Rare Book Monthly Articles - November - 2022 Issue

Arsenic In Old Books

We think of “green” as meaning natural, healthy, life-giving like plants. Well, not always. Arsenic is the primary ingredient in something very green, a pigment known as Emerald Green or Paris Green. In its Emerald Green incarnation it is a vivid green pigment, a bright and attractive color used for coloring things such as wallpaper and paint. The latter includes paintings, with artists such as Renoir, Monet, Cezanne and Van Gogh having used it. It has also been used in book covers. In its incarnation as Paris Green it has a very different use, and this is the one most often associated with...

Quinn’s Nov. 29 Rare Books, Prints & Autographs auction features collection and library of distinguished ecologist Dr. Thomas E. Lovejoy

FALLS CHURCH, Va. – On Tuesday, November 29, Northern Virginia’s Quinn’s Auction Galleries will present a Rare Books, Prints and Autographs auction, loaded with over 450 lots of rare books, antique...

The Boston Antiquarian Book Fair: Presto!

The annual Boston International Antiquarian Book Fair (BIABF) will soon be held November 11-13 after being on hiatus because of Covid.   There’s pent up interest to see this storied event staged an...

Boston Rare Book and Ephemera Fair: November 12th

  For many years The ABAA’s Boston Fair has attracted shadow fairs that have permitted non-ABAA members to exhibit over the same weekend when the big guys are showing some of the crown jewels of c...

Batch Valuation: The Big Idea

The hallmark of the rare books and paper field has long been obscurity.  Publicly, few seem to know, but the reality is that both the highly skilled and highly intelligent often do.  That’s why a f...

Nye & Company’s upcoming auction, “Property from a Private Collection: A 20th Century Machinal Delight” will be held on November 16th, 2022.

Nye Company’s upcoming auction, “Property from a Private Collection: A 20th Century Machinal Delight” will be held on November 16th, 2022.  This amazing collection – all of it the lifetime vision ...

T.S. Eliot's "The Waste Land"At 100

We musn't be surprised that the first review of Eliot's poem was damning. The redoubtable F.L. Lucas ridiculed the work as a trite academic pastiche of allusions and pretentious philosophical mumbo...

AbeBooks Lists Its Most Expensive Sales Prices for July-September

AbeBooks has issued their list of the most expensive sales on their website for the third quarter of 2022, July through September. The visual plays an increasing role this time. As AbeBooks explain...

Figaro in Spain, or The Vitriolic Traveller

The author of Le Voyage de Figaro En Espagne (Saint Malo, 1784), they say, never set a foot in Spain. It doesn’t really matter. His narrative is a pretext to draw a vitriolic portrait of a country ...

Democracy is on the Ballot

On election day you will have four choices, voting Democratic, Republican, protest for a third party that cannot win, or not voting at all. That is how the ballot will appear but the choice is far ...

At Sotheby's on Nov. 22: The John Golden Library: Book Illustration in the Age of Scientific Discovery

Sotheby’s has announced a live-auction sale at noon on November 22 of The John Golden Library: Book Illustration in the Age of Scientific Discovery. A full public exhibition of the Library will be ...

A Bizarre Baseball Card Sells for Over $100,000; or Why You Should Never Throw Anything Out

From time to time we write about baseball cards when they achieve new record prices, which these days seems to be about every other month. In September we wrote about the most recent such record, a...

Hindman Auctions: Two on Deck

As we head into November many of the auction houses worldwide present their most interesting material.  Hindman of Chicago has two upcoming sales; No. 1095 on November 3rd and 4th, and No. 1097 on ...

Old World Auctions: Maps and More at Auction

RICHMOND, Va. (October 27, 2022) – Henry Briggs’ first English map to show California as an island and the earliest collectible map of Eastern North Carolina and Virginia by John White/Theodor De B...

Contemporary Issues in Rare Book & Manuscript Collecting

Spencer W Stuart, Collections Advisor, to publish a handbook for Collectors and the Trade in 2023   Spencer W Stuart, Collections Advisor, is pleased to announce the publication of Contemporary I...

Diverse Fellowships Offered for CABS-Minnesota 2023. Apply Now.

CABS-Minnesota, the annual book school maintained by the Antiquarian Book School Foundation, is now accepting applications for its annual Diverse Voices Fellow program. Now in its second year, the ...

The 21st Paris Map Fair Will Be held on November 5

The 21st Paris Map, Globe and Scientific Instruments Fair, often called simply the Paris Map Fair, will take place on Saturday, November 5. It is again being held at the Hotel Ambassador in the hea...

Five New Catalogues Reviewed for November

This month we review five new catalogues of books and related paper. Riverrun Books Manuscripts is offering items from the Bart Auerbach Collection. Bart Auerbach was for many years one of America...

Rare Book Monthly

  • Gonnelli
    Auction 51
    Antique prints, paintings and maps
    May 14st 2024
    Gonnelli: Leonard Bramer, The descent from the cross, 1634. Starting price 3200€
    Gonnelli: Gustav Hjalmar de Morner Karel, Rome’s Carnival, 1820. Starting price 1000€
    Gonnelli: Various Authors, Mater Dolorosa, 1700. Starting price 200€
    Gonnelli: Giovanni Battista Piranesi, Carcere Oscura, 1790. Starting price 180€
    Gonnelli: Jan Brueghel, Marine fauna view, 1620 ca. Starting price 28000€
    Gonnelli: Ippolito Scarsella, Mary and Christ with Sant Rocco and Arch-Angel Michele,1615. Starting price 8000€
    Gonnelli: Hans Sebald Beham, Adam and Eve, 1543. Starting price 600€
    Gonnelli: Francesco Burani, Baccanale, 1630. Starting Price 280€
    Gonnelli: Giuseppe Maria Mitelli, Plance from Ventiquattr’ore, 1675. Starting price 800€
    Gonnelli: Giuseppe Angeli, Livorno’s Plan, 1793. Starting price 240€
    Gonnelli: XIV Century Artist, Capital “N” letter, 1350 ca. Starting price 340€
  • Sotheby’s
    Modern First Editions
    Available for Immediate Purchase
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Winston Churchill. The Second World War. Set of First-Edition Volumes. 6,000 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: A.A. Milne, Ernest H. Shepard. A Collection of The Pooh Books. Set of First-Editions. 18,600 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Salvador Dalí, Lewis Carroll. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Finely Bound and Signed Limited Edition. 15,000 USD
    Sotheby’s
    Modern First Editions
    Available for Immediate Purchase
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Ian Fleming. Live and Let Die. First Edition. 9,500 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: J.K. Rowling. Harry Potter Series. Finely Bound First Printing Set of Complete Series. 5,650 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Ernest Hemingway. A Farewell to Arms. First Edition, First Printing. 4,200 USD
  • Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: Isaac Newton on chemistry and matter, and alchemy, Autograph Manuscript, "A Key to Snyders," 3 pp, after 1674. $100,000 - $150,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: Exceptionally rare first printing of Plato's Timaeus. Florence, 1484. $50,000 - $80,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: On the Philosophy of Self-Interest: Adam Smith's copy of Helvetius's De l'homme, Paris, 1773. $40,000 - $60,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: "Magical Calendar of Tycho Brahe" - very rare hermetic broadside. Engraved by Merian for De Bry. c.1618. $30,000 - $50,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: Author's presentation issue of Einstein's proof of Relativity, "Erklärung der Perihelbewegung des Merkur aus der allgemeinen Relativitätstheorie." 1915. $30,000 - $50,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: First Latin edition of Maimonides' Guide for the Perplexed. Paris, 1520. $20,000 - $30,000.
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: De Broglie manuscript on the nature of matter in quantum physics, 3 pp, 1954. $20,000 - $30,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: Tesla autograph letter signed on electricty and electromagnetic theory. 1894. $20,000 - $30,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: Heinrich Hertz scientific manuscript on his mentor Hermann Von Helmholtz, 1891. $20,000 - $30,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: The greatest illustrated work in Alchemy: Micheal Maier's Atalanta Fugiens. Oppenheim, 1618. $30,000 - $50,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: Illustrated Alchemical manuscript, a Mysterium Magnum of the Rosicurcians, 18th-century. $30,000 - $50,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: Rare Largest Paper Presentation Copy of Newton's Principia, London, 1726. The third and most influential edition. $60,000 - $90,000

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