Rare Book Monthly

Articles - March - 2017 Issue

Arader Galleries Spring Auction March 25th

Arader Galleries Spring Auction

March 25th – 1pm at 1016 Madison Avenue, New York

The Arader Gallery is holding an important sale of rare books and images on March 25th.  The sale will be hosted by Mid-Hudson Auctions and the material in the sale available for inspection beginning on the 9th at 1016 Madison Avenue in New York. Gallery hours are 10:00 am to 6:00 pm Monday through Saturday.  Viewing by appointment at 29 East 72nd Street [and Madison].

 

To make an appointment 212.628.3668.  Please call or email at [email protected]

 

The following are a few selections

Lot 19 - Rosate Spoonbill, Plate 321. J John James Audubon (1785 - 1851) from Birds of America. Double Elephant Folio. First Edition Engravings with Original Hand Color

London: Robert Havell, 1827-1838. 25 x 37 3/4 inches sheet, 37 x 49 inches framed

Estimate: $110,000 - 150,000. Retail: $225,000. Reserve: $100,000

Guidance: Mid-Hudson, 2016 - $176,900

 

Lot 23 - American White Pelican, Plate 311. John James Audubon (1785 - 1851). First Edition Robert Havell Aquatint Engraving with Original Hand Color From Birds of America Double Elephant Folio. London: Robert Havell, 1827-1838.

Estimate: $100,000 - 140,000. Retail Price: $750,000. Reserve: $125,000

 

Lot 128 - Birds of Asia

John Gould  (1804-1881)

London: Taylor and Francis for the Author, 1850-83

Estimate: $80,000 - 130,000

Guidance: Christie’s, 1999 - $126,887

Reserve: $72,000

7 volumes. Folio (21 5/8 x 14 1/2 inches). 530 hand-colored lithographs after John Gould, H.C. Richter, Josef Wolf and W. Hart. Contemporary half green morocco, all edges gilt, spine gilt, 7 compartments with 6 raised bands (vol 1, front marbled endpaper detached, vol. 4 front marbled endpaper loose. vol. 5 front marbled endpaper loose).

 

Lot 129 - The Birds of Europe

John Gould (1804-1881)

London: by Richard and John E. Taylor,

published by the Author 1832-37

Estimate: $60,000 - 90,000

Guidance: Sotheby’s, 2007, $145,000

Reserve: $54,000

 

Physical Description: 5 volumes. Folio (21 1/4 x 14 1/4 inches). 448 hand-colored lithographs [numbered to 449, nos. 447 and 448 on one] by C. Hullmandel after Elizabeth Gouldand Edward Lear, from John Gould’s sketches. Contemporary calf binding, rebacked to style (covers knicked). With gilt and blind roll tools, spine and binding edges gilt, 6 compartments with 5 raised bands. Book plate removed.

 

Lot 132 - The Birds of Great Britain

John Gould (1804-1881)

London: Taylor and Francis for the author, [1862]-1873

Estimate: $30,000 - 45,000

Guidance: Christie’s, 2006 - $78,000

Reserve: $27,000

 

Physical Description: 5 volumes. Folio (21 x 5/8 x 14 1/2 inches). 5-page list of Subscribers. 367 EXCEPTIONALLY FINE hand-colored lithographs after John Gould, Josef Wolf, and H.C. Richter. Half red morocco, spine gilt, top edge gilt, 6 compartments with 5 raised bands. Provenance: Bookplate of Wrest Park.

 

Lot 133 -  The Natural History of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama Islands

Mark Catesby (1682/83–1749)

London: at the expense of the author, [1729-] 1731-1743 [-1747]

Estimate: $275,000 - 350,000

Guidance: Sotheby’s, 2007 - $657,000. Sotheby’s, 1989 - $462,500

Reserve: $250,000

Physical Description:  2 volumes. Folio (20  1/2 x 14 1/2 inches). 220 hand-colored plates, double-page map; two leaves with a marginal tear (one catching a headline), scattered spotting and the usual offsetting, but a generally VERY FINE COPY. With the 44-page Appendix (of 1747) bound in vol. 2. Contemporary diced russia, covers with gilt borders incorporating insect and animal tools, gilt spines; joints split, one cover nicked.

Provenance: Front pastedown with 18th century armorial bookplate of Fane William Sharpe, “Student of Ch[rist] Ch[urch, Oxford]”; From the Estate of Clarence Dillon, Far Hills, New Jersey.

A rare first edition with engravng & hand coloring done by Mark Catesby

 

VERY FINE First Edition. Trained as a botanist, Catesby travelled to Virginia in 1712. He lodged in Williamsburg with his sister and brother-in-law, who had emigrated to the New World in 1712, and began to fulfill his “passionate desire of viewing as well the Animals as Vegetable Productions in their Native Countries; which were Strangers to England” (preface). He remained in British America for seven years, sending back to England collections of plants and seeds, as well as beginning to make natural history drawings.

 

Lot 134 - Dell’arcano del mare [Books 1-4]

Robert Dudley (1573-1649)

Firenze: Francesco Onofri, 1646

Estimate: $50,000 - 70,000. Retail: $190,000

Guidance: Sotheby’s, 1988 - £ 48,400 GBP

Reserve: $40,000

Physical Description: 2 volumes [of an eventual 3] in one. Folio (13 x 9 1/2 inches). Half-title, title-page dated 1646, with fine engraved vignette of a compass (without half-title and title-page to volume 2, ie Books 3-4, and errata leaf at end, dampstaining to half-title, title-page and folding engraved patent plate, some minor and occasional spotting), folding engraved facsimile of the patent of nobility granted to Dudley in 1620 by Ferdinand II, 15 engraved folding charts in Book 2, including 5 double-sheet, and 66 (of 69) engraved plates by Antonio Francesco Lucini, various sizes, 49 folding, the plates variously numbered (see Phillips), , including 30 plates of astronomical or nautical instrument designs with volvelles, pointers or string-pointers, 7 double-sheet plates of diagrams of ship-building in Book 4, and one very small engraved diagram pasted down in lower margin of folio I2 in Book 4, four plates in Book 1 with letterpress text on versos, 5 inserted unnumbered leaves in Book 3 containing 10 letterpress diagrams of naval formations (without 2 plates in volume one, and one folding plate in Book 4, three plates with tears near the gutter, map of the Americas with small tear at fold juncture, a few of the double-sheet maps slightly browned along sheet junctures from original paste, else EXCEPTIONALLY FINE). Contemporary vellum, manuscript title on spine, edges stained red (a bit creased, especially at the extremities, and with a few pale stains, pastedowns torn).  Provenance: with the near contemporary ownership inscription of the library of the Colegio Mayore Cuenca in Salamanca (“En la libreria del Colegio . Cuenca”) on the title-page, numbering to the plates, and extensive underscoring and a few marginal notes in red pencil throughout.

  

Lot 137 - Cartes Generales de Toutes les Parties du Monde

Nicholas Sanson D’Abbeville (1600-1667)

Paris: The Author and Pierre Mariette, 1658 [but 1659]

Estimate: $20,000 - 30,000. Retail: $90,000

Guidance: Christie’s, 2010 - $47,500

Reserve: $18,000

Physical Description: Folio (17 x 11 3/4 inches). Title-page with woodcut arms (dampstained), 3-page contemporary manuscript “Repertoir des Cartes de ce livre” (without letterpress table of contents). 85 FINE engraved double-page maps, including 10 folding, hand-colored in outline, mounted on guards throughout (one or two early repairs, tears, stains and edges frayed to folding map of Gascony, last map of Ancient Greece stained and laid down on contemporary stock). Contemporary mottled calf, spine in seven compartments with six raised bands, morocco lettering piece in one, the others decorated with small gilt tools (scuffed and worn with loss to extremities).

  

Lot 193 -

A Map of the Inhabited Part of Virginia, containing the whole of the Province of Maryland with Part of Pennsylvania, New Jersey and North Carolina.

Joshua Fry (1699-1754) and Peter Jefferson (1708-1757).

Engraved map with original hand color in outline by state, the title within a fine rococo cartouche.

London: Thomas Jefferys, August 1753.

30 3/8 x 48 6/8 inches sheet, 41 x 50 inches framed.

Estimate: $150,000 - 300,000. Retail Price: $750,000. Reserve: $125,000

 

The most important engraved map of Virginia to ever be offered for sale. This map was used by the French Naval and Military Commanders to plot strategy for the French and Indian War and the American Revolution

  

Lot 218 –

Voyage dans l’Interieur de l’Amerique du Nord

execute pendant les annees 1832, 1833 et 1834

BODMER, Karl (1809-1893, illustrator) - Prince Maximilian zu Wied-Neuwied (1782-1867)

Coblenz, Paris, and London: J. Hoelscher, A. Bertrand, Ackermann and Co., [1839-1841]

Large Folio (24 1/4 x 17 1/4 inches). 81 engraved and aquatint plates 48 large aquatint tableau plates [all 48 hand colored and heightened in gum arabic], & 33 vignette plates on full folio sheets [all 33 hand colored and heightened in gum arabic], Vignette X pasted down on contemporary paper. All 81 plates with Bodmer blindstamp. 1 large folding engraved map by Lieut.-Col.W. Thorn, titled “Map to illustrate the Route of Prince Maximilian of Wied,” hand colored in outline. Contemporary quarter calf with marbled boards, spine gilt, 8 compartments with 6 raised bands. contemporarily rebound and cover extended.

Estimate: $525,000 - 750,000. Reserve: $500,000

Guidance: Christie’s, 2004 - $477,900; Siebert, 1999 - $415,000

Rare Book Monthly

  • Sotheby’s Geek Week
    14-15 July
    Sotheby’s, July 14: Henry De La Beche. "Awful Changes," 1830. $6,000 to $9,000.
    Sotheby’s, July 15: [Apollo 11]. Flight Plan, Complete Original Printing Signed by Buzz Aldrin. $5,000 to $8,000.
    Sotheby’s, July 15: Thomas Alva Edison. Documents Establishing and Ending the Edison Electric Railway Company. $20,000 to $30,000.
    Sotheby’s, July 15: Richard P. Feynman. Feynman's Lectures on Gravitation 1-16, Including the Original Transcriptions of Lectures 12-16 by Morinigo and Wagner, With Richard Feynman's Manuscript Notations, 1971. $12,000 to $18,000.
    Sotheby’s, July 15: [Apollo 9]. A Group of Manuals and Mission Documents used by Stuart Roosa as a member of the Astronaut Support Crew. $5,000 to $8,000.
    Sotheby’s, July 15: [BYTE: The Small Systems Journal]. A collection of early foundational issues of Byte: The Small Systems Journal, with rare hardcover editions. $5,000 to $8,000.
  • Forum Auctions
    The 10th Anniversary Sale
    Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    July 16, 2026
    Forum, July 16: Inundation papyrus. P.Michael 4, the ‘Inundation papyrus’, a geographical account of the Nile near Canopus, in Greek, remains of two columns from a manuscript scroll on papyrus, Egypt, second century CE. £12,000-18,000
    Forum, July 16: Book of Hours, use of Sarum, manuscript on vellum, 6 full-page miniatures, with famous Middle English inscriptions, Southern Netherlands for the English market, [c.1430]. £30,000-50,000
    Forum, July 16: Qu'ran, Arabic manuscript on burnished, stencilled, and gold-flecked paper, 447ff., Sultanate Gujarat, Ahmadabad, [after 1411 but no later than 1442]. £15,000-20,000
    Forum Auctions
    The 10th Anniversary Sale
    Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    July 16, 2026
    Forum, July 16: Turner (William). A New boke of the natures and properties of all wines that are commonly vsed here in England, rare first edition of the first English book on wine, By William Seres, 1568. £20,000-£30,000
    Forum, July 16: Spenser (Edmund). The Faerie Queene. first edition, Printed [by John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, 1590. £30,000-40,000
    Forum, July 16: Shakespeare (William). The Comedie of Errors, extracted from the first folio, Isaac Jaggard and Edward Blount, 1623. £15,000-20,000
    Forum Auctions
    The 10th Anniversary Sale
    Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    July 16, 2026
    Forum, July 16: Fleming (Ian). Casino Royale, first edition, signed presentation inscription from the author, 1953. £40,000-60,000
    Forum, July 16: d'Agoty (Jacques-Fabien Gautier). Anatomie de la Tête, first edition, Paris, chez le Sieur Gautier, 1748. £10,000-15,000
    Forum, July 16: Martial Arts.- Lee (Bruce). 'Praying Mantis style' Kung Fu book, containing numerous annotations, diagrams and graphs in Bruce Lee's hand, c. 1960. £50,000-70,000
    Forum Auctions
    The 10th Anniversary Sale
    Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    July 16, 2026
    Forum, July 16: Warre (Capt. Henry James). Sketches in North America and the Oregon Territory, first edition, rare hand-coloured issue, 1848. £30,000-40,000
    Forum, July 16: Norie (John William). The Marine Atlas, or Seaman's Complete Pilot for all the principal places in the known world..., 1826. £30,000-50,000
    Forum, July 16: Mao Tse-tung.- Kim Il-sung.-[Note book for visitors from China to Korea], signed by Mao and Kim, [Beijing, 1954]. £10,000-15,000

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