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Sotheby’s
Fine Books and Manuscripts
8 December 2023Sotheby’s, Dec. 8: [Austen, Jane] — Isaac D'Israeli. Jane Austen's copy of Curiosities of Literature. 100,000 - 150,000 USDSotheby’s, Dec. 8: [Austen, Jane]. A handsome first edition in boards of the author's debut novel. 70,000 - 100,000 USDSotheby’s, Dec. 8: Brontë, Charlotte. "I am no bird; and no net ensnares me..." 100,000 - 150,000 USDSotheby’s, Dec. 8: Eliot, George. The author's magnum opus. 25,000 - 35,000 USDSotheby’s, Dec. 8: Whitman, Walt. Manuscript written upon the Death of Lincoln, 1865. 60,000 - 80,000 USD -
Sotheby’s
Important Modern Literature from the Library of an American Filmmaker
8 December 2023Sotheby’s, Dec. 8: Kerouac, Jack. Typescript scroll of The Dharma Bums. Typed by Kerouac in Orlando, Florida, 1957, published by Viking in 1958. 300,000 - 500,000 USDSotheby’s, Dec. 8: Hemingway, Ernest. The autograph manuscript of "The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber." [Key West, finished April 1936]. 300,000 - 500,000 USDSotheby’s, Dec. 8: Miller, Henry. Typescript of The Last Book, a working title for Tropic of Cancer, written circa 1931–1932. 100,000 - 150,000 USDSotheby’s, Dec. 8: Ruscha, Ed. Twentysix Gasoline Stations, with a lengthy inscription to Joe Goode. 40,000 - 60,000 USDSotheby’s, Dec. 8: Hemingway, Ernest. in our time, first edition of Hemingway’s second book. 30,000 - 50,000 USD -
Swann
Maps & Atlases, Natural History & Color Plate Books
December 7, 2023Swann, Dec. 7: Samuel Augustus Mitchell, A New Map of Texas, Oregon and California with the Regions Adjoining, Philadelphia, 1846. $3,500 to $5,000.Swann, Dec. 7: 17th–19th-century case maps of various locations. $1,500 to $2,000.Swann, Dec. 7: Andreas Cellarius, Haemisphaerium Stellatum Boreale Cum Subiecto Haemisphaerio Terrestri, celestial chart, Amsterdam, 1708. $2,500 to $3,500.Swann
Maps & Atlases, Natural History & Color Plate Books
December 7, 2023Swann, Dec. 7: Vincenzo Coronelli, Set of engraved gores for Coronelli’s monumental 42-inch terrestrial globe, Venice, circa 1688–97. $18,000 to $22,000.Swann, Dec. 7: Lucas Janszoon Waghenaer, group of four navigational charts, Antwerp, 1580s. $2,000 to $3,000.Swann, Dec. 7: Thomas Bros, Block Book of Berkeley, Oakland, 1920s. $800 to $1,200.Swann
Maps & Atlases, Natural History & Color Plate Books
December 7, 2023Swann, Dec. 7: John Nieuhoff & John Ogilby, An Embassy from the East-India Company of the United Provinces, map of China, plan of Canton, London, 1673. $1,200 to $1,800.Swann, Dec. 7: Frederick Sander, Reichenbachia, St. Albans, 1888-1894. $5,000 to $7,000.Swann, Dec. 7: Two early illustrated works on horsemanship and breeding, Nuremberg, early 18th century. $700 to $800.Swann
Maps & Atlases, Natural History & Color Plate Books
December 7, 2023Swann, Dec. 7: John Gould, A Monograph of the Ramphastidae, or Family of Toucans. Supplement to the First Edition, London, 1834; 1855. $40,000 to $60,000.Swann, Dec. 7: John Pinkerton, A General Collection of the Best and Most Interesting Voyages and Travels in All Parts of the World, London, 1808–14. $1,500 to $2,500.Swann, Dec. 7: Oakley Hoopes Bailey, Hackensack, New Jersey, Boston, 1896. $800 to $1,200. -
CHRISTIE’S
Valuable Books and Manuscripts
London auction
13 December
Find out moreChristie’s, Explore now
TREW, Christoph Jacob (1695–1769). Plantae Selectae quarum imagines ad exemplaria naturalia Londini in hortus curiosorum. [Nuremberg: 1750–1773]. £30,000–40,000Christie’s, Explore now
VERBIEST, Ferdinand (1623–88). Liber Organicus Astronomiae Europaeae apud Sinas restituate. [Beijing: Board of Astronomy, 1674]. £250,000–350,000Christie’s, Explore now
PROPERTY FROM THE COLLECTION OF ALICE & NIKOLAUS HARNONCOURT. Master of Jean Rolin (active 1445–65). Book of Hours, use of Paris, in Latin and French, [Paris, c.1450–1460]. £120,000–180,000Christie’s, Explore now
A SILVER MICROSCOPE. Probably by Antoni van Leeuwenhoek (1632–1723), c.1700. £150,000–250,000Christie’s, Explore now
AN ENGLISH HORARY QUADRANT
C.1311. £100,000–150,000
Rare Book Monthly
Book Catalogue Reviews - June - 2008 Issue
Americana from Oak Knoll Books
Americana is the subject of Oak Knoll's sixth special catalogue.
By Michael Stillman
Oak Knoll Books has issued the sixth installment in their series of special catalogues, aptly named Oak Knoll Special Catalogue 6. It is also quite logically headed Americana. This catalogue includes various types of works in the field, some being within their typical area of "books about books" as well as about America, others being reprints of early items of Americana, and many being early copies of antiquarian American works. Those who collect Americana may not typically look to Oak Knoll as a source for books, but here is a chance to expand your resources. These are a few of the items we found in Oak Knoll's "special" catalogue.
Item 7 is a look at colonial America from the eyes of a Frenchman, Georges Marie Butel-Dumont: Histoire et Commerce des Colonies Angloises, dans l'Amerique Septentrionale... published in 1755. This is an interesting date as it came out just after the outbreak of the French and Indian War, which would a few years later separate France from its one-time colonies in Canada and Louisiana. Surprisingly, this French-language book was published in London. Butel-Dumont believed that Britain's American colonies were a major source of its wealth, and he attributed the economic success of those colonies to the relative freedom their people enjoyed compared to those of most nations (of course, once the French and Indian War was over, the colonists soon determined that they were not as free as they wished to be). Offered is a second printing of the first edition. Priced at $400.
Item 6 is a later French work about what had now become the United States: New Travels in the United States of America, Performed in 1788, by Jean Pierre Brissot de Warville. This is a 1793 first Irish edition of a work about a country he for the most part admired. The one shortcoming this advocate of human freedom found was the institution of slavery, but he was an optimist, believing in time it would be eliminated. Brissot was a friend of Jefferson, whom he consulted on some of his writings about America. Brissot went on to be a leader of the French Revolution, and was considered a hero at the storming of the Bastille. Sadly, the excesses of that Revolution caught up with him, and the year in which this Irish edition was published was also the year the French radicals led Brissot to the guillotine. $400.
Item 34 was an early, though flawed attempt to explain the mounds of the North American Midwest. William Pigeon was an Indian trader and amateur archeologist who came up with explanations based in part on legends learned from the Indians living in the area in the mid-19th century. His book, published in 1853, is Traditions of De-Coo-Dah and Antiquarian Researches: Comprising Extensive Explorations, Surveys, Excavations of the Wonderful and Mysterious Earthen Remains of the Mound-Builders in America. Pigeon was convinced there had once been a much larger and more advanced civilization in America, one whose knowledge and technology rivaled that of ancient Egypt or Greece. He described De-Coo-Dah, whom he interviewed, as the last prophet of the Elk Nation, but the old prophet may have been knowledgeable in legend and lore more than historical fact. Pigeon theorized a great war in which the more advanced civilizations were wiped out and replaced by the Indians he found. $300.
Where can you learn more about pre-19th century medical practice in New Jersey? Believe it or not, there is such a book: History of Medicine in New Jersey And of its Medical Men, From the Settlement of the Province to A.D. 1800. George Wickes provides historical information about disease and the medical practice in the state in part one, and then follows that up with a section containing biographical sketches of New Jersey physicians. Item 40. $250.
Oak Knoll Books may be reached at 302-328-7232. Their website is www.oakknoll.com.
