Search Results: Authors starting with D from Bernard Quaritch Ltd

A remarkably detailed manuscript, and a very attractive object, detailing the seigneurial rights of Marguerite de Cicon in the small town of Montureux-lès-Baulay, situated between Nancy and Dijon in the Burgundy region of eastern France.
As Seigneur de Montureux, Marguerite's husband François de Saint Martin shared various manorial privileges with Jean Claude du Houx and his wife Barbe de Charmoille. Upon François's death, these rights came to Marguerite as his widow and as the mother of their children Claude François and Jean Philibert. Fearing that they might be challenged or neglected, however – and fear is the word employed here in the phrase 'laditte Vefue suppliante crainct oppression' (f.4r) – Marguerite called upon the services of Guillaume Estiennet of nearby Jussey, notary general of Burgundy, to draw up this document laying out her rights.
The document opens by detailing ancient privileges enjoyed by the lords of Montureux, with accompanying remarks by the local inhabitants agreeing… Read More

First edition, very scarce in commerce, of an exhilaratingly spiteful attack on Pope in the wake of the publication of the Dunciad variorum, comprising seven different satirical texts, three in verse, issued in quarto to match 'the least pompous Edition of the Dunciad'.
Its authorship remains uncertain. Pope wrote to Lord Oxford on 16 May 1726: 'I see a Book with a Curious Cutt calld Pope Alexrs Supremacy &c. 4o. In it are 3 or 4 things so false & scandalous that I think I know the Authors, and they are of a Rank to merit Detection … The book is writ by Burnet, & a Person who has great obligations to me, & the Cut is done by Ducket'. He later ascribed it to Duckett and John Dennis.
Among the various charges laid at Pope's feet are his deformity ('Be his Crown Picked, to One Side reclin'd / Be to his Neck his Buttocks closely join'd')' his ingratitude to Wycherley; that he is a spy for the Tories ('he listed openly in the Tory Service'); and that he avoided facing his critics after the… Read More

4to, pp. vi, [2], 132, xxii (ix–xvi double-page), [1, privilège du Roi], [1, blank]; a very few marks; a fine copy in contemporary mottled calf, spine gilt in compartments and with gilt morocco lettering-piece, red edges, marbled endpapers; neatly rebacked preserving spine, corners repaired; from the library of Francois-Alexandre-Frédéric de La Rochefoucauld (1747-1827), with gilt arms (Olivier 710, fer 2) on covers and Bibliothèque de Liancourt bookplate on front pastedown; book label of Erwin Tomash. £5500

A large, crisp and illustrious copy of the first edition of a classic of statistical science: it is the first to define expectation of life – which Deparcieux calls 'la vie moyenne' – and the first to contain life tables for males and females. 'The first French work in the actuarial field ... After publication of this Essai, expectation of life came into general use as a descriptive statistic. Deparcieux scaled his mortality data to a radix of 1000 at age 3, calculated the… Read More

8vo (255 x 158mm), 23 volumes and etched steel plate in box; uncut, volumes and box bound in original coloured full buckram by the Leighton-Straker Bookbinding Co., Ltd., gilt morocco lettering-pieces on spines, top edges gilt; a little light wear and occasional soiling, spines of a few volumes lightly sunned; a very good set.
Limited edition of 877, of which 66 sets were destroyed when a bomb hit the bindery in September 1940, so at most 811 complete sets survive (Dreyfus, Nonesuch Press, 108). The steel plate included with this set is number 605, "Solemn reference is made to Mr. Bunsby" from Dombey and Son
(Chapter 23, facing p.458), engraved by H. K. Browne ('Phiz'), with the typed letter of authenticity on Chapman & Hall headed paper, signed by Arthur Waugh.
Intended as a definitive edition of Dickens' works the Nonesuch Press edition was printed using the original steel… Read More

First edition, very scarce, of a history of the conquistadores for young readers, loosely derived from Antonio Solís de Ribadeneyra's Historia de la Conquista de México. Contrary to the suggestion of the British Library catalogue, it is not a reprint of the text that had appeared in Smollet's A Compendium of authentic and entertaining Voyages (1756), though the description of the voyage of Vasco de Gama (II, 101-130) is the same. Little is known of Dilworth, despite his authorship of numerous digests of history for younger readers in the 1750s, including one of Pizarro's conquest of Peru, as well as biographies of Pope and Swift and a Complete Letter-Writer that saw numerous editions in America.ESTC shows five copies, of which only Kent State and John Carter Brown have volume II. There are also complete copies at Yale and Newberry. Sabin 20184.Two vols. in one, 12mo., pp. [4], 127, [1]; 130, no title-page to second volume (as issued), with a half-title to volume I; a very good copy in the… Read More

First edition, limited to 500 copies; an association copy of this eulogy to America's National poet, Joel Barlow, gifted by his widow to Count Rumford. American businessman, diplomat, and poet Joel Barlow (1754–1812) studied at Yale, where he developed interests in poetry, moral and political philosophy, and science, but his studies were interrupted by the revolutionary war, during which he became chaplain of the Third Massachussetts Brigade. Barlow continued to write poetry, and secretly became engaged to Ruth Baldwin, 'whose father wished her to select a more practical suitor' (ADNB; the secret engagement was also illegal in Connecticut). After the war, Barlow opened a printing and stationer's shop in Hartford, CT, considering himself 'destined – if he could only find the right topic – to be the epic poet of the United States' (loc. cit.). In 1787 he published The Vision of Columbus, his epic work on Columbus' discovery of the Americas, which enjoyed a great success. In 1788, as the… Read More

First edition of this illustrated account of the Gold Coast by Joseph Dupuis (1789-1874), British consul at Mogador.The first part comprises a description of Dupuis's journey to Kumasi (in modern-day Ghana) and his audience with the Ashanti king, with sections on, for example, 'seductive arts of the females', 'magical rites and superstitions', 'human sacrifices', 'merchandize suitable for African markets', and 'the slave trade'. The second part is devoted to the geography of Western Africa, and the various appendices include details of the treaty brokered by Dupuis with the Ashanti king, and transcriptions and translations of Arabic manuscripts describing various routes in the region. The splendid plates, by C. Williams after Dupuis's drawings, include native men and women and their costume (e.g. priests and soldiers), a view of the Pra River, examples of Ashanti sculpture, and panoramic depictions of various ceremonies.Dupuis, who was married to Evelina Danby, daughter of the painter J.M.W. Turner,… Read More

8vo, pp. [ii], 51, [1] blank; title within engraved border, engraved illustration of balloon on p. 8, and headpiece on p. 9; aside from occasional very minor spotting, clean and crisp throughout; in recent vellum-backed green marbled boards, title gilt on spine; a good copy.
First edition, with a parallel Italian translation, of these Latin verses commemorating the first Montgolfier experiments with balloon flight by the Milanese diplomat and cardinal Angelo Maria Durini (1725-1796).
A contemporary reviewer in the Journal des scavans
notes that 'The enthusiasm which the Montgolfiers' discovery has excited in Italy could not be better demonstrated than by this suite of pieces in Italian and Latin'. In his dedication, to the first Italian balloonist Paolo Andreani, the translator Francesco Mainoni, argues that the best use the rich can put their riches to is the advancement of the sciences and the arts, and that experimentation with… Read More