Travel & Exploration

Unrecorded celestial atlas, made by a Jesuit missionary in China.

An unrecorded manuscript celestial atlas from the Sui dynasty, edited with an extensive commentary by the early 18th century Jesuit astronomer Antoine Gaubil, hailed by Joseph Needham as the “the interpreter general and father superior of Chinese astronomy”, of which this manuscript gives impressive evidence. The manuscript contains an unpublished translation of the “Bu Tian Ge” (a.k.a. “Songs of pacing the heavens” or “The song of the marches of the heavens”), a Sui dynasty (581-618 CE) star catalogue in verse by the Taoist hermit Dan Yuanzi, also known as Wang Ximing. Beyond the text of the star catalogue, Gaubil provides his ink- drawn copies of 31-star charts, including a fold-out celestial map of the north polar region. Gaubil provides an extensive commentary on the text, and a tabular catalogue of Chinese stars that allows us to determine the corresponding European stars based on their distance from the North Pole.

Integrating Confucionism, one of the earliest Chinese books printed in Singapore, bound in the contemporary wrappers

First edition of a religious tract by Aihanze, the pen-name of the German Protestant missionary Gützlaff. Comprising five parts dealing respectively with morality in Holy Scripture, Christian ethics, the Saviour, theory of prayer and explanations of the law, and the doctrine of Christ.

Early edition of Sir Mandeville’s landmark work

An Italian vernacular edition of the Travels of Sir John Mandeville, the fundamental travel book, first best-seller in the genre, and a text which greatly influenced the course of subsequent exploration. One of the most popular texts of the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance, taking the reader to the Holy Land, Egypt, Turkey, Persia, Tartary, India and Cathay, its influence was profound and persisted well into the era of printing and the age that saw the Western discoveries of the New World and the sea routes to Asia.

The finest example Cortes navigational treatise to come to the market in a century.

First edition, a fabulous copy with the woodcuts and maps in contemporary color and housed in 17th or 18th century calf, in genuine condition, of the “most complete statement of navigational science to date” (PMM), a work of significant influence in the English world, an English translation by Richard Edden appeared as early as 1561, becoming one of the most relevant navigational treatises used in the Elizabethan era. The work contains information about the recently discovered regions by the Spanish and the Portuguese in America and the East.

The itinerary from Venice to Constantinople in pictures

Attractive copy of a highly illustrated itinerary from Venice to Constantinople, comprising 72 full-page maps, including many of Constantinople and also of Cyprus, Famagusta, Crete, Rhodes, Jerusalem and the Near East. Published several times in the first half of the 17th century, the subsequent editions contained a variable number of plates. The maps show cities and outposts along the Mediterranean, the Dalmatian coast and the Levant.

A rare Spanish account of a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, unlocated in the United States.

Second edition, extremely rare, of the account of the pilgrimage to the Holy Land in 1518 by the Marquis of Tarifa accompanied by Juan del Encina, one of the earliest Spanish accounts of a voyage to Middle East, and one of the rarest accounts of a Holy Land pilgrimage, an interesting addition to the corpus of better-known accounts of voyages of the Holy Land. The narrative details the journey through the south of Europe and the Middle East on the way to Jerusalem. During the trip, the Marquis contacted local noblemen, merchants, and acquired books for his library, including works by Boccaccio and Marco Polo. The book is extraordinarily rare, as is the first edition printed in 1580 in Lisbon, of which no copy is located in OCLC.

The first description of the Escorial and its contents, by its architect.

First edition, first issue, extraordinarily rare, of the first description of the Escorial, by Juan de Herrera, the architect of what is widely regarded as the most impressive building created in Spain in the 16th century. A book of exceptional rarity, and importance, which gives us the architect´s feel of what his magnum opus is and looks like. Herrera was the author of a set of drawings on the Escorial which were engraved by Pedro Perret Perret (1555-1637).

First edition of the first major survey of China, which influenced European perception of the country for a century; the first appearance of Espejo’s exploration of Mexico.

First edition of the first major survey of China, and an early Americana, noted by Sabin as the “First European book in which Chinese characters occur” (Sabin); it was translated into Italian, French, Latin, German, and English by order of Richard Hakluyt by Robert Parke. It was a true 16th century best seller and the first serious work on China, influential for over a century. Finally, it also contains significant material on the Philippines.

Bound in contemporary Spanish Mudejar bindings, one of the first Spanish works to adhere to the Ptolemaic geographical vision of the World, used by 15th century explorers such as Columbus

First edition of a cosmographically-relevant Spanish work, apparently the first published in Spain to adhere to the Ptolemaic theory of the world, printed at the first press established Valencia (Spain), in a fascinating strictly contemporary Spanish “Mudejar” style binding.

Detailed account of missionary work in the Far East 1807-1819, printed in Malacca on Asian paper

First edition, printed in Malacca, a detailed account of a wide variety of missionary activities in China, Southeast Asia and the East Indies by the Scottish Protestant missionaries Robert Morrison (1782-1834), who arrived in Macau in 1807, and William Milne (1785-1822), who joined him there in 1813. They were the first Protestant missionaries in China, made the second complete Chinese translation of the Bible, set up two printing offices (including the press at Malacca that produced the present book) and established the Anglo-Chinese College at Malacca under the auspices of the London Missionary Society in 1818.

The first English grammar of 'low' Tamil

First English edition of Beschi's grammar of colloquial (or "low") Tamil, first published in Latin by the Danish Missionary Press in 1738. This English translation by the German soldier and educator Christoph Horst (1761-1810) formed the subsequent basis for all following English-language attempts at a Tamil grammar.

The Malay Vocabularies collected and published in Batavia

Collected edition of five early Malay vocabularies, published in Batavia for the Dutch East India company by Andries Lambert Loder, the company's chief printer.

The pharmacological use of sugar in 17th century Spain, of which we locate a single copy worldwide

First edition, exceedingly rare and interesting work about the pharmacological and somewhat gastronomical use of a pink sugar made with rose extract during the 17th century Spain, a curiously popular product at the time; according to OCLC only one copy is found, at the BNE in Spain, no copies in the United States.