This edition opens with a copper-engraved added title-page signed by J. Padebrugge; the main title-page bears the Elzevir sphere mark. Willems notes that it is “une copie exacte et ligne pour ligne de celle [the Elzevir edition] de 1672, dont en effect Moetjens s'était rendu adjudicataire, mais c'est positivement une réimpression.” It is, in effect, aline-for-line piracy, and a handsome one faithful to its original's good qualities.

Uncommon: OCLC and NUC Pre-1956 locate only eight U.S. holdings.

Provenance:  Front pastedown with bookplate of collector Robert J. Hayhurst.

•  Brunet, III, 1309; Willems 1472.   Contemporary vellum, spine with early inked title; vellum remarkably clean. Original blue silk place marker present and intact. Front free endpaper with upper outer corner excised, mostly removing an early inked ownership inscription; title-page with early inked inscriptions lined through; back free endpaper with recent pencilled purchase record. One leaf with short tear from outer margin, just touching text without loss. Pages clean. A nice book.  (25561)

The engraved title-page vignette here incorporates the Dauphin’s coat of arms and the French royal banner, while the headpiece on the next page depicts two cherubim wrestling with dolphins.

Binding: Contemporary speckled calf, spine overlaid some time ago with red morocco (to achieve a uniform appearance with other books in a previous owner’s library); spine with gilt-stamped leather title label and a similar series/date label (“In usum Delphini”). Raised bands, spine compartments, and head and foot bear gilt-stamped decorations

•  Brunet, IV, 342; Sandys, II, 292. Binding as above; boards very slightly warped, spine darkened and with small paper label, leather a bit rubbed at extremities and along spine. Front pastedown with private collector’s bookplate, old institutional rubber-stamp, and pencilled annotations; front free endpaper with inked ownership inscription dated 1892; title-page with small early ownership inscription. Frontispiece lacking. Some offsetting to margins of first and last few leaves. All edges speckled blue and red.

Click the interior image for an enlargement.

The author was the cosmographer and historiographer of the Dutch East India Company as well as the Dutch royal family's official translator.

This is one of the scarcest volumes in commerce of the Elzevirs' series of histories in the Respublica series. It is only the third copy we have had in our 30+ years in the antiquarian book business.

•  Willems 313; Rahir 284; European Americana 629/79; Palau 129562; Sabin 38560; Borba de Moraes (2nd ed.), Bibliographia brasiliana, I, 450.   Recased in contemporary Dutch vellum over paste boards. Red leather spine label, abraded and sunned. Tiny pin-type wormhole in margin of first three leaves, and silverfish damage to final blank and rear privilege leaf, costing a few letters of the privilege, but not impairing sense. Ownership inscription at base of title-page has been inked through. A clean decent copy of this nice little book.  (24335)

Provenance: Charles Spencer, Third Earl of Sunderland, lot 7230 in the Sunderland Library sale (1882).

•  On Lamy, see: New Catholic Encyclopedia, VIII, 354–55. 18th-century vellum over boards with raised bands, lightly soiled; on the covers an ornate mandorla inside a composite frame. Crack in the vellum along front joint, joint itself sound. Ex-library with paper labels on spine; old pressure-stamps, including one on title-page of vol. I. Upper outer corner of title-leaf lost taking part of one letter of title; small tear into printed border of first map in vol. II. All edges speckled blue and red. A stout, substantial volume.

Bound with Lancellotti's work is a summary of titles of chapters of canon law compiled by Thomas Naogeorg (1508–63). Naogeorg's wanderings took him from being a Dominican to being a Lutheran to being a Calvinist. Along the way, during his Lutheran phase, he studied canon law for a year (1551) at Basel, during which time he compiled and published this work, likely as a student's guide. He is better known for his plays, in which he sharply attacks the Papacy.

The two works here were first published by the firm of Guillaume Rouillé, in 1587 and 1588 respectively, and may have been intended to be bound together, as witnessed by the Library of Congress copy. The title-page transcriptions of the earlier editions (except for the date and "hæredes"), and their signatures, pagination, and arrangement, match those of these present 1614 editions. There are italic shouldernotes, and woodcut headpieces and initials.

•  On Lancellotti, see: New Catholic Encyclopedia, VIII, 356. 17th-century calf; covers gilt-ruled; gilt spine. Abraded, corners bumped with leather lost, joints opening—yet this is a perfectly sound volume. All edges speckled brown. Bouquiniste's paper label on front pastedown and front free endpaper lacking. Two words inked long ago in two margins, and one page with old pencilled underlining.

Click the image for an enlargement.

•  Palau 60707; not in Almirante. Removed from a nonce volume. Creased, with holes along creases causing loss of some letters; lower inner margins waterstained. Leaves trimmed closely, second leaf with first line lost and second line partially shaved.