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  • VITRUVIUS POLLIO, MARCUS

    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

  • (WOMEN’S HEALTH AND SEX.)

    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).

    $75,000

  • SWIFT, JONATHAN

    Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World . . . by Lemuel Gulliver. London: Benj. Motte, 1726

    FIRST EDITION. This is a handsome set of Teerink’s A edition, the true first edition.

    $75,000

  • CANTILLON ,RICHARD

    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”

    $75,000

  • (DARWIN, CHARLES.) CAMERON, JULIA MARGARET

    Profile bust portrait of Charles Darwin, signed by Cameron. London: Colnaghi, 1868

    The great Darwin portrait, Julia Margaret Cameron’s 1868 profile of Darwin is probably the most famous photograph of a 19th-century scientist. Darwin remarked, “I like this photograph very much better than any other which has been taken of me.”

    $68,000

  • TANNER, [HENRY SCHENK]

    A New American Atlas containing maps of the several states of the North American union … Projected and Drawn on a Uniform Scale …. Philadelphia: H. S. Tanner, 1823

    First edition of “the most distinguished atlas published in the United States during the engraving period” (Ristow). Tanner’s greatest work, A New American Atlas was painstakingly produced and issued in installments between 1818 and 1823. Few complete sets have survived. Tanner’s use of a uniform scale of 15 geographical miles to the inch and his careful selection of sources resulted in a comprehensive American atlas of unprecedented detail and reliability which was the standard by which American atlases were measured until the modern era. This was by a considerable margin the greatest American atlas up to its time.

    $65,000

  • JOHNSON, SAMUEL

    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

  • WHITMAN, WALT

    Autograph letter signed to Alfred, Lord Tennyson. Camden, New Jersey, 9 August 1878

    “The Good Gray Poet” to the Poet Laureate. Tennyson was the most important of of the many English literary figures who subscribed to the “Author’s Edition” of Leaves of Grass, privately issued by Whitman in 1876. Hearing that Whitman was “in great straits, almost starving,” Tennyson sent him five pounds virtually as an outright gift, rather than the more modest subscription price (Kaplan, Walt Whitman).

    $60,000

  • DARWIN, CHARLES

    Collection of four letters to William Chester Tait.. Down, Beckenham, Kent, February 2, February 24, April 18, and June 1, 1869

    This fascinating series of letters reflects Charles Darwin’s wide-ranging scientific research, his boundless curiosity, and his encouragement of a young naturalist.

    $60,000

  • FRANK, ANNE

    Het Achterhuis: Dagboekbrieven van 12 Juni 1942—1 Augustus 1944.. Amsterdam: Contact, (1947).

    First edition of the diary of Anne Frank. A rare and important association copy signed by Miep Gies, the woman who helped the Frank family in hiding and who preserved Anne’s diary after their arrest. Miep and two as-yet unidentified friends (Wil and Greet) have signed the front free endpaper with their first names, presenting it to Martin Tjebbe Mobach, a member of the Dutch resistance and a survivor of the infamous Neuengamme concentration camp. The top of that leaf bears the inscription “Amsterdam 13 Juli 1947.”

    On Hold