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First modern treatise on oceanography, and a challenge to Machiavelli: rulers must be moral

BOTERO, Giovanni. Aggiunte fatte ... alla sua ragion di stato ove si tratta dell... con una relatione del mare.
Including:
2 [part 1]) Delleccellenze de gli antichi capitani libri due. ...
3 [part 4]) Dellagilita della forze del prencipe libri due. ...
4 [part 3]) Della riputatione del prencipe libri due. ...
5 [part 2]) Discorso della neutralita [del prencipe] ...
6 [part 5]) Discroso[!] intorno alla fortificatione ...
7 [part 6]) Relationi del mare ...
Rome, Giorgio Ferrari, 1598. A preliminary part and 6 text parts in one volume. 4to. With a general title-page and 6 part-titles, each with Ferraris woodcut device: the coat of arms of the city of Rome supported by Saints Paul and Peter, a woodcut headpiece (plus repeats), 3 woodcut tailpieces and woodcut decorated initials, decorations built up from arabesque typographic ornaments. Set in an italic type with incidental roman. Sheepskin parchment (ca. 1700?), sewn on 5 supports, with a hollow back, gold-tooled smooth spine divided into 6 fields with author and title in the 2nd and 3rd and a built-up ornament in the others. [22], [2 blank]; 72; 46, [2 blank]; 31, [1 blank]; 15, [1 blank]; 14, [2 blank]; 31, [1 blank] pp. Full description
€ 8,250
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Contemporary accounts of two power struggles, in Italy and in the Low Countries

CAPELLA, Galeazzo Flavio. De rebus nuper in Italia gestis [in the running heads: "De bello Mediolanensi"] libro octo ...
(Colophon: Antwerp, Maarten de Keyser), 1533.
With: (2) SERVILIUS, Johannes (Jan KNAAP). Geldrogallica conjuratio in totius Belgicae clarissimam civitatem Antverpiam, duce Martino Rosheymio, ...
Augsburg, Heinrich Steiner, 1544. 2 works in 1 volume. Small 8vo (15 x 10 cm). Contemporary vellum wrappers, with 2 fragments of the March and April calendar leaf (in red and black) of a manuscript Missale romanum (ca. 1475/1500?) used as end leaves. 96; [44] ll. Full description
€ 4,500
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First edition of a rare work about the Orient and the crusades

CENTENO, Amaro. Historia de cosas del oriente primera y segunda parte...
Cordoba, Diego Galván, 1595. 2 parts in 1 volume. 4to. With a woodcut coat of arms on the title-page and the divisional title-page for part 2, an elaborate Jesuit woodcut IHS vignette on the verso of the last leaf above the colophon and woodcut initials throughout, with a few typographical or woodcut tail-pieces, al text is set within a simple woodcut frame. Later tree marbled sheepskin. [8], 138, [4] ll. Full description
€ 28,000
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Francis Drake’s failed attempt to depose the King of Spain and Portugal

DRAKE, Francis (subject). Brevis & fida narratio, et continuatio rerum omnium a Drako et Norreysio (post ex Occidentalibus Insulis, reditum) in sua expeditione Portugallensi singulis diebus gestarum.
Frankfurt am Main, Paul Brachfeldt, 1590. 4to. With the woodcut arms on the title-page, the upper related to that of Queen Elizabeth of England and the lower that of King Philip I of Portugal (Philip II of Spain), each supported by putti, a full-page woodcut standing soldier with sword and spear, perhaps intended as Francis Drake. Gold-tooled green morocco (2nd half of 19th century). [2], 29, [1 blank] pp. Full description
€ 15,000
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First European biography of Timur derived from an Arabic source

DU BEC-CRESPIN, Jean. The historie of the great emperour Tamerlan wherein are expressed, encounters, skirmishes, battels, sieges, assaults, skalings, taking of cities and strong places, defended, and assaulted, with diverse stratagems of warre, the which this great and renowned warriour hath conducted and accomplished, during his raigne of fortie or fiftie yeares: with other instructions for the warre, which should not be unknowen of them that would attaine unto the knowledge of armes. Drawen from the auncient monuments of the Arabians, by messire Jean du Bec, abbot of Mortimer. Newly translated out of French into English, for their benefite which are ignorant in that language. by H.M.
London, R. Field for Willam Ponsonby, 1597. 4to. With a woodcut device on the title-page, woodcut initials, head- and tail-pieces.17th-century calf, 19th century gold-tooled spine. [4], 265, [1] pp. Full description
€ 35,000
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Pioneering work on fortification design, building techniques and equipment,
with more than 150 woodcut illustrations

LORINI, Buonaiuto. Delle fortificationi ... libri cinque.
Venice, Antonio Rampazetto, 1597 (colophon: 1596). Large folio (34.5 x 25 cm). With a large engraved device on the title-page, woodcut printer's device above the colophon, an engraved plate with a portrait of the author (often lacking), and more than 150 diagrams and woodcut illustrations on the integral leaves, many full-page or double-page. Modern vellum in 17th-century style. [12], “219” [= 217], [1], [2 blank] pp. Full description
€ 2,500
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The first contemporary history of the Netherlands. In the first Latin edition, with a rare portrait of the author

METEREN, Emanuel van. Historia Belgica nostri potissimum temporis Belgii sub quatuor Burgundis & totidem Austriacis principibus coniunctionem & gubernationem breviter. Turbas autem, bella et mutationes tempore regis Philippi, Carli V. Caesaris filii, ad annum usque 1598. plenius complectens, conscripta.
[Cologne, A. Mylius, 1598]. Folio. With letterpress title-page in engraved border with scenes of trade and war (Verduyn, pl. XIV), additional engraved medallion portrait of the author mounted on blank back of title-page, by Hendrik Hondius the Elder, double-page engraved map of the Netherlands, by Frans Hogenberg and 22 engraved portraits on 19 plates. Contemporary vellum. [8], "623" [= 643], [1] pp. Full description
€ 2,000
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First Dutch edition of an eyewitness account of the 1573 siege of Alkmaar

[FOREEST, Nanning van]. Een cort verhael van de strenghe belegheringhe ende aftreck der Spangiaerden van de Stadt Alcmaer gheleghen in Hollandt. Die welcke de Spaengiaerts nae dat syse int Jaer MDCLXXIII seven weecken beleghert hadden niet sonder haer groote schade ende schande hebben moeten nalaten, uyt het Latyn int Duytsch overgeset.
Delft, Aelbert Hendrickz., "1573" [1580 or soon after?]. Small 4to. With a woodcut illustration of a king on the title page, with his shield bearing an (Irish!?) harp, and 1 woodcut decorated initial (roman capital). Set in textura types except for the italic running heads. 19th-century block-printed decorated wrappers (in blue). 29, [3] pp. Full description
€ 8,500
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Three letters written in 1539 on the Ottoman threat in the Mediterranean

[LETTERS]. ALVAREZ DE TOLEDO, Pedro and Maria OSORIO Y PIMENTEL. [Three letters to Ferrante Gonzaga, Viceroy of Sicily, two from Pedro Alvarez de Toledo and one from his wife Maria Osorio y Pimentel].
Andria (in the Kingdom of Naples), 13 August to 10 September 1539. Folio (21.5 x 30 cm).
(1) Letter in Italian, signed, from Pedro Alvarez de Toledo in Andria to Ferrante Gonzaga, 13 August 1539, with a 23 mm seal bearing Alvarez de Toledo's coat of arms (with a chain of flags) stamped on a slip of paper attached with red wax.
(2) Letter in Spanish, signed, from Pedro Alvarez de Toledo in Andria to Ferrante Gonzaga, 3 September 1539, with the 45 mm imperial armorial seal stamped on a slip of paper attached with red wax.
(3) Letter in Italian, signed, from Maria Osorio y Pimentel [in Andria] to Ferrante Gonzaga, 10 September 1539, with the remains of what appears to be her husband's 23 mm red wax seal.
Each letter, in brown ink, occupies one page, with the last page containing the address and the sender's seal. The two inside pages of the second and third letter are blank. Each formerly folded for posting, so that the address would have appeared on one side and the seal on the other. [4]; [4]; [2] pp. including blanks. Full description
€ 15,000
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