Quarto: 21.5 x 15.5 cm. [4], 8 pp., 9-10 ll., 11-127, [1] pp. Collation: π2 A4 B4 (±B1.2) C-Q4
FIRST EDITION of one of the most important eyewitness accounts of 17th-century Canada devoted primarily to the Huron Indians, but also with accounts of other groups, including the Jesuit author’s captivity and mutilation under the Iroquois. He also devotes 25 pages to a 1643 letter written by his Jesuit colleague Isaac Jogues (1607-1646), who was killed by the Mohawks.
Bressani (1612-1672), an Italian Jesuit, travelled to Canada as a missionary in 1642.
Alden & Landis 653/15; De Backer & Sommervogel II, col. 133; Walter, Jesuit relations, 43; Church 524; James Ford Bell Lib. B-407; JCB II, p. 428; Lande, Canadiana 57; McCoy, Jesuit relations 82; Sabin 7734; not in Eberstadt; Streeter.
Paris: Chez Sebastien Cramoisy, imprimeur ordinaire du Roy, & de la Reyne, 1648
$32,000.00
Octavo: 17 x 11 cm. [8], 276 p. a4, A-Q8, R4, S8 (-S7-8 blank.)
First edition of this rare and important Jesuit relation from Canada, with an account of the Iroquois, missionary activities and martyrdom of Isaac Jogues in 1647.
“Lalemant begins the Relation proper by describing the treachery of the Iroquois — the Mohawks, who had made peace with the French a year before, being the first to break it, and persuading the other Iroquois tribes to attack the French.
Sabin 38694; Bell 33-34; Church 487; McCoy, Jesuit relations of Canada, 1632-1673, variant 4 (no. 66) in which p. 166, last line ends "mon cher amy le" and Lallemant's letter is dated (p. 5) "647."; De Backer-Sommervogel,; IV, column 1401
Two Holograph Letters of Joseph Creswell, S.J., with arguments to the Spanish King for the conversion of England & A Second Spanish Armada
1. No place, ? St. Alban 29 March, 1597 And, 2. "en este Collegio" ? St. Alban 1597
$16,000.00
Folio: 31 x 22.5 cm. I. [3] pp. II. [8] pp.
Two manuscript letters, apparently unpublished, by Joseph Creswell, S.J. advising Philip II, King of Spain, on the restoration of Catholicism in England, , apparently written at St. Alban's College, Valladolid, Spain in early 1597. The letters are addressed to an unnamed religious figure, apparently close to the king, who heeds his counsel. These letters are not found in Calendar of State Papers, Spanish (Simancas, Valladolid).
Maffei, author of the influential history of the Jesuit missions in Asia, wrote his life of Ignatius to advance the Jesuits’ case for the canonization of the Society’s founder. In his opening letter to the Jesuit General Claudio Acquaviva, Maffei tells us that he composed the work at the behest of the previous general of the order, Everard Mercurian. The year in which this biography appeared (1585) was an inauspicious year for the Jesuits, for it was the first year of the reign of Pope Sixtus V, who was hostile to the order.
Octavo: 15 x 10 cm. [16], 385 (recte 389) [2] p. Collation: *8, A-Z8, Aa8, Bb4
Giacinto de Magistris, an Italian Jesuit, worked in India for twenty years before returning to Rome in 1660. From 1644 to 1659 he acted as secretary and companion to Archbishop Francisco Garcia of Cranganore. He returned to Europe as procurator of the Malabar mission. He later returned to India, where he died in 1668.
In 1661 Magistris published at Rome his ‘Relation’ as a call to his confreres to enlist for service in Madura, Tanjore, and other places in southern and eastern India.
Octavo: 16 x 10.5 cm. 188, [11] pp. Collation: A-M8, N4
This collection contains the following letters from the Jesuit missions in Japan: Francesco Carreón, writing from Kuchinotsu, 1 Dec., 1579; Gregorio de Céspedes, 1579; Lorenço Mexia, at Bungo, 20 Oct., 1580; three letters by Luís Fróis, Miyako, 14 April, 1581; 19 May, 1581; and 29 May, 1581; Francesco Cabral, 15 Sept., 1581. The final letter is by Alessandro Valignano, written at Goa 28 Dec.
Engraved by Ambrogio Brambilla for the publisher Nicolas van Aelst, with a dedication to Ranuccio Farnese, Prince of Parma and Piacenza. The 15-year printing privilege, granted by Pope Sixtus V, is engraved on the plate. Brambilla’s monogram AMBR appears at bottom right.
Giacomo Della Porta’s design for the façade of the church of the Gesù at Rome, the mother church of the Jesuit Order and a masterpiece of early (or “proto”-) Baroque architecture.
Marigliani, Lo splendore di Roma nell’Arte incisoria del Cinquecento (2016), n. VI.39; W. Lotz, 2004, pp. 118-19; C. Witcombe, 2008, pp. 365-67. See Peter Parshall "Antonio' Lafreri's 'Speculum Romanae Magnificentiae'" Print Quarterly. 1, London, 2006
"The First Book Published in Europe Devoted Entirely to Acoustics" –Merrill
Folio: 30.2 x 20 cm. [41], [1, blank], 229, [1, blank], [16] pp. Collation: π4, a-c4, d1, (*)2, (**)2, (***)2, A-Z4, Aa-Hh4 (with final blank). With 2 added plates at p. 114 and p. 132. The engraved title page and the portrait are integral to the collation.
The “Phonurgia” is illustrated with an added engraved allegorical title by G. And. Wolfgang after Felix Cheurier, an engraved title vignette, an engraved portrait of Emperor Leopold I by G. And. Wolfgang after Franz Herman, two engraved plates, seventeen engravings and numerous woodcut diagrams and illustrations in the text, musical notation, ornamental woodcut head- and tail-pieces, and decorative initials.
Folio: 32.2 x 21.5 cm. [41], [1, blank], 229, [1, blank], [16] pp. Collation: π4, a-c4, d1, (*)2, (**)2, (***)2, A-Z4, Aa-Hh4 (lacking final blank). With 2 added plates at p. 114 and p. 132. The engraved title page and the portrait are integral to the collation.
The “Phonurgia” is illustrated with an added engraved allegorical title by G. And. Wolfgang after Felix Cheurier, an engraved title vignette, an engraved portrait of Emperor Leopold I by G. And. Wolfgang after Franz Herman, two engraved plates, seventeen engravings and numerous woodcut diagrams and illustrations in the text, musical notation, ornamental woodcut head- and tail-pieces, and decorative initials.
Amsterdam: Apud Jacobum `a Meurs, in fossa vulgo` de Keyfersgracht, 1667
$16,000.00
Folio: 31 x 21 cm. *4, **4; A-Z4; Aa-Hh4. (*1 is the engraved title page)
"In 1667 the learned German Jesuit, Athanasius Kircher, published his ‘China Illustrata’ at Amsterdam. Gathering his materials from the works of other members of the Society travelling and resident in Asia, Kircher wrote one of the century’s most influential treatises on China.
Kircher included a sizeable description of China (and other parts of Asia), drawn from eyewitness accounts (some previously unpublished).
Merrill 20 ("Constitutes the first Chinese vocabulary ever printed in the West. He includes a Sanskrit grammar and vocabulary ... the first printing of a Sanskrit grammar in Europe"); De Backer Sommervogel IV 1063, 24; Cordier 26; Caillet 5774; Brunet III, 666-667; Reilly #23; Lach "Asia in The Making of Europe", Vol III, Bk I, pp. 485-486, 527-528.
Octavo: 15.5 x 9.5 cm. 240 p. Collation: )(6, A-P8, Q2
Originally published in 1658, 7 years before Hooke's "Micrographia" appeared in print, Kircher's work on the plague and its causes was a landmark work on the subject. In 1740, in response to the Great Plague that was ravaging Eastern Europe, the Jesuit faculty at the University of Graz republished the work "for the public good." The plague began in 1738 and killed at least 50,000 people in areas of (modern-day) Romania, Hungary, Ukraine, Serbia, Croatia, and Austria.
For the first edition, see: Brunet III, 668; Caillet II, 365.5792; Clendening 7.8; De Backer I, 426.16; VII, 286.13; Garrison /Morton 589.5118; Grassse IV, 22; Sommervogel IV, 1057-58.16
The First Description of Kircher’s Museum With the Engraved Frontispiece Showing the Museum’s Interior - Bound with Kircher's Final Work on Mummies & Hieroglyphics
Folio: 37 x 24.5 cm. Folio: 37 x 24.5 cm. I. *4 (*1 is the engraved title), A-I4. With an engraved title page, an added engraved portrait of Kircher, 17 engraved plates, 10 of which are folding, and 21 text engravings and woodcuts. II. II. *4, **4, A-I4, K3. With five engraved plates, two of which are double-paged, and numerous text illustrations.
I. Kircher's "Most Celebrated Museum of the Roman College of the Society of Jesus"
The only description of Kircher’s museum in the Collegio Romano as it appeared in his lifetime, with the only extant depiction of the museum in all its fantastic glory.
DeBacker Sommervogel IV, 1076; Wellcome III, 396; Cicognara, 3399; Caillet 5784 Not in Merrill; Wm. Schupach, "Cabinets of Curiosities in Academic Institutions," in Impey/MacGregor, The Origins of Museums (Oxford 1985), pp. 174-5; J. Browne, The Secular Ark (Yale 1983); Kangro, DSB VII. II. DeBacker Sommervogel IV, 1069, no. 34; Merrill 27.
Paris: Chez Sebastien Cramoisy, imprimeur ordinaire du roy et de la reyne, et Gabriel Cramoisy, Ruë S. Iacques, aux Cicognes, 1658
$35,000.00
Octavo: 17 x 10.5 cm. [12], 211, [1] p. ã4, ẽ2, A-N8, O2 (O2 verso blank)
The Jesuit relation for 1656-1657, written by Paul Le Jeune, with contributions by François Le Mercier (concerning the Senecas and Mohawks), Paul Ragueneau (recounting the Onondagas mistreatment of the French and their attacks on the Hurons) and apparently a part of Jean de Quen’s unpublished relation for 1657.
Paul Le Jeune arrived in New France in 1632 and remained there for eighteen years.
Church, E.D. Catalogue of books relating to the discovery and early history of North and South America, entry 554; Harrisse, H. Notes sur la Nouvelle France, entry 110; Lenox, J. Jesuit relations, p. 9, Rel. no. 26; McCoy, J.C. Jesuit relations of Canada, 1632-1673, entry 110; Sabin, J. Dictionary of books relating to America from its discovery to the present time, entry 39957; Thwaites, R.G. Jesuit relations and allied documents: travels and explorations of the Jesuit missionaries in New France, 1610-1791, vol. 43, p. 319, entry XCVI; Winsor, J. Narrative and critical history of America, vol. 4, p. 308; Backer-Sommervogel 4:797
Mexico: la Imprenta de la Bibliotheca Mexicana, 1758
$8,000.00
Octavo: 14.2 x 10.2 cm. [17] ff., 170 pp., [1] f. Collation: A-I4, L-Z4, Aa-Cc4, Dd2. With an added engraved plate. There is no signature signed K but text and pagination is continuous. Complete.
The engraving, by the prolific Mexican artist José Benito Ortuño (active 1750-1808), depicts St. Francis Xavier (with halo) preaching to indigenous children who stand adoringly before him. One of the children holds a rosary and kneels in prayer. For the artist, see Romero de Terreros, Grabados y grabadores de Nueva España, pp. 520-522 (this plate cited at p. 520).
This is the first edition of Father Ignacio de Paredes' Nahuatl translation of Father Gerónimo de Ripalda's Spanish-language catechism.
Garcia Icazbalceta, Lenguas, 56; Viñaza 341; H. de León-Portilla, Tepuztlahcuilolli, 2286; Palau 269110; Medina, Mexico, 4500; De Backer-Sommervogel, VI, 210–211; Sabin 71488; Pilling, Proof-sheets, 2891; Ugarte, Obras escritas en lenguas indigenas de Mexico, 290; Brasseur de Bourbourg, Bibl. Mex.-Guat., pp. 117-188; Brinton Library 3561; Brunet VIII (Supplement II) cols. 485-486; Bulletin of the New York Public Library (1909), “List of Works relating to Mexico”, p. 176; Field 1305; JCB III (1, 1700-1771) #1191; JCB online Indian Languages Database; Leclerc, Bibliotheca Americana (1878) 2334; Sánchez, Doctrina cristiana del Jerónimo de Ripalda 62. Wagner, “Some Bibliographical Notes Concerning Jeronimo de Ripalda’s ‘Catecismo’“ in California Historical Society Quarterly, Vol. 16, No. 4 (December, 1937), pp. 373-375
Paris: chez Bordelet, libraire, rue S. Jacques, vis-à-vis le Collége de Jésuites, à Saint Ignace, 1754
$3,800.00
Octavo: 16.5 x 9.7 cm. [2], XXIV, 402, [4] p., With added map. Collation: π1, a-b8/4, A-Z8/4, Aa-Kk4/8, Ll3 (Lacking final blank.)
Muratori’s book marked an important development in the historiography of Paraguay. Muratori offered a new approach to the subject, distinct from the narratives of the Jesuits, the skeptical approach of the Jansenists, and those writers who filled their accounts with a mixture of adventure and romance.
“Muratori was far from being a propagandist for the Society of Jesus: during the research for his “Cristianesimo felice” he was locked in violent argument with them, and was not allowed to consult any of their archives.
Duodecimo (in 8’s and 4’s): 14.5 x 8 cm. 23 leaves, 883, [21] p. Collation: a8(-a1) b4, c8, d4, A-Z8/4, Aa-Zz8/4; Aaa-Ccc8/4, Ddd-Eee8, Fff4
The “Christian Directorie”, a landmark in English recusant literature, is an enlarged version of Parsons’ “Resolution” (published as "The first booke of the Christian exercise" in 1582). Parsons adds four completely new chapters, along with side-notes for addressing the “infinite corruptions, maymes, and manglings” in the Protestant adaptation of the book made by Edmund Bunny.
A collection of texts by prominent English Catholics, compiled and edited by John Gibbons and John Fenn (though often erroneously attributed to John Bridgewater.) Among the texts are Edmund Campion's "Rationes Decem", Cardinal William Allen's "Apologia pro sacerdotibus Societatis Iesu", Robert Parsons' "De Persecutione Anglicana", and the anonymous account of the capture, torture, trial, and execution of Edmund Campion and his companions Ralph Sherwin and Alexander Briant.
Allison & Rogers, English Counter-Reformation, Vol. 1, no. 524; De Backer-Sommervogel, Vol. III, col. 1403, no. 1; Adams G262 and E141; Shaaber G262 and A239; VD16 ZV 22415; Milward, Religious controversies of the Elizabethan age, 251; Haile, Elizabethan Cardinal, 1914, p. 376
Vomiting Lobsters & Other Automata: The Machines of Athanasius Kircher - With the Earliest Published Description of von Guericke's Air Pump - An Exceptional Copy
Wurzburg: Henricus Pigrin for J. G. Schönwetter, 1657
$12,500.00
Quarto: 22 x 18.3 cm. 14 lvs. (lacking half title), 488 pp., [8] lvs.
First and Only Edition of Schott's First Work, With Descriptions of Kircher's Machines and the First account of von Guericke's Vacuum Pump. Illustrated with an engraved title page, 46 full-paged engraved plates of instruments, machines and experiments; 13 pages of printed music, and 77 woodcut illustrations of mechanical devices and instruments.
STC German S-1246; Norman 1910; Sommervogel VII 940; Baillie, Clocks and Watches ,I p.51; Dibner p.67; Wheeler Gift 142; Eitner IX, 66. Wheeler Gift 142. DSB XII, 210. Dünnhaupt 3
The Diary of Matteo Ricci: The Jesuit Mission in China
Lyon: Sumptibus Horatii Cardon, Ex typographeio Ioannis Iullieron, 1616
$16,000.00
Quarto: 20.2 x 15.4 cm. [16], 628 (i.e. 608), [12] pp. a4, e4, A-Z4, Aa-Zz4, Aaa-Zzz4, Aaaa-Llll. With the final blank leaf and the folding plan both present.
The Jesuits were convinced that they had to understand China in order to win converts. Accordingly, they adopted Chinese names, dress, and language, traveled extensively, and immersed themselves in Chinese language, philosophy, art, and literature. Ricci was the first Western scholar to master Chinese, and he brought Confucian philosophy to the West. At the same time, Ricci brought to China western mathematics, scientific instruments, cartography, and astronomy, in part through his published works in Chinese, thereby ushering in a new era of Chinese understanding of the world.
Cordier, Sinica 810. De Backer-Sommervogel VIII, 240. Lust 839. Morrison II, 258. Streit V, 2094. J. Gernet, China and the Christian Impact (1985) p. 7. Mungello, Curious Land: Jesuit accommodation and the origins of Sinology, Ch. 2.
