Asher Rare Books

Masting and rigging of ships, with 25 plates

FORFAIT, Pierre Alexandre Laurent. Traité élémentaire de la mature des vaisseaux, a l'usage des élèves de la marine; ... Seconde édition, ... considérablement augmentée ... Suivi d'un mémoire sur le système de construction des mâts d'assemblage en usage dans les ports de Hollande ...
Paris, Bachelier (back of half-title: printed by De Fain), 1815. 4to. With 25 engraved folding plates and with several tables folded because they exceed our copy's margins. Contemporary green half calf, gold-tooled spine. 16, 340, [2] pp. Full description

€ 950

Ships & Shipbuilding

Manuscript plan of the "Stelling Den Helder": the oldest surviving defence line in Dutch military history, including the important marine shipyard Willemsoord

[FORTIFICATION PLAN - DEN HELDER - WILLEMSOORD]. KRAG, Rasmus. Kort over en deel af provindsen Nordholland med befestningen af de Helder, maritime & etablissementet Willemsoort samt en deel af den nye Nordhollandske Canal.
[The Netherlands?], 1825. Double Elephant 1mo sheet (92 x 63 cm). With a pen and ink-drawn fortification plan (ca. 85 x 55 cm) of the Den Helder fortifications and the marine shipyard Willemsoord, coloured by a contemporary hand, with a manuscript title, scales and a key in Danish, written in a fine and legible 19th-century hand surrounding the plan. On Whatman wove paper. Folded. [1] sheet. Full description

€ 1,800

Fortification & Military Architecture Military History (19th Century) Naval History Water Management

Agricultural sketch of rural New York State, a shipwreck and a journey along the Azores

FOWLER, John. Journal of a tour in the state of New York, in the year 1830; with remarks on agriculture in those parts most eligible for settlers: and return to England by the Western Islands, in consequence of shipwreck in the Robert Fulton.
London, Whittaker, Treacher, and Arnot (colophon: Liverpool, printed by E. Smith and co), 1831. 8vo. Modern half calf, marbled sides, title in gold on spine. [2], V, [1], 7-333, [1 blank] pp. Full description

€ 450

Agriculture Mutiny, Piracy & Shipwrecks New York North America Travel & Voyages Africa Travel & Voyages Europe Travel & Voyages North America West Africa

Unpublished illustrated supplement to Duhamel du Monceau's Traité général des pesches

[AUTOGRAPH]. FRANCQ VAN BERKHEY, Jean le. [Autograph letter in French, signed, to Henri Louis Duhamel du Monceau.]
Leiden, 10 December 1771. 25 x 20 cm (letter) & 23.5 x 18.5 cm (manuscript). Never bound.
With: [MANUSCRIPT]. [FRANCQ VAN BERKHEY, Jean LE]. Memoires, pour servir a ce que l'illustre auteur de "L'histoire generale des poissons" Monsieur M. Du Hamel de Monceau, solicite a l'egard des morues.
[Leiden, 1771].
A letter and treatise in French, written in dark brown ink on paper in a neat and easily readable hand, the treatise with 9 tipped-in pen and ink illustrations drawn by the author (6.5 x 10.5 to 11.5 x 21.5 cm) and a few small illustrations in the text. [4]; “29” [= 30], [1], [1 blank] pp. plus tipped in illustrations. Full description

€ 25,000

Autographs & Letters Fishery & Whaling Fishes Manuscripts & Documents

Splendid manuscript on the state, condition and organization of the French Royal navy in 1732,
from the library of Henri Beraldi

[FRENCH ROYAL NAVY]. [Binding title:] Abregé de la marine du Roy 1732.
[Paris?, 1732]. 13.5×19 cm. Manuscript in brown-black, red and blue ink on vellum, some of the lettering and borders gilt. With a beautiful frontispiece painting in coloured gouaches (14×9.5 cm) pasted on the page facing the opening of the text, showing a small warship at a shipyard in a small harbour being repaired by workmen. Contemporary red morocco, gold-tooled spine, gold-tooled fillets on boards and board edges, richly gold-tooled frame, gilt edges. Frontispiece plus [2], 26 ll., including 2 double and 1 larger folding. Full description

€ 95,000

Bindings Calligraphy Canada & Greenland Drawings & Watercolours France Manuscripts & Documents Military History (18th Century) North America Ships & Shipbuilding West Indies

Rare Swedish scientific dissertation on the making of nautical charts and their use

FRIBERG, Olavus and Olavus HERWECH. Q.B.V. Dissertatio academica, de constructione et usu mapparum hydrographicarum, quam consentiente ampliss. senatu philosoph. in regia academia Upsaliensi, publico eruditorum examini modeste submittunt auctor Olavus Friberg et respondens Olavus Herwech. ad. fil. Vermelandi, In auditorio Carolino Marjori die III. Maji Anno MDCCXLIV.
Uppsala, 1744. 4to. With 4 woodcut geometrical illustrations in the text, a large woodcut headpiece (with the words "constantia coronatur" in it) and one large woodcut decorated initial. Modern stiff (marbled?) paper boards with the title in gold on the spine. 16 pp. Full description

€ 750

Charts & Maps Mathematics Navigation School & Textbooks

One of the last manuals on sailing ships before mechanical propulsion took over

FUNCH, Diderik Hansteen. Dansk Marine-Ordbog.
Copenhagen, Bianco Luno, 1846-1852. 2 parts in 1 volume. Large 4to (30 x 23.5 cm). With 67 full-page engraved plates (7 folding), partly coloured by hand. [4], 169, [3]; 152 pp. Full description

€ 1,950

Scandinavia Ships & Shipbuilding Technology

Spanish pioneer of the use of the chronometer in navigation and mapping

GALIANO, Dionisio Alcalá. Memoria sobre las observaciones de latitud y longitud en el mar.
[Madrid], widow of Joaquin Ibarra, 1796. Narrow 4to (20.5 x 14 cm). With a woodcut crowned cypher monogram (of a Spanish Duke?) on the title-page and 7 folding leaves containing 13 numbered letterpress tables. Early 19th-century gold-tooled tree calf. [2], 87, [1] pp. Full description

€ 3,950

Circumnavigation Navigation Spain Travel & Voyages South America

Well-illustrated encyclopaedia of astronomical and surveying instruments from the time of Galileo,
with a world map in two hemispheres, and 3 volvelles

GALLUCCI, Giovanni Paolo. Della fabrica et uso di diversi stromenti di astronomia, et cosmografia, ove si vede la somma della teorica, et pratica di queste due nobilissime scienze.
Venice, Roberto Meietti, 1598. 4to (22 x 16.5 cm). With engraved title-page, folding woodcut plate, 3 woodcut volvelles with moving parts, and numerous woodcut illustrations in text. Including a world map in two hemispheres (incl. America and a scattering of islands at the location of Australia) on two facing pages, they reappear with volvelle attachments on both sides of leaf 149 and leaf 153. Contemporary limp sheepskin parchment. [8], 228 ll. Full description

€ 35,000

Astronomy & Cosmography Charts & Maps Early Printing - 16th century Instruments & Microscopy Navigation Technology

Three fortification plans, including a large coloured plan of the fortifications of Neuf-Brisach

[DRAWING - FORTIFICATION]. GENNEP, T.P. van. [Three fortification plans].
[Raamsdonk], 1798. 3 manuscript fortification plans (measuring (ad 1) 58 x 93 cm, (ad 2) 24.5 x 24.5 cm (ad 3) 29.5 x 37 cm) on paper. All signed: T.P. van Gennep, 1798; and one: Raamsdonk, 29 January 1798. Full description