JAPAN
JAPAN
Early German Study of Japan — In English 
(A
Book with Fascinating Pictures). Rein, Johannes Justus.
Japan: Travels and researches undertaken at the cost of the Prussian government.
New York: A.C. Armstrong & Son, 1884. 8vo (25.8 cm, 10.25"). x, [2], 534 pp.;
13 plts., 5 maps (2 col. fold.).
Click the images for enlargements. The present volume is
illustrated with a total of 18 plates: eight steel engravings, five mounted phototypes (by Strumper & Co. of Hamburg), and five maps (including two very large folding maps printed in color), as well as several in-text engravings.
• Publisher's brown cloth, front cover stamped in red, white, and gilt with images of Japanese lanterns, back cover with publisher's stylized monogram in red, spine with gilt-stamped title and additional lantern image; rubbed, front cover with small dent to edge and cloth partially split at joint, spine with paper shelving label and cloth torn at head/foot (especially the latter at rear joint). Ex–social club library: call number on front fly-leaf, rubber-stamp on title-page and three other pages, no other markings. Large folding map of Japan with small tear from one edge. A few leaves uncut. Pages and plates clean. A significant work in a still-attractive copy, priced to reflect condition. (26861)
A Jesuit Pioneer in
India & Japan Bouhours, Dominique. La vie de Saint François Xavier, de la Compagnie de Jésus, apostre des Indes et du Japon. Nouvelle édition. Paris: Chez Guillot, 1787. 12mo (16 cm, 6.5"). 2 (of 2) vols. I: 24, 442, [2] pp. (lacks frontis.) II: [4], 418, [1] pp.
Click the interior image for an enlargement. The New Advent Catholic Encyclopedia notes that Dominique Bouhours (1632–1702) was best known to English readers as the author of this much-reprinted work and an earlier life of Ignatius of Loyola; for a long time these were “the most widely circulated biographies” of the two saints. Bouhours also achieved prominence for his anti-Jansenist writings.
The pair of volumes were nicely printed, with some nicely engraved head- and tailpieces. The text offers sidenotes.
Rare. A search of OCLC records only two copies, of which this is one, now deaccessioned.
• De Backer-Sommervogel, I, 1904–1905; Cordier, Bibliotheca Japonica, 146. Recent full calf, covers framed and panelled with single gilt fillets and with gilt-stamped corner fleurons; spines gilt extra, with gilt-ruled raised bands, gilt-stamped leather title and volume labels, gilt publication date at foot, and elaborately gilt-tooled floral decorations in compartments; marbled endpapers. Tear in outer margin of pp. 269/270, just barely touching sidenotes; very occasional foxing; offsetting from leather of previous binding affecting first and last leaves at margins, including title-pages. Ex-library, with faint penciled notations on verso of title-page and at base of following page in each volume. Vol. I lacks the frontispiece portrait. Faults noted, still a good copy and in an attractive binding. (24526)
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Japan during theYears of Seclusion, for an American Audience Busk, Mary Margaret, & Philipp Franz von Siebold. Manners and customs of the Japanese, in the nineteenth century. From the accounts of recent Dutch residents in Japan, and from the German work of Dr. Ph. Fr. von Siebold. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1841. 12mo (15.7 cm, 6.2"). Add. engr. t.-p., [2], 298 pp.
Click the images for enlargements. Binding: Publisher's olive-brown vermiform embossed cloth of Krupp's style Mis1, spine with gilt-stamped series and individual title.
• American Imprints 41-3339; Cordier, Bibliotheca Japonica, 475–76. Binding as above, cocked and front board slightly warped, sides with light discolorations; spine faded and head with strip of dark cloth tape extending onto sides. Ex–social club library: 19th-century bookplate and call number on front pastedown, first three leaves pressure-stamped, no other markings. First half of volume with pages faintly waterstained in upper portions and cockled; a sound book and as good a “read” as it was for the club members. (26428)
Michener on
Japanese Woodblocks Michener, James A. Japanese prints from the early masters to the modern. Rutland, VT & Tokyo, Japan: Charles E. Tuttle Co., (copyright 1959). Folio (31.7 cm, 12.5"). 287, [1] pp.; plts., 6 fold.
• Publisher's textured taupe silk binding, front cover with patterned coral silk insert; spine with gilt-stamped title. Dust wrapper and original slipcase present, lower back corner of jacket slightly crumpled; otherwise a gorgeous, clean copy in an undamaged slipcase. (24683)
The
FIRST ENTIRELY
ENGRAVED Book
the
AMERICAS
Montes de Oca,
José. Vida de San
Felipe de Jesus protomartir de Japon y patron de
su patria Mexico. Mexico: Montes de Oca ... Calle del. Baustisterio de S. Catalina
m.e n.o 3, 1801. 4to (23 cm; 9"). [1] f., 28 [of 30] plts.
Click the interior images for enlargements. 
self-published this, the first entirely engraved book printed in the Americas. In a series of 30 plates with captions he told the biography of St. Philip of Jesus (1572–97), the protomartyr of Japan. 
Montes de Oca's plates are particularly detailed and moving when they show the saint in Japan being abused and tortured, but all are strong and striking.
Uncut.
• Palau 363045. Late 19th-century plain sheep binding. Uncut; lacking two plates and two with minor worming as noted above; all plates well impressed, as would be expected of a work that the artist himself saw through the press! A very good copy of a scarce and important work. (25095)
WORLD MYTHOLOGY — 8 Vols. & Thousands of Entries Pozzoli, Giovanni; Felice Romani; Antonio Peracchi, et al. Dizionario storico-mitologico di tutti i popoli del mondo. Livorno: Stamperia Vignozzi, 1824–28. 8 vols. 8vo (21 cm, 8.25"). I: 580 pp. II: 581–1163, [1] pp. (pp. 1057–64 repeated in place of pp. 1065–72). III: [1165]–1708 pp. (pagination 1551–52 repeated, 1687–88 skipped). IV: [1709]–2342 pp. V: 2351–3086 pp. (pagination skips 2519–26). VI: 3087–3855 pp. (pagination skips 3407–08). VII: 576 pp. VIII: 577–1074 pp.
Click the middle and right hand-images for enlargements. Japan,
China, etc, along with Jewish, Greek, and Roman antiquities. The foundation
of the work was François Noel's Dictionnaire de la Fable; copious
additions and corrections were made by Pozzoli, Romani (the famed poet, scholar,
and librettist for La Scala), and Peracchi (another librettist). The resulting
encyclopedic endeavor was originally published from 1809–27 under the
title Dizionario d'ogni mitologia e antichità incominciato, according
to Graesse and Brunet, who both give Pozzoli's first name as Girolamo.
This set includes two volumes of supplemental text, adding a number of entries. The first edition was followed by two volumes of supplemental plates, not present here and not called for: Graesse describes this edition as “sans grav.”
The pagination is erratic in a number of places; there is a numbering gap from 2342 to 2351 between vols. IV and V, but the text and signatures are uninterrupted.
Uncommon: OCLC locates only two U.S. institutional holdings of this second edition.
Provenance: Most volumes with small inked ownership inscription in an outer margin: “G.R.W.” the mark of William Rollinson Whittingham (1805–79), fourth Episcopal Bishop of Maryland and an enthusiastic book collector.
• Brunet, IV, 851; Graesse, V, 429. Not in Sabin. Contemporary half binding, recently rebacked with tan paper, spines with printed paper labels; boards rubbed and faded with small chips, one vol. with front cover waterstained. Foxing almost throughout, generally no worse than moderate; light waterstaining in upper margins of vol. I; one leaf in vol. VII with lower outer portion torn away, with loss of words from about 18 lines on each side. Vol. II with printer's error replacing pp. 1065–72 with duplicates of pp. 1057–64; pagination erratic in other places. Most vols. with ownership mark as above; vol. VI with one pencilled and one inked marginal annotation. (25862)
Delicate & DelightfulUnger, Mary E. The favorite flowers of Japan. Tokyo: Hasegawa, [1911]. 8vo (24.5 cm; 9.5"). [4] ff., 59, [4] pp. 
A wonderful example of early 20th-century Japanese book printing.
• Publisher’s paper over light boards; paper of spine flaked off with covers dusty and little discolored. A delicate book, priced according to its faults and still a nice object.
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