Tractatus Theologico-Politicus Continens Dissertationes Aliquot. Hamburg: Heinrich Künraht [i.e. Amsterdam: Rieuwertsz], 1670

First edition of this landmark of 17th-century thought, the Theological-Political Treatise. This is the rare first edition, readily identified by the misspelled “Künraht” imprint and the mis-numbering of page 104 as 304.

$120,000

De Architectura. Venice: Giovanni Tacuino, 22 May 1511

First illustrated edition of Vitruvius’s Ten Books on Architecture, a landmark in the history of architecture. This is the only work on architecture to survive from antiquity. It was Vitruvius (ca. 90-20 BC) who famously declared that a structure must be durable, useful, and beautiful. His terms for order, arrangement, proportion, and fitness for purpose have guided architects for centuries. Vitruvius served in the campaigns of Julius Caesar, and he was involved in the restoration of Roman aqueducts. In ancient Rome, architecture encompassed not just the design of buildings but also civil and mechanical engineering, construction, military engineering, and urban planning.

$95,000

“Whereas a great many false reports have been raised, by Deserters from the Virginia Regiment …” in The Maryland Gazette, 5 September 1754, p. 3. Annapolis: Jonas Green, 1754

FIRST EDITION of George Washington’s second appearance in print. This rare document shows George Washington at the dawn of his military career, building the experience and reputation that would ultimately lead to his appointment as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army in the Revolutionary War.

$85,000

Redburn: His First Voyage. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1850

“An association copy linking two of the greatest figures in American literature” (Reese), this is Nathaniel Hawthorne’s copy of Herman Melville’s Redburn. A remarkable association highlighting not only Melville’s greatest creative period but also his fall to obscurity.

$72,000

A Dictionary of the English Language. London: W. Strahan for J. & P. Knapton, 1755

First edition of this enduring classic of English literature. This is Johnson’s “audacious attempt to tame his unruly native tongue … combining huge erudition with a steely wit and remarkable clarity of thought” (Hitchings).

$65,000

Aristoteles Master-piece, or, The Secrets of Generation displayed in all the parts thereof.. London: J. How, 1684

First edition of Aristotle’s Masterpiece, “the most popular book about women’s bodies, sex, pregnancy, and childbirth in Britain and America from its first appearance in 1684 up to at least the 1870s” (Treasures, Library Company of Philadelphia).

$60,000

Essai sur la Nature du Commerce en General, traduit de l’Anglois.. “Londres [Paris]: Fletcher Gyles”, 1755

First edition of the book that is, “more emphatically than any other single work, the cradle of political economy”

$60,000

Molecular structure of nucleic acids.  A structure of deoxyribose nucleic acid.. Nature, 1953

The discovery of the structure of DNA, the cornerstone event in modern genetics and biology and one of the greatest scientific discoveries of all time.

$60,000

A collection of images associated with South Carolina physician and plantation owner Sidney Smith. South Carolina, 1845-50

A unique survival. This important collection of largely identified photographs documents the home and family of Dr. Sidney Smith and those he enslaved at Gravel Hill, his South Carolina plantation. The collection includes an extraordinary daguerreotype depicting Dr. Smith, his two daughters, and his brother, posed together with two enslaved African American men. This is one of the earliest known images—if not the very earliest photograph—of an identified plantation owner posing with enslaved African Americans.

$60,000

The Haggadah. London: Beaconsfield Press, [1940]

FIRST EDITION of the greatest Haggadah of the 20th century, finely printed in color on vellum, published in an edition of 250 copies.  The entire edition of the celebrated Szyk Haggadah was printed on vellum.

This is Szyk’s own copy, out of series and unsigned. An accompanying provenance note states that it descended from Szyk to his heirs until it appeared for sale at Christie’s in New York in 2015.

$55,000