New York, Sakett & Wilhelms Corp., [1918].

This poster was produced to for the sale of the third or fourth liberty loans in 1918, which saw the printing of 9 and 10 million promotional posters produced, respectively. The large-scale of the effort was seen to reflect a turning point in war advertising. As the US was an immigrant nation, the Federal...

£400

[China], [1840–1] 道光卄年.

A letter sent by the Department of Justice to the Hubei provincial government to request an arrest warrant for the French missionary François-Alexis Rameaux (1802–1845). This is most likely a copy, being written on decorated paper as used in private exchanges, especially between lower and higher...

£3500

[China, 1845.]

A circular notifying the Christian community of the death of François-Alexis Rameaux (1802–1845), Vicar Apostolic of Zhejiang and Jiangxi from 1838, issued by his friend and successor Bernard-Vincent Laribe (1802–1850), asking that prayers for his soul be practiced nightly for six months.

£2000

Leipzig, Lankisch, 1762.

First edition in German of this collection of amusing literary, philosophical and historical anecdotes on French men and women of letters from the fifteenth century to the eighteenth, translated by the composer and conductor Johann Adam Hiller (1728–1804), one of Bach’s successors as Cantor in...

£250

[London], Quaritch, 2007.

Pocahontas – meaning ‘Little Wanton’ or playful one – is famous for something she may or may not have done four hundred years ago: rescue the English colonist John Smith from execution by her father, Powhatan, the Indian paramount chief of the Virginia area. Pocahontas, Little Wanton investigates...

£25

Bologna, Stabilimenti tipografici riuniti, 1925.

First and only edition of this history of the Franciscan Mission in Southern Hunan, an important copy bound for presentation by the Vicar Apostolic of Southern Hunan to King Victor Emmanuel III of Italy.

£750

Calcutta, printed at the Bengal Secretariat Press, 1894.

First edition of this comprehensive survey of Sikkim, in northeast India (bordering Tibet, Bhutan, Nepal and West Bengal), which had become a princely state of British India in 1890. The chapters cover, inter alia, the region’s history, geography, laws, geology, agriculture, vegetation, butterflies,...

£2500

Venice, Damiano Zenaro, 1582.

First edition of Rocca’s military treatise, from the library of the world’s oldest defence and security think tank.

£450

Lisbon, Joao da Costa, 1672.

First edition in any language of the Dutch Jesuit François de Rougemont’s history of mid seventeenth-century China, published a year before the Latin original. Inspired to join the Chinese missions after meeting the famed Jesuit sinologist Martino Martini in Louvain, Rougemont arrived in Macao...

£2500

London, printed for H.M. and sold by J. Whitlock, 1695.

First edition. The Royal Fishery Company, incorporated in 1662, had great trouble finding subscribers. Initially, Charles II offered £9000 as an incentive to investors but on these only raising £3680 he withdrew his undertaking, instead allowing a lottery to aid the Company’s fortunes. After attempts...

£200

London, E. Whitlock, 1698.

First edition; a French version appeared the same year. Since its foundation in 1688, the Royal Lustring Company (importers of ‘lustrings’ or ‘alamodes’ – a fine, light, glossy, black silk) had enjoyed special monopolistic privileges which it had exploited to the full. However, by the end...

£275

[Clichy, Maurice Loignon for] Paris, Arnauld de Vresse, [c. 1864].

A hand-coloured copy of this scarce and charming juvenile guide to twenty-four countries across the globe. The plates are adapted from those first published in Paris by Aubert c. 1845 under the title Récréations instructives: voyage pittoresque à travers le monde (Gumuchian 5037).

£1250

Paris, chez les marchands de nouveautés, 1821.

Rare first edition of this work on Parisian prostitution, attributed to the writer and journalist Émile Marco de Sainte-Hilaire (1796–1887). The Réclamation is presented as a letter from the prostitute Modeste Agnès to the newly-appointed Paris chief of police, Guy Delavau (1787–1874),...

£850

[France, c. 1920].

A seemingly unpublished French manuscript translation of a manual for the use of Sandow’s Combined Developer, a fitness device designed by Eugen Sandow, the founding father of modern bodybuilding.

£850

London, Rupert Hart-Davis, 1953.

Sassoon’s proof copy of Hunting Scenes from Surtees, with pages left blank for the inclusion of his as-yet unwritten introduction.

£850

‘Eleuteropoli’ [Freistadt?], 1672. 

First edition of this treatise on the ancient oar-driven warships known as triremes by the noted German philologist and archaeologist Johannes Scheffer (1621–1679), written as a critical response to the De fabrica triremium liber of Marcus Meibom, which had appeared in Amsterdam the previous...

£875

Paris, chez Valade; Brussels, chez Emmanuel Flon, 1774.

£100

Seville, 25 July 1576.

A commercial document from the heyday of Seville’s trade with the Indies. Drawn up for Sebastián de Baeza, a resident of the barrio of San Bartolomé in Seville, the document recapitulates a previous agreement of 25 June 1576 between, on the one hand, Hernán López de Segovia and, on...

£1200

Moscow & Petrograd, Gosizdat, 1923.

First edition of Shaginyan’s account of a pilgrimage to Weimar, presented by the author ‘to the respected Vladimir Pavlovich Pirogov in dear memory’ (trans.).

£600

[Shanghai, A. S. Watson & Co. and Kelly & Walsh, c. 1935.]

Rare first edition of a photographic souvenir book of Shanghai. The initial full-page topographical views of the city are followed by a series of smaller format ‘Studies of Chinese Life’, including street scenes and portraits.

£350