern marbled slipcase. 39 pp. Full description

[BINDING]. [GHELARDI SCOLOPI, Orazio Antonio]. La pace tra la virtu', la gloria, ed amore. Componimento drammatico da cantarsi in occasione delle faustissime nozze del nobil uomo signor Silvestro Michele Arnolfini con la nobil donzella signora Beatrice Luisa Bernardini dedicato alla medesima.
Lucca, Giuseppe Rocchi, 1767. Small 4to (17 x 14 cm). Contemporary red velvet, embroidered with silver and gold thread and white and yellow silk (each board with an emblematic image: a crowned mirror[?] showing a hand planting a flag, perhaps intended as the groom's hand on the front and the bride's hand on the back), sewn without supports through 3 holes, brocade paper endpapers (grape vines and large flowers, white on a copper background), green silk ribbon marker. 24 pp. Full description

[BINDING - SILVER]. [Pair of embossed silver book covers, with two engraved silver clasps].
[Netherlands?, ca. 1725?]. Pair of embossed silver book covers (34 x 25 x 3 cm); each cover with a large scrollwork cartouche surrounded by extensive vine and flower decorations and with medallion portraits in each of the four corners, the front showing the crucifixion flanked by Mary and St. John (with an "INRI" scroll above, flanked by a crescent moon and a sun, and a skull and crossbones below), with portraits of four saints, each with a blank scroll (above left bearded with a regal crown; above right clean-shaven with a round-topped mitre; below left and right bare-headed and bearded), the back showing the resurrection with an angel and two astonished guards, with portraits of the four Evangelists. Full description

BOCKENBERG, Pieter Cornelisz. Catalogus & brevis historia pontificum Ultraiectensium. Item catalogus & brevis historia antistitum Egmondanorum.
Leiden, Jan Jacobsz. Paets, 1586 (Colophon: 'Extant Goudae, apud Leonardum Theodori Librarium, ad pontem Hornensem'). Small 8vo. [16], 99, [12] [1 blank] pp. Full description

[BOOK OF HOURS]. Hore [= Horae beate Marie Virginis] secundum usum Romanum ad longum.
(colophon: Paris, Thomas Kees), [ca. 1511, with an almanac for the years 1511-1530]. 8vo (18 x 12 cm). Printed on vellum in red and black throughout, with illustrations printed from (mostly metal?) relief blocks: 17 nearly full-page plus 1 repeat, 27 small plus 2 repeats in the text, many additional small in the decorated border pieces that surround nearly every page. Dark brown gold- and blind-tooled goatskin morocco (ca. 1870?), signed "HARDY-MENNIL" in the foot of the front turn-in. [216] pp. Full description

[BOTTLE IN BOOK FORM]. Esprit de Francklin ... Le B[on].homme Richard.
Chalonnes sur Loire, Fremy frères, Bottrel et Cie., [ca. 1830]. Blown glass bottle made in the form of a book (15 x 10 x 3 cm plus 1.5 cm neck and lip). The "spine" is covered with gold-tooled red morocco, with 7 horizontal rolls dividing it into 5 fields plus a smaller 6th at the foot, the title and the French form of Franklin's pen-name in fields 3 and 4 and a decoration in fields 1, 3 and 5, the "boards" covered with paper, each with an lithographed rectangular decorative border enclosing an oval laurel wreath around an oval paper overlay with a lithographed view, that on the front board showing Benjamin Franklin and that on the back board showing a man in the distillery, each with accompanying texts above and below the wreath. The paper sides (but not their overlays) have a slight reddish cast. Full description

[BOUHOURS, Dominique]. Les entretiens d'Ariste et d'Eugene. Dernière edition. ... Sur la copie imprimée à Paris.
Amsterdam, "Jaques le Jeune" [= Daniel Elzevier], 1671. 12mo. With an engraved frontispiece, woodcut publisher's device (armillary sphere) on title-page and 2 woodcut decorated initials. Polished gold-tooled red goatskin morocco (ca. 1840?), each board in a panel design. A pencil note on an endleaf attributes the binding to "Muller" on grounds unknown to us, but he was active from 1834, which accords well with the date of the present binding. [8], 438, [9], [1 blank] pp. Full description

BRETEZ, Louis. Plan de Paris commencé l'année 1734. Dessiné et gravé, sous les ordres de Messire Michel Etienne Turgot, Marquis de Sousmons ... Achevé de graver en 1739.
[Paris, 1739]. Grand-Aigle folio (56 x 45.5 cm). An enormous engraved map of Paris in 20 numbered sheets plus a key map, at a scale of about 1:2000, each segment measuring 55 x 84 cm (plate size 51.5 x 80.5 cm; image 48 x 79 cm) which would give an assembled map with image size about 240 x 316 cm! The key map is slightly larger than the segments and folds out at the head. Bound as an atlas (but with segments 18 and 19, containing the cartouche, assembled to make a long fold-out) in contemporary gold-tooled red morocco, each board with as centrepiece the Paris coat of arms (a ship with chief a field of fleurs-de-lis). Full description