• Koller Auctions
    Books & Autographs
    20 March 2024
    Koller, Mar. 20: DADA - Der Zeltweg. Redaktion: Flake, Serner, Tzara. Zürich, 1919. CHF 5,000 – 8,000
    Koller, Mar. 20: Jespers, Floris - Peeters, Jan. Kinderlust. Antwerpen, J. F. Bogaerts & R. R. Dodson, [1923]. CHF 2,000 – 3,000
    Koller, Mar. 20: FARBENLEHRE - Chevreul, M. E. De la Loi du contraste simultané des couleurs et de l'assortiment des objets colorés. Paris, 1839. CHF 4,000 – 5,000
    Koller, Mar. 20: BOTANIK - Schrank, Franz de Paula von. Flora Monacensis, seu plantae sponte circa Monachium nascentes. München, 1811-1818. CHF 20,000 – 30,000
    Koller, Mar. 20: French Bible manuscript. Latin manuscript on parchment. With 81 illuminated, ornamental and figurative initials. Paris, c. 1250. CHF 90,000 – 120,000
    Koller Auctions
    Books & Autographs
    20 March 2024
    Koller, Mar. 20: Gradual for the use of a Dominican convent. Latin manuscript on parchment, with Flemish rubrics in black and red. Mecheln (?), c. 1520. CHF 25,000 – 40,000
    Koller, Mar. 20: Calendar. French manuscript on parchment. With 12 large colored thorn leaf initials on a gold background. Paris, c. 1380/1390. CHF 40,000 – 60,000
    Koller, Mar. 20: Freud, Sigmund. Collection of 23 handwritten letters to Alphonse Maeder in Zurich. In addition to 4 letter drafts from Maeder to Freud. 2 February 1910 - 21 September 1913. CHF 50,000 – 80,000
    Koller, Mar. 20: Jung, Carl Gustav. Collection of 26 autograph and 3 typescript letters and a postcard to Alphonse Maeder. 1911-1918. CHF 20,000 – 30,000
    Koller, Mar. 20: Nietzsche, Friedrich, philosopher. Handwritten letter signed to Richard Wagner. Basel, September 27, 1876. CHF 20,000 to 30,000
  • 19th Century Shop
    Catalogue 198 just published
    19th Century Shop. Darwin and Wallace, first printing of the first paper on natural selection
    19th Century Shop. Shakespeare’s Poems, first collected edition
    19th Century Shop. Walt Whitman portrait inscribed with a Leaves of Grass poem
    19th Century Shop. Major Elizabeth Barrett Browning manuscript notebook
    19th Century Shop. Spock's Baby Book, original MS
    19th Century Shop. Cellarius, Harmonia Macrocosmica, the great celestial atlas
  • Forum Auctions
    Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    28th March 2024
    Forum Mar. 28: [Langland (William)]. The vision of Pierce Plowman, nowe the seconde time imprinted..., Roberte Crowley, 1550. £8,000 to £10,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: [Shakespeare (William)]. [Comedies, Histories, and Tragedies], second folio edition, [by Tho.Cotes, for Robert Allot], [1632]. £30,000 to £40,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: Bible, Czech Biblia Bohemica, first complete Bible printed in the Czech vernacular, Prague, August 1488. £30,000 to £40,000.
    Forum Auctions
    Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    28th March 2024
    Forum Mar. 28: Shabthai Tzvi.- Collection of four printed and illustrated broadsides detailing the appearance, rise and fall of the false messiah, Shabthai Tzvi, Augsburg, 1666-67. £40,000 to £60,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: Leaf from the Beauvais Missal, in Latin, illuminated manuscript on parchment, [Northern France (perhaps Beauvais or Amiens)], [fourteenth century (c.1310)]. £4,000 to £6,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: Aubrey (John). [Remaines of Gentilisme and Judaisme], manuscript in English, Latin and Greek, [c. 1693]. £30,000 to £50,000.
    Forum Auctions
    Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    28th March 2024
    Forum Mar. 28: Byron (George Gordon Noel, Lord). Poems on Various Occasions, first edition, Harriet Maltby's copy, Newark, Printed by S. & J. Ridge, 1807. £30,000 to £40,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: Tolkien (J.R.R.) The Hobbit, first edition, second impression with dust-jacket, 1937 [but 1938]. £7,000 to £10,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: Blake (William).- Thornton (Robert John). The Pastorals of Virgil, 2 vol., engraved plates by William Blake, 1821. £8,000 to £12,000.
    Forum Auctions
    Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    28th March 2024
    Forum Mar. 28: America.- Mount (William J.) & Thomas Page. The English Pilot…, [bound with] The Fourth Book, describing The West Indies Navigation from Hudson's-Bay to the River Amazones, 1721. £20,000 to £30,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: Oldfield (Henry Ambrose), Rajman Singh Chitrakar & others. An album of 160 photographs and 13 original artworks, (1833-1919), [c. 1850s-1880s]. £20,000 to £30,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: Audubon (John James) [and William MacGillivray]. Ornithological Biography…, 5 vol., first edition, presentation copy inscribed by Audubon, Edinburgh, 1831-49 [i.e. 1831-39]. £10,000 to £15,000.

Rare Book Monthly

Articles - April - 2019 Issue

A Search Underway for Thousands of Books Looted Almost Four Centuries Ago

Codex Gigas and its Devil's portrait (Kungl. biblioteket photo).

The theft of books is a centuries-old problem that has received increasing attention in recent years as tools for locating them have improved. Not just better scientific means of identifying copies has played a role, but also communications have been greatly enhanced by the internet. More recently, we have seen attempts to locate books stolen, not just years or decades but centuries ago. Last month, we reported on an attempt by a group from the Portuguese city of Faro to have books stolen four centuries earlier returned by the Bodleian Library (click here). Usually, the searches are done by those seeking to have the books returned, though that is not always the case. Here is another attempt to locate, though not return books and manuscripts looted over three and one-half centuries ago.

 

This story goes back to the Thirty Years' War. That took place from 1618-1648. Most of it occurred in the Holy Roman Empire, which as they say, was neither holy, Roman, nor an empire. It was more of a loose confederation of states in Central Europe, consisting of numerous principalities, not just the larger countries, such as Germany of today. Parts of the empire were at war with each other and with other European nations for 30 years. Sometimes, parties switched sides. It started out as a Catholic-Protestant thing, but as it evolved, it had more to do with national rivalries than theological disputes.

The war began, and ended, in Prague, then capital of Bohemia. It started with what was known as the Defenestration of Prague. A defenestration is when you throw somebody out of an upper story window. It's not a nice thing to do, but some Protestants were seriously peeved at Catholics for taking rights away from them. Thirty years later, it ended in the same city, though this was not a final, concluding battle that determined the outcome of the war. Treaties were already being signed. By this time, Sweden had been long involved in the war for some reason. Sweden was still a military power in the day. The Swedes attacked Prague, capturing part of the city before peace was officially concluded and the war ended.

 

Before peace was announced, the Swedes engaged in some looting. Some believe that with the war about to end, the only reason the Swedes attacked Prague was for one more opportunity to loot. The Swedes captured Prague Castle, where the defenstrations started the war 30 years earlier, and began looting books, manuscripts, whatever. The castle contained the library of the earlier Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II. Among the spoils of war was the Codex Gigas, sometimes referred to as the "Devil's Bible" for its large drawing of the Devil. It is the largest extent illuminated medieval bible. Between the castle and other locations, including a monastery, Jesuit college, and several aristocrats' palaces, the Swedes packed up thousands of books and manuscripts and left town. They took them, naturally enough, to Sweden.

 

Now, Lenka Vesela of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic is trying to identify what books were stolen and where they are now. It is a daunting task, though progress is being made. First, it is hard to know exactly what was taken. There weren't good records in Prague. Some of the best records are in Sweden where libraries noted their provenance. Still, it is only expected that 15%-20% of what was taken will ever be identified.

 

Then there is the question of where it all went. Some went to the Swedish Royal Library in Stockholm and is still there. Sadly, there was a big fire in 1697 and many of the books were destroyed. Fortunately, some quick thinking person grabbed the Codex Gigas and defenestrated it.

 

While many of the books are still scattered around Swedish libraries, many others are no longer in the country. A large collection of manuscripts was given to Swedish Queen Christina. Christina ascended to the throne at the age of 6 in 1632, but in 1654, she converted to Catholicism and abdicated. She and her library moved to Rome, and after her death, they were purchased by the Pope for the Vatican Library, where they remain.

 

Another part of the collection was dispersed when the Library of Strangas (Sweden) sold its books at auction in the late 18th century. Most were purchased by collectors in Denmark, with many of the estimated 1,000 Czech books ending up in the Royal Library of Copenhagen. A few others made their way to a library in St. Petersburg. A handful were actually returned to Prague in 1878 thanks to the efforts of a Czech historian and the Swedish King making a conciliatory gesture. Many others were destroyed in fires beyond that at the Swedish Royal Library, while others ended up in private hands. In one case, a librarian was paid in Czech books in place of an unpaid salary. Those in private hands will be even more difficult if not impossible to trace. Vesela estimates that only around 3,000 of what may have been as many as 25,000 looted books will ever be located.

 

Interestingly, Vesela does not see this as an attempt to return the books to the Czech Republic. She sees looting as part of the law of war in that era and attempting to apply current law retrospectively as being problematic. Rather, this is a joint heritage project, the books now having spent more of their lives in Sweden than in the Czech Republic. Digitization of the books and manuscripts would open virtual libraries to all, making it unnecessary to pursue the return of physical copies.

Rare Book Monthly

  • Sotheby’s
    Modern First Editions
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    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Winston Churchill. The Second World War. Set of First-Edition Volumes. 6,000 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: A.A. Milne, Ernest H. Shepard. A Collection of The Pooh Books. Set of First-Editions. 18,600 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Salvador Dalí, Lewis Carroll. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Finely Bound and Signed Limited Edition. 15,000 USD
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  • Forum Auctions
    Colour Plate Books from the Library of Norman Bobins
    Part 2
    27th March 2024
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Alken (Henry). Sporting Notions, first edition, T.McLean, 1832-33. £800 to £1,200.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Bardi (Lorenzo). Nuova Raccolta delle piu interessanti Vedute della Citta di Firenze…, Florence, Lorenzo Bardi, [c.1840]. £1,500 to £2,000.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Crawfurd (John). Journal of an Embassy from the Governor-General of India to the Court of Ava..., first edition, 1829. £1,000 to £1,500.
    Forum Auctions
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    27th March 2024
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Dawe (George, engraver). The Life of a Nobleman, first edition, Geo. Henderson, [c.1825]. £1,000 to £1,500.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: [Doyle (John)], "H.B.". Political Sketches &c., 10 vol. including The Descriptive Key to H.B., Thomas McLean, [1829-51]. £4,000 to £6,000.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Eben (Adolphus Christian Frederick, Baron von) and Nicolaus Heideloff. Modèles de l'Uniforme Militaire Adopté dans l'Armée Royale de Suède, Rudolph Ackerman, 1808. £1,500 to £2,000.
    Forum Auctions
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    27th March 2024
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Geissler (J.G.G.) and Friedrich Hempel. Mahlerische Darstellungen der Sitten, Gebrauche und Lustbarkeiten bey den Russischen, Tartarischen…, 4 parts in 1, Leipzig and Paris, [1804]. £1,000 to £1,500.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Hunt (Charles). Portraits of Winning Horses...of the Derby, Oaks, & St. Leger, from the Year 1842 to 1849…, Rock Brothers & Payne, 1849. £1,500 to £2,000.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Kunike (Adolf Friedrich). Zwey hundert und sechzig Donau-Ansichten nach dem Laufe des Donaustromes…, Vienna, Leopold Grund, 1826. £3,000 to £5,000.
    Forum Auctions
    Colour Plate Books from the Library of Norman Bobins
    Part 2
    27th March 2024
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Lasinio (Carlo). [Matrimony], Florence, 1790. £1,500 to £2,000.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Reinhardt (Joseph). A Collection of Swiss Costumes, in Miniature, second English edition, James Goodwin, [1828]. £800 to £1,200.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Wengen (Gottfried Durst von). Die Öffentliche Maskerade Bamberg am Fastnachts-Montage 1833…, Bamberg, [1833]. £2,000 to £3,000.

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