• Sotheby's
    Fine Books, Manuscripts & More
    Available for Immediate Purchase
    Sotheby’s: J.R.R. Tolkien. The Lord of the Rings Trilogy. 11,135 USD
    Sotheby’s: Edgar Allan Poe. The Raven and Other Poems, 1845. 33,000 USD
    Sotheby’s: Leo Tolstoy, Clara Bow. War and Peace, 1886. 22,500 USD
    Sotheby’s: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, 1902. 7,500 USD
    Sotheby’s: F. Scott Fitzgerald. This Side of Paradise, The Great Gatsby, and Others, 1920-1941. 24,180 USD
  • Doyle, Dec. 5: Minas Avetisian (1928-1975). Rest, 1973. $8,000 to $12,000.
    Doyle, Dec. 5: Anna Vaughn Hyatt Huntington (1876-1973). Yawning Tiger, conceived 1917. $3,000 to $5,000.
    Doyle, Dec. 5: Robert M. Kulicke (1924-2007). Full-Blown Red and White Roses in a Glass Vase, 1982. $3,000 to $5,000.
    Doyle, Dec. 5: Pablo Picasso (1881-1973). L’ATELIER DE CANNES (Bloch 794; Mourlot 279). The cover for Ces Peintres Nos Amis, vol. II. $1,000 to $1,500.
    Doyle, Dec. 5: LeRoy Neiman (1921-2012). THE BEACH AT CANNES, 1979. $1,200 to $1,800.
    Doyle, Dec. 5: Richard Avendon, the suite of eleven signed portraits from the Avedon/Paris portfolio. $150,000 to $250,000.
    Doyle, Dec. 5: Robert Mapplethorpe (1946-1989). Flowers in Vase, 1985. $20,000 to $30,000.
    Doyle, Dec. 5: Edward Weston (1886-1958). Nude, 1936. $20,000 to $30,000.
    Doyle, Dec. 5: Edward Weston (1886-1958). Juniper, High Sierra, 1937.
    Doyle, Dec. 5: Steven J. Levn (b. 1964). Plumage II, 2011. $6,000 to $8,000.
    Doyle, Dec. 5: Steven Meisel (b. 1954). Madonna, Miami, (from Sex), 1992. $6,000 to $9,000.
  • ALDE, Dec. 9: BLAEU (JOAN) ET BORGOGNIO (GIO TOMASO). Theatre des Estats de son Altesse Royale le duc de Savoye…, La Haye, 1700. €25,000 to €30,000.
    ALDE, Dec. 9: BROWNE (JAMES D. HOWE). Ten Scenes in the last Ascent of Mont Blanc including five Views from the Summit. London, 1853. €6,000 to €8,000.
    ALDE, Dec. 9: FELLOWS (CHARLES). A Narrative of an Ascent to the Summit of Mont-Blanc. London, 1827. €30,000 to €40,000.
    ALDE, Dec. 9: HACQUET (BELSAZAR). Physikalisch= Politische Reise aus den Dinarischen durch die Julischen…, Leipzig, 1785. €3,000 to €4,000.
    ALDE, Dec. 9: HAWES (BENJAMIN). A Narrative of an Ascent to the Summit of Mont-Blanc made during the summer of 1827 by Mr. William Hawes and Mr. Charles Fellows, 1828.
    ALDE, Dec. 9: MARTEL (PIERRE) ET WINDHAM (WILLIAM). An account of the glacieres or ice Alps in Savoy, in two letters…, London, 1744. €6,000 to €8,000.
    ALDE, Dec. 9: PITSCHNER (WILHELM). Der Mont Blanc Darstellung des Besteigung desselben am 31 Juli, 1 und 2 August 1859…, Berlin, 1860-1864. €8,000 to €10,000.
    ALDE, Dec. 9: SCHEUCHZER (JOHANN JACOB). Natur-Geschichte des Schweizerlandes, samt seinen Reisen über die Schweitzerische Gebürge. Zurich, 1746. €3,000 to €4,000.
    ALDE, Dec. 9: STUMPF (JOANNES). Gemeiner loblicher Eydgnosschaft Stetten, Landen, und Völckeren Chronicwirdiger Thaatenbeschreybung. Zurich, Christoph Froschauer, 1548. €2,500 to €3,500.
    ALDE, Dec. 9: WALTON (ELIJAH) ET BONNEY (THOMAS GEORGE). The Peaks and valleys of the Alps. London, 1868. €3,000 to €4,000.
    ALDE, Dec. 9: WYTTENBACH (JACOB SAMUEL). Vues remarquables des montagnes de la Suisse, avec leur description. Amsterdam, 1785. €15,000 to €20,000.
  • Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 11-12: A Rare Complete Run of the Cuala Press Broadsides. €5,500 to €7,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 11-12: Rare First Edition of a Classic Work. [Stafford (Thos.)] Pacata Hibernia, Ireland Appeased and Reduced…, 1633. €1,500 to €2,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 11-12: Yeats (W.B.) The Poems of W.B. Yeats, 2 vols. Lond. (MacMillan & Co.) 1949. Signed by author, limited edition. €1,250 to €1,750.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 11-12: Fishing: Literal Translation into English of the Earliest Known Book on Fowling and Fishing, Written originally in Flemish and Printed at Antwerp in 1492. London (Chiswick Press) 1872. €1,500 to €2,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 11-12: Fishing: Blacker's - Art of Fly Making, etc., Comprising Angling & Dying of Colours..., Rewritten & Revised. Lond. 1855. €250 to €350.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 11-12: Joyce (James). Finnegans Wake,, London (Faber & Faber Ltd.) 1939, Lim. Edn. No. 269 (425) copies, Signed by the Author (in green pen). €3,000 to €4,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 11-12: Synge (J.M.) & Yeats (Jack B.) illus. The Aran Islands,, D. (Maunsel & Co. Ltd.) 1907, Signed Limited Edn. €4,000 to €5,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 11-12: Meyer (Dr. A.B.) Unser Auer -, Rackel-Und Birkwild und Seine Abarten, Wien (Verlag Von Adolph W. Kunast) 1887. €2,500 to €3,500.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 11-12: Carve (Thomas). Itinerarium R.D. Thomas Carve Tripperariensis, Sacellani Maioris in Fortisima iuxta…,, Moguntia (Mainz) impriemebat Nicolaus Heyll, 1639. €1,500 to €2,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 11-12: Grose (Francis). The Antiquities of Ireland, 2 vols. folio London (for S. Hooper) 1791. First Edition. €3,000 to €5,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 11-12: Heaney (Seamus) & Le Brocquy (Louis) artist. Ugolino, D. (Dolmen Press) 1979, Signed Limited Edition No. 87 (125) Copies. €3,500 to €4,500.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 11-12: Heaney (Seamus). Eleven Poems, Belfast (Festival publications - Queens University) [1965], First Edn., (First Issue) Signed. €2,500 to €3,500.

Rare Book Monthly

Articles - July - 2019 Issue

Theodore De Bry & the Bodmer Project! A Complete digitized tour of the World...

For the first time ever, a complete collection of Theodore de Bry’s Voyages—‘Great’ and ‘Small’—is available online! These 29 volumes published between 1590 and 1634 are, with their extraordinary illustrations, a landmark in the field of travel books! They’ve just been digitized by the Bodmer Foundation*, in Switzerland.

 

Theodore de Bry (1528-1598) was a Protestant drawer, printer and engraver from Frankfort, Germany. Nowadays, his name is associated with one of the most outstanding collections of voyages ever. It is divided into the “Grands Voyages" (America) and the “Petits Voyages” (Africa and Asia). It took him more than 40 years to put it together. “Actually, Theodore is only responsible for the first six volumes of the Grands Voyages,” Matthieu Bernhardt says. Bernhardt is a Professor at the University of Geneva, Switzerland, and he’s been piloting this project initiated by the Bodmer Foundation. “When Theodore died, his two sons Jean Theodore and Jean Israel—and after them, their sons-in-law—completed the project. These books were very expensive and reserved to a happy few.” They are even more expensive today—and very rare, especially the complete sets. So far, the Library of Congress, in Washington, offered the most complete digitized copy in the world—“but they are missing 3 or 4 volumes,” Bernhardt underlines. “Ours, which is the Latin edition and not the German one, is complete.” It is, nonetheless, a recomposed set with mismatched bindings.

 

The Bodmer Foundation wishes to touch as wide an audience as possible, and the website dedicated to this project was put together by a professional designer. The opening page is very exciting as several vignettes are placed over a map of the New World—taken from the collection. When you click on them, you are granted access to the scanned pages of the books. Actually, these are more photographs than scans—the colour and defects of the physical books are faithfully rendered; only the smell of paper is missing. Unfortunately, to leaf through a physical De Bry remains a privilege granted to a “happy few”. Matthieu Bernhardt himself had to wait for this project to become one. He laughs: “It was a moving first time, indeed.”

 

Vespucci, Herrera, Gomara, Benzoni... The works of these authors are classics. Yet, they were already available when De Bry compiled them. “The only original text of the collection is the relation of Johan Verken’s travel to the East Indies, in the Petits Voyages,” Bernhardt says. In fact, the true interest of this collection lies not exactly in the texts—but in the engravings. I do not know how ‘wide’ the Latin-speaking audience is for such a project—but it doesn’t really matter. When you go through these documents, you’re simply tracking down the illustrations, like a kid with his first book. There are more than 600 copper plates, including portraits, maps and historical scenes—they were, at the time, of unchallenged quality. “They are fascinating. First because they are copper plates, very clean-cut; then because they almost depict the whole known world of the 16th century!” Bernhardt studied them thoroughly. “When De Bry first decided to publish Benzoni’s relation of the New World, he had no illustration. Thus, he created 60 plates following Benzoni’s text. In fact, out of the 600 plates of the full collection, half were creations. The rest were updates from already existing illustrations—most of the time raw woodcuts. It’s interesting to note that the quality of the engravings dropped after Theodore’s deathprobably because the project grew too big too fast.”

 

These illustrations shaped the vision that Europeans had of the rest of the world. They are particularly striking—especially the dreadful scenes of massacre of Native Americans. “These plates are controverted! De Bry clearly insists on the massacres committed by the Catholics while minimizing those committed by the Protestants, in Florida or Virginia for instance.” At the end of the 16th century, images already meant power! And De Bry was a powerful engraver. In 2019, as true scenes of violence are becoming unfortunately too common, the reading of Las Casas’ relation of the “destruction of the Indies by the Spaniards” remains a traumatizing experience—partly because of the breath-taking 400-year old plates of Theodore de Bry! When a Native-American—whose nose, ears, lips and hands, have just been cut off by a laughing Spaniard—runs away from his tyrant, his cry of pain and despair pierces the paper to reach our ears! And when another Spaniard is about to crush a Native American baby against the rock, we look away in fear! Curiously, Las Casas’ work is not included in the Great Voyages, although De Bry published and illustrated it separately. “This is indeed the great mystery about this collection!” Bernhardt wonders. Anyway, the other illustrations are of the same vein. “You can see specific clothes of many overseas peoples,” Jérôme David from the Bodmer Foundation states, “including to Algonquians from Virginia—there are nine full portraits that show that each social position matched with a particular garment. Furthermore, these illustrations are extremely varied: maps, bestiaries and portraits have captured old cultural practices such as cannibal rituals of the Tupinambà in Brazil, elephant hunt in Pegu (current Burma) or the sacrifice of widows in India.” They thus can be regarded as sociological documents—although De Bry never set a foot in the New World!

 

It took the De Brys more than 40 years to publish this collection—and 3 years for the Bodmer Foundation to digitize it (bodmerlab.unige.ch/recits-et-images/debry/#/grands-voyages/Preface). Reading these books, even through a computer, is a unique intellectual and visual experience. You will feel like touring a vanished world in 29 volumes—a great voyage, indeed.

 

 

Thibault Ehrengardt

 

 

* The Bodmer Foundation is a library and museum specialised in manuscripts and precious editions. It is located in Cologny, Switzerland, near Geneva. It was founded in 1971 and is classified by the UNESCO.

 

Additional DeBry illustrations can be seen on each of the following pages. Click the images to enlarge them.

Rare Book Monthly

  • High Bids Win
    Letterpress & Bindery Auction
    Nov. 20 – Dec. 5, 2024
    High Bids Win, Nov. 20 – Dec. 5: Book Press 10 1/2× 15 1/4" Platen , 2 1/2" Daylight.
    High Bids Win, Nov. 20 – Dec. 5: The Tubbs Mfg Co. wooden-type cabinet 27” w by 37” h by 22” deep.
    High Bids Win, Nov. 20 – Dec. 5: G.P.Gordon printing press 7” by 11” with treadle. Needs rollers, trucks, and grippers. Missing roller spring.
    High Bids Win
    Letterpress & Bindery Auction
    Nov. 20 – Dec. 5, 2024
    High Bids Win, Nov. 20 – Dec. 5: D & C Ventris curved wood type 2” tall 5/8” wide.
    High Bids Win, Nov. 20 – Dec. 5: Wood Type 1 1/4” tall.
    High Bids Win, Nov. 20 – Dec. 5: Quarter Case with Lead Triangles.
    High Bids Win
    Letterpress & Bindery Auction
    Nov. 20 – Dec. 5, 2024
    High Bids Win, Nov. 20 – Dec. 5: Page & Co wood type 1 1/4” tall 1/4” wide.
    High Bids Win, Nov. 20 – Dec. 5: Awt 578 type hi gauge.
    High Bids Win, Nov. 20 – Dec. 5: Quarter Case with Lead Penline Flourishes.
    High Bids Win
    Letterpress & Bindery Auction
    Nov. 20 – Dec. 5, 2024
    High Bids Win, Nov. 20 – Dec. 5: Quarter Case with Lead Penline Flourishes.
    High Bids Win, Nov. 20 – Dec. 5: Quarter Case with Lead Cents and Pound Signs.
    High Bids Win, Nov. 20 – Dec. 5: Wooden type cabinet 27” w by 19” d by 38” h.
  • Dominic Winter Auctioneers
    Printed Books, Maps & Ephemera
    Printing Woodblocks by Thomas & John Bewick
    12 December 2024
    Dominic Winter, Dec. 12: Gell (William). The Topography of Troy, and its Vicinity, 1804. £2,000 to £3,000.
    Dominic Winter, Dec. 12: Low (David). The Breeds of the Domestic Animals of the British Islands, 1842. £1,500 to £2,000.
    Dominic Winter, Dec. 12: North America. Moll (Herman)..., This Map of North America..., circa 1725. £1,000 to £1,500.
    Dominic Winter Auctioneers
    Printed Books, Maps & Ephemera
    Printing Woodblocks by Thomas & John Bewick
    12 December 2024
    Dominic Winter, Dec. 12: Bible [English]. [The Holie Bible conteynyng the Olde Testament and the Newe, 1568]. £3,000 to £5,000.
    Dominic Winter, Dec. 12: Chaucer (Geoffrey). The Workes of Our Ancient and Learned English Poet, newly Printed, 1602. £1,500 to £2,000. £1,500 to £2,000.
    Dominic Winter, Dec. 12: Cuffee (Paul). Memoir of Captain Paul Cuffee, A Man of Color, Liverpool, 1811. £300 to £500.
    Dominic Winter Auctioneers
    Modern First Editions & Illustrated Books, Playing Cards, Toys & Games
    13 December 2024
    Dominic Winter, Dec. 13: Milne (A. A.) The House at Pooh Corner, signed limited edition, 1928. £3,000 to £5,000.
    Dominic Winter, Dec. 13: Huxley (Aldous). Brave New World, limited signed edition, 1932. £2,000 to £3,000.
    Dominic Winter, Dec. 13: Orwell (George). Animal Farm, 1st edition, 1945. £2,000 to £3,000.
    Dominic Winter Auctioneers
    Modern First Editions & Illustrated Books, Playing Cards, Toys & Games
    13 December 2024
    Dominic Winter, Dec. 13: Rowling (J. K.). Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, 1st edition, 1st impression, 1997. £30,000 to £50,000.
    Dominic Winter, Dec. 13: Tolkien (J. R. R.) The Lord of the Rings, 3 volumes, 1st edition, 1954-55. £2,000 to £3,000.
    Dominic Winter, Dec. 13: Wells (H. G.) The War of the Worlds, 1st edition, 1st issue, 1898. £1,000 to £1,500.
  • Doyle, Dec. 6: An extensive archive of Raymond Chandler’s unpublished drafts of fantasy stories. $60,000 to $80,000.
    Doyle, Dec. 6: RAND, AYN. Single page from Ayn Rand’s handwritten first draft of her influential final novel Atlas Shrugged. $30,000 to $50,000.
    Doyle, Dec. 6: Ernest Hemingway’s first book with interesting provenance. Three Stories & Ten Poems. $20,000 to $30,000.
    Doyle, Dec. 6: Hemingway’s second book, one of 170 copies. In Our Time. $15,000 to $25,000.
    Doyle, Dec. 6: A finely colored example of Visscher’s double hemisphere world map, with a figured border. $12,000 to $18,000.
    Doyle, Dec. 6: Raymond Chandler’s Olivetti Studio 44 Typewriter. $10,000 to $20,000.
    Doyle, Dec. 6: Antonio Ordóñez's “Suit of Lights” owned by Ernest Hemingway. $10,000 to $20,000.
    Doyle, Dec. 6: A remarkable Truman archive featuring an inscribed beam from the White House construction. $8,000 to $12,000.
    Doyle, Dec. 6: The fourth edition of Audubon’s The Birds of America. $8,000 to $12,000.
    Doyle, Dec. 6: The original typed manuscript for Chandler’s only opera. The Princess and the Pedlar: An Entirely Original Comic Opera. $8,000 to $12,000.
    Doyle, Dec. 6: A splendidly illustrated treatise on ancient Peru and its Incan civilization. $7,000 to $10,000.
    Doyle, Dec. 6: A superb copy of Claude Lorrain’s Liber Veritatis from Longleat House. $5,000 to $8,000.

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