Recent Acquisitions
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KIRAM, Zeki Hasmet.
Vocabularium anatomiae latine-arabice. [Qāmūs al-ta¬šrīḥ Lātīnī-‘Arabī].
Berlin, Morgen- und Abendland-Verlag, 1923.
First edition of an uncommon glossary of anatomical terms in Latin with corresponding translation in Arabic, intended for Arabic-speaking medical students studying in European universities, by army officer turned Berlin publicist, arms dealer, and Muslim activist Zeki Kiram (1886–1946).
£375
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[WARD, Edward, and VOLTAIRE.]
The Humourous and Diverting Story of Two Sailors, Who, in order to recruit their Stock of...
6, Punderson’s-Place, Bethnal-Green-Road’, [c. 1800?].
Seemingly unrecorded edition of this humorous chapbook tale of two penniless sailors who turn to piracy in an attempt to pay their rent, printed with a translation of Voltaire’s Memnon and the anonymous poem ‘Clara’.
£450
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JAYADEVA, and Friedrich MAJER (translator).
Gita-Govinda, ein Indisches Singspiel ... aus der Ursprache ins Englische...
Weimar, Landes-Industrie-Comptoir, 1802.
First and only separate edition of this uncommon German translation of Gita Govinda, a ‘devoutly erotic poem of the twelfth-century Bengali poet Jayadeva’ (ODNB).
£475
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[JACOBUS DE GRUYTRODE, (attr.)].
Lavacrum conscientie [omnium sacerdotum].
[Colophon:] Cologne, Heinrich Quentell, 1504.
Rare edition of this popular late medieval treatise widely ascribed to the Carthusian monk Jacobus de Gruytrode (c. 1400–1475).
£750
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TALIANI, Giuseppe.
Orologi riflessi, per mezo di un picciolo specchio parallelo o perpendicolare all’orizonte.
Macerata, Filippo Camacci, 1648.
Only recorded edition, rare, of this work by mathematician Taliani on the construction of sundials in the interior of buildings, to be achieved through mirrors reflecting solar rays – our copy uniquely furnished with a contemporary large hand-drawn representation of the face of a sundial. ...
£950
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BIANCHINI, Giuseppe.
Enarratio pseudo-Athanasiana in symbolum ante hac inedita, et Vigilii Tapsitani de Trinitate ad Theophilum...
Verona, Pierantonio Berno, 1732.
First edition, presented by the author, of this scarce work on the Apostles’ Creed by the Veronese Oratorian, Biblical and liturgical scholar, and librarian Giuseppe Bianchini (1704–1764), with a delightful frontispiece depicting the city of Verona.
£675
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LEWIS, Wyndham.
America and Cosmic Man.
London and Brussels, Nicholas and Watson Ltd., [1948].
First edition, second state binding as always (the first, in green cloth, was rejected by Lewis as ‘hideous’ and was used on only 3 trial copies). In hand by 1943, not finished until 1946 and then rejected by American publishers until it finally found a British home in 1948, America and Cosmic Man...
£200
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[HOMILETIC.]
Meditations de la seconde annee.
[France, c. 1700.]
Apparently unpublished set of meditations for the Sundays in the liturgical year running from the seventh to the twenty-fourth week after Pentecost, shedding light on tools and practices in the homiletic art. Themes range from reflections on the Eucharist, to considerations on mortality, on...
£750
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WILLIAMS, William Carlos.
Paterson [Books 1, 2, 3 & 4].
Norfolk, New Classics, [1951]. [with:]
First collected edition of Books One to Four and first edition of Book Five; inscribed on the front free endpaper of One to Four (in Williams’s distinctive scrawl, in two different pens after the first ran out of ink) ‘D.J. [i.e. G.] Bridson with my compliments / William...
£1250
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[LE MARCHE.]
Deed relating to the sale of property in Beltrovato (a district of Morrovalle in the Province of Macerata in the...
[Rome, 1616.]
A curiously bound public instrument notarised by the Apostolic Camera in Rome detailing the sale of property belonging to two brothers from the influential de’ Mozzi family of Macerata.
£850
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[MEIN, Robert.]
A Nominal Encomium on the Election of Magistrates at Michaelmass 1764.
[Edinburgh, 1764.]
First edition, very rare, a poem celebrating both the election of James Stuart of Binend as Lord Provost of Edinburgh, and the plans for the construction of Edinburgh New Town, of which building was to commence in 1767. Typically for Mein he anagrammatizes his subject as ‘A Just Master’,...
£450
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VILLA, Antonio, and Giovanni Battista VILLA.
Dispositio systematica conchyliarum terrestrium et fluviatilium quae adservantur...
Milan, ex typis Borroni et Scotti, 1841.
First edition of this catalogue of molluscs and shellfish in the collection of Antonio and Giovanni Battista Villa.
£275
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[POPE, Walter.]
The Memoires of Monsieur Du Vall: containing the history of his Life and Death. Whereunto are annexed his last...
London, Printed for Henry Brome … 1670.
First(?) edition of a partly fictitious and often satirical life of the highwayman Claude Duval, published shortly after his execution in 1670. This is the more substantial of two opportunistic biographies, between them the main sources of information about him, though by no means entirely trustworthy. ...
£750
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BACON, Francis.
Francisci Baconi, Baronis de Verulamio, Vice-Comitis Sancti Albani, operum moralium et civilium tomus … cura...
London, Edward Griffin [and John Haviland] for Richard Whitaker [and John Norton], 1638.
First edition, first issue, a copy from the celebrated Albani library: tangible witness to the early and fecund reception of Bacon’s thought in the circles of Galilean science in Italy.
£3500
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REXROTH, Kenneth.
An Autobiographical Novel …
Garden City, NY, Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1966.
First edition, inscribed ‘In friendship / for Geoffrey Bridson / Kenneth Rexroth SF June 66’.
£300
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AIKEN, Conrad.
Ushant, an Essay.
New York & Boston, Duell, Sloan and Pearce / Little, Brown and Company, [1952].
First edition, inscribed ‘For Geoffrey [Bridson] from Conrad. Ex – Xmas 1956’. Ushant, Conrad’s ‘autobiographical narrative’, is often considered his most significant work in prose.
£300
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AIKEN, Conrad.
Thee.
New York, George Braziller, 1967.
First trade edition, inscribed ‘For Geoffrey and Joyce [Bridson] / this little hymn of love / from Conrad / 1968’.
£250
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NADAL, [Augustin,] Abbé.
Herode: Tragedie nouvelle.
Paris, Pierre Ribou, 1709.
First edition of Nadal’s tragedy on King Herod, the second in the series of Biblical plays over which he quarrelled with Voltaire.
£275
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LINNAEUS, Carl (or von LINNÉ), and James JENKINSON (translator).
A generic and specific Description of...
Ashburner, and Lancaster, A. Ashburner, 1775.
First edition of this provincially printed partial translation of Linnaeus’s Genera plantarum. It precedes both William Withering’s The Botanical Arrangement of all the Vegetables naturally growing in Great Britain (1776), the first such work to be based on Linnaean taxonomy,...
£225
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LEWIS, Wyndham.
The Vulgar Streak.
London, Robert Hale Ltd., 1941.
First edition, first impression, a scarce work because of wartime paper shortages and, possibly, the destruction of a portion of the first impression in the Blitz; certainly Robert Hale’s offices were bombed and the records destroyed, and the work was reprinted within a month.
£750