Varied Items from Hungarian Bookseller Foldvari Books

Next we have another foreign writer about the U.S., though this one spent a decade living in America. Janos Xantus (John Xantus de Vesey) was a Hungarian nationalist who fled the country in the late 1840s after being arrested. In 1850, he arrived in America. He plied his trade at a variety of occupations, including the military, where he met a collector for a notable zoologist. He became a collector himself. In 1860, he went to Baja California, where he collected plant and animal specimens for what is now the Smithsonian Institution. However, after obtaining a consular position in Mexico, the consul was closed, leading to his returning to Hungary. He spent most of the remainder of his life as the Director of the Budapest Zoo and Botanical Gardens. Item 21 is his Xantus Janos levelei Ejszakamerikabol (Janos Xantus letters from America), published in 1858. €2,300 (US $3,073).

Item 12 is a Mercator work, though not the Mercator with whom you are likely familiar. Breves in Sphaeram Meditatiunculae is the work of Bartholmaus Mercator, not his more famous father, Gerardus. Gerardus Mercator was a notable map and atlas maker (he is credited with coining the term “atlas”), most notably maps using the Mercator Projection. The Mercator Projection allowed him to place even world maps on a flat surface, the concession being distortion (enlarging of land masses) near the poles. Bartholomaus, unfortunately, never got to make his mark. He did help his father on one or two maps and was an assistant to his father teaching mathematics at the University of Duisberg. Unfortunately, he died suddenly shortly after his graduation. This was his only book and it has some references to America though it does not appear in major American bibliographies such as Sabin. It was published in 1563. €10,000 (US $13,359).

Foldvari Books may be reached at +36 20 356 4888 or info@foldvaribooks.com. Their website is www.foldvaribooks.com.