By Bruce McKinney
In a few days we'll release the next generation of the site you are on today. It is a complex undertaking, the integration of many services that reflect our sense of what an up-to-date web-site for books, manuscripts, maps and ephemera logically combines. At its heart it is our commitment to a unified market where knowledge is concentrated and buyers and sellers efficiently find each other. To accomplish this we employ triangulated searches. It is what we think the world of rare books, manuscripts, maps and ephemera will rely on. It is efficient and seeks to set t...
By Michael Stillman
Would you like to buy 360 copies of Still Reading Khan, by Mushtaq Siekh? Maybe you would prefer 59 assorted Bibles, or thousands of various textbooks. Or how about this one ...
By Tom McKinney
I recently read an article on the front page of the New York Times about a public library being turned over to a private company for management. This is my reaction.
The conc...
By Michael Stillman
One of the more spectacular book auctions in recent memory will take place at Sotheby's in London on December 7, 2010. It isn't a large collection, nor is it a subject-focuse...
By Susan Halas
A lot of you, like me, are on-line antiquarian booksellers who sell older books and other vintage material such as maps, prints, photos and ephemera via the Internet. Some of yo...
By Michael J. Osborne
(This event took place Labor Day weekend in downtown Baltimore's convention center. The show produced by the Palm Beach Show Group celebrated its thirtieth year and attrac...
By Karen Wright
It was a gorgeous day in Sacramento for the Sacramento Antiquarian Book Fair; sunny and warm, but not too hot! Almost too nice to be inside all day. There was a more positive f...
By Michael Stillman
Libraries would appear to be a threatened species, if you read the news. A 24-hour vigil was recently held at City Hall in Newark, New Jersey, to protest the closing of two b...
By Bruce McKinney
On December 2nd, at Bonham's in New York, material long prized goes to auction. This is my second auction in as many years of important personal book collections. This next s...
By Michael Stillman
Has Facebook co-opted the exclusive right to use the word "book" in a business name? To some extent, a lawsuit they recently filed against start-up website Teachbook may lead...
By Bruce McKinney
With the coming of fall, or if you live in Australia the coming of spring, more dealers send out catalogues, shops remain open longer, shows and fairs throw open their doors ...
By Michael Stillman
The courtroom is ordinarily a dull place. Lawyers argue over motions, defendants plea bargain, delay is followed by delay, and incomprehensible legalese replaces intelligible...
By Michael Stillman
It would seem that few people believe the email from Nigeria about the General's widow who wants to share his $20 million in ill-begotten funds in return for your bank accoun...
This month we have seven new catalogues to review. There are rare, unusual, and sometimes odd works offered by Garrett Scott, Bookseller, and Thomas Cullen, Rockland Bookman. David Lesser Antiquari...
ALDE, Apr. 8: GUEVARA (ANTONIO DE). Histoire de Marc-Aurèle, Empereur Romain, vray miroir et horloge des Princes. Paris, Pierre et Galliot du Pré, frères, 1565. €3,000 to €4,000.
ALDE, Apr. 8: HEURES DE LA VIERGE. Horæ in laudem beatissimæ virginis Mariæ ad usum Romanum. Paris, Charles L'Angelier, 1556. €4,000 to €5,000.
ALDE, Apr. 8: MONTAIGNE (MICHEL DE). Les Essais. Édition nouvelle, trouvée après le deceds de l'autheur… Paris, Abel L'Angelier, 1595. €6,000 to €8,000.
ALDE, Apr. 8: [ROJAS (FERNANDO DE)]. Celestina, tragicomedia di Calisto et Melibea, tradotta de lingua castigliana in italiano idioma… Venise, 1531. €2,000 to €3,000.
ALDE, Apr. 8: CAMÕES (LUÍS DE). Os Lusiadas. Lisbonne, Pedro Crasbeeck, 1613. €2,000 to €3,000.
ALDE, Apr. 8: CERVANTES (MIGUEL DE). El Ingenioso hidalgo Don Quixote de la Mancha. Bruxelles, Roger Velpius & Huberto Antonio, 1611. €6,000 to €8,000.
ALDE, Apr. 8: LA FONTAINE (JEAN DE). Fables choisies, mises en vers. Paris, Denys Thierry et Claude Barbin, 1678-1694. €6,000 to €8,000.
ALDE, Apr. 8: CERVANTES (MIGUEL DE). El Ingenioso hidalgo Don Quixote de la Mancha. Madrid, Joaquin Ibarra, 1780. €3,000 to €4,000.
ALDE, Apr. 8: DIDEROT (DENIS) ET JEAN LE ROND D'ALEMBERT. Encyclopédie, ou dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers. Paris, 1751-1765. €15,000 to €20,000.
ALDE, Apr. 8: [LIVRE TISSÉ]. LAMARTINE (Alphonse de). Les Laboureurs. Poème tiré de Jocelyn… Lyon, J. A. Henry, 1883. €8,000 to €10,000.
ALDE, Apr. 8: [LIVRE TISSÉ]. Livre de prières tissé d'après les enluminures des manuscrits du XIVe au XVIe siècle. Lyon, [A. Roux], 1886. €5,000 to €6,000.
Sotheby’s Books, Manuscripts & Objects from Three Important Collections Open for Bidding 2-17 April
Sotheby’s, Apr. 2-17: [Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meun]. Le Roman de la Rose, [Geneva or Lyons, c.1481], first printed edition of the most important medieval French vernacular poem. £200,000 to £300,000.
Sotheby’s, Apr. 2-17: Castiglione. Il libro del cortegiano. [Venice], April 1528, first edition, in a magnificent binding by Jean Picard for Jean Grolier. £100,000 to £150,000.
Sotheby’s, Apr. 2-17: Jacobus de Cessolis. Schachzabelbuch, Strasbourg, 1483, von der Lasa copy. £50,000 to £70,000.
Sotheby’s, Apr. 2-17: World Championship, 1972. A collection of 84 press photographs of the famed match between Spassky and Fischer. £2,000 to £3,000.
Sotheby’s, Apr. 2-17: Ben Franklin. Autograph letter signed, to Lord Shelburne, British Prime Minister, during peace negotiations, November 1782. £15,000 to £20,000.
