The Celebrated Library of Boies Penrose. The First and Second Portion: Travel and Exploration, Navigation and Trade: A- L & M - Z. .[ 2 Parts, complete set ] [ Sotheby & Co., auction catalogue, sale dates: 7 June and 9 November 1971 ]

Sotheby & Co., London, auction catalogue for the sales held on 7th June and 9th November 1971. Yellow printed wrappers, 8vo,. 106 + 161 pp, plates (some folding). 366 lots. From the foreword to the first part of the sale: "The richness of the collection and the fastidiousness with which it has been assembled were both made possible by the quality of the material which became available during the period of the great Britwell, Leconfield and Lothian dispersals. ..Dealing with a comparatively short period of time during which Europeans reached almost every corner of the globe, the collection demonstrates in particular the impact of all this activity on Tudor and early Stuart England. At first it was by means of translations from the Spanish, Portuguese and Italian, and secondhand reports, sometimes incredulous; but many of the important English contributions to the subject, which are present here, show how very quickly the commercial and political implications were realised, and how the seizing of the initiative, consolidation, and finally colonization laid the foundation of the greatest empire since classical times. Among the translations from foreign works are the first English editions of Acosta The naturall and morall historie of the East and West Indies, 1604; Anghiera The decades of the newe worlde, 1555; Boemus The fardle of facions, 1555; Casas The Spanish colonie, 1583; Cortes The arte of nauiga-tion, 1584; Curio A notable historie of the Saracens, 1575; Escalante A discourse of the nauigation which the Portugales doe make, 1579; Fernandez de Quiros Terra australis incognita, or a new southerne discoverie, 1617; Galvao The discoveries of the world, 1601; Gonzalez de Mendoza The historie of the great and mightie kingdome of China, 1588 ; Lescarbot Nova Francia, 1609; Linschoten Discours of voyages into ye East & West Indies, [1598]; Lopes & Pigafetta A report of the kingdome of Congo, 1597; and Lopez de Gomara The pleasant historie of the conquest of the VVeast India, [1578]. The original English books of travel include first editions of Bruton Newes from the East-Indies, 1638; Coryate Thomas Coriate traueller for the English vvits, 1616; and Mr Thomas Coriat to his friends in England, 1618; Fletcher Of the Russe commonwealth, 1591; Foxe North-west Fox, 1635; Gilbert A discovrse of a discouerie for a new passage to Cataia, 1576; Hakluyt The principall navigations, 1589; Hamor A trve discourse of the present state of Virginia, 1615; Harcourt A relation of a voyage to Gviana, 1613; Hawkins Observations . . . in his voiage into the South Sea, 1622; James The strange and dangerovs voyage, 1633; Jobson The golden trade, 1623; and Johnson Nova Britannia, 1609. Among the important works on navigation are the first editions of Addison Arithmeticall nauigation, 1625; Barlow Magneticall aduertisements, 1616; Blagrave The mathematical iewel, [1585]; Bourne A booke called the treasure for traueilers, 1578; Cortes Breue compendio de la sphera, Seville, 1551; Cuningham The cosmographicall glasse, 1559; Dee General and rare memorials pertayning to the perfecte arte of navigation, 1577; Fale Horologiographia, [1593]; and Furttenbach Architectura navalis, Ulm, 1629. The second portion of the sale will comprise M to Z of the travel collection, the geographical manuscripts, and a fine miscellany of fifteenth-century and STC books. Wrappers a little marked, Good.