Abu Dhabi
Our catalogue, compiled for the Abu Dhabi International Book Fair, presents two selections of rare books and manuscripts: one of material relating to the Islamic and Arabic-speaking world, the other of highlights of western literature.
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ARABIAN NIGHTS; BURTON, Richard F. (trans.) The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night.London : 1897
The Library Edition, a most striking and handsome set of Burton's Arabian Nights, retaining the imposing box which has kept the set in lovely condition. "The Arabian Nights had been an important part of Burton's life for decades. In 1882 he began translating it in earnest. Although there were other translations of the Nights in English, Burton's was... Learn More£12,500.00Stock Code: 131161
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CERVANTES, Miguel de. El ingenioso hidalgo Don Quixote de la Mancha.Madrid : 1780
First printing of the celebrated Ibarra edition. Printed for La Real Academia Española (the Spanish Royal Academy) by Joaquín Ibarra y Marín, this edition was intended to be a supreme example of Spanish craftsmanship lavished on the nation's greatest literary work. This edition excels in beauty of type, design, paper, illustration and printing, as... Learn More£22,500.00Stock Code: 137798
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COLERIDGE, Samuel Taylor (trans.); GOETHE, Johann Wolfgang von. Faustus: from the German.London : 1821
First edition in English of Goethe's Faust, translated by Samuel Taylor Coleridge. When Faust, Part I first appeared in a finished form (1808) Coleridge expressed concern for the apparent immorality. Despite this, he briefly entertained a proposal in 1814 to translate the work, and returned to and completed the task in 1820-21. Coleridge denied that... Learn More£4,750.00Stock Code: 132612
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EINSTEIN, Albert. Signed photograph.1932
Signed by Einstein in ink below the image, "Albert Einstein, 1932". The photograph, showing Einstein in a pale pinstriped suit, wing collar, and plain necktie, was taken at a press conference on the occasion of Einstein's first visit to Caltech in Pasadena on 2 January 1931. Einstein wintered at Caltech in 1931, 1932, and 1933.
Provenance: from... Learn More£8,500.00Stock Code: 135297
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EUCLID. Elementa Geometriae.Venice : 1482
First edition of "the oldest mathematical textbook still in common use today" (PMM) and one of the earliest printed books with geometrical figures. The text is the standard late mediaeval recension of Johannes Campanus of Novara, based on the 12th-century translation from the Arabic of Adelard of Bath. The text is preceded by a dedicatory letter by... Learn More£150,000.00Stock Code: 136914
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GALILEI, Galileo. Difesa... Contro alle Calunnie & imposture di Baldessar Capra Milanese,Venice : 1607
Rare first edition of the second published work of this most famous of 17th-century scientists, in which Galileo glories in his defeat of Baldassar Capra, who had plagiarized his work. He also describes the applications of his compass, his first significant scientific invention.
Galileo's first published work, Le Operazioni del compasso geometrico... Learn More£175,000.00Stock Code: 138789
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GIBRAN, Kahlil. Twenty Drawings.New York : 1919
First edition, first printing, inscribed by Gibran on the front free endpaper, "To Margarrite Marguerite? Harrison Day, with kindest thoughts from Kahlil Gibran, 1923". The recipient has proved unidentifiable, though it is tempting to think her some relation of Gibran's early creative mentor the Boston photographer Fred Holland Day.
Twenty Drawings... Learn More£12,500.00Stock Code: 137819
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GILL, Eric. The Four Gospels of Lord Jesus Christ according to the Authorized Version of King James I.Waltham St Lawrence : 1931
Limited edition, number 454 of 500 copies on paper; 12 copies were also issued on vellum. "Conceived in the fruitful mind of Robert Gibbings, this is the Golden Cockerel book usually compared with the Doves Bible and the Kelmscott Chaucer. A flower among the best products of English romantic genius, it is also surely, thanks to its illustrator, Eric... Learn More£13,500.00Stock Code: 133103
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GOULD, John. A Century of Birds from the Himalaya Mountains.London : 1832
First edition of Gould's first book, the rare issue with the backgrounds coloured; in a letter to Lord Derby, Gould wrote "You will probably recollect that in my first work... neither the plants or sic Backgrounds were coloured; In order to render the Series of my Publications complete... I have had those parts coloured in the few copies I have left"... Learn More£32,500.00Stock Code: 134609
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HARRISON, John. The Principles of Mr. Harrison's Time-Keeper, with plates of the same.London : 1767
First edition of the primary account of the invention of the marine chronometer, which revolutionized the science of navigation. "There was no comparable advance in navigational aids until the development of radar in the twentieth century" (Norman).
In 1714, the Board of Longitude offered a substantial reward of 20,000 to anyone who could find... Learn More£100,000.00Stock Code: 138402
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HAWKING, Stephen. A Brief History of Time.London : 1989
First UK edition, later impression. The title page with a thumb print of Hawking, next to which his personal assistant has inscribed in blue ink, "Thumb print of, S. W. Hawking, witnessed by, Susan Masey."
One of the most important scientific works of the second half of the 20th century and a masterpiece of scientific popularisation, A Brief... Learn More£12,500.00Stock Code: 134236
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HORSBURGH, James. The India Directory, or, Directions for Sailing to and from the East Indies, China, Australia, and the Interjacent Ports of Africa and South America.London : 1841-43
An exceptionally well-preserved copy, presented here in an American naval officer's portable book box - as such remarkably uncommon - with the additional appeal of a series of original holograph coastal profiles. This is the fifth edition of this important publication, much enlarged in successive editions from the first of 1809-11, which was to become... Learn More£30,000.00Stock Code: 126537
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LEVAILLANT, François. Histoire naturelle des perroquets.Paris : 1801-05
First edition in the preferred folio format of this celebrated work, which stands in the front rank of ornithological books; a quarto version was issued at the same time. The very fine colour plates are by Jacques Barraband, "a superlative bird artist" (Buchanan, p. 97-8), which, apart from their undoubted beauty, display a scientific accuracy that... Learn More£125,000.00Stock Code: 137037
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LEWIS, C. S. Collection of autograph letters signed to the dedicatees of The Magician's Nephew.1963
A remarkable and rich archive of 29 autograph letters from C. S. Lewis to the Kilmer children, dedicatees of The Magician's Nephew. This highly desirable archive is the most extensive collection of letters by Lewis to have come to market in recent years.
The letters, three of which are unpublished, were written over nine years from 1954 to 1963.... Learn More£200,000.00Stock Code: 134030
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MUN, Thomas. England's Treasure by Forraign Trade.London : 1664
First edition of the bible of mercantilism and the first exposition of the theory of the balance of trade. "For those who want to read a single example of mercantilist writing, it is difficult to better Thomas Mun's England's Treasure by Forraign Trade, completed in 1628 and published posthumously in 1664. Adam Smith at any rate regarded it as perfectly... Learn More£95,000.00Stock Code: 134494
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NEWTON, Isaac. Opticks: or, A Treatise of the Reflexions, Refractions, Inflexions, and Colours of Light.London : 1704
First edition, first issue, without Newton's name on the title. Newton's Opticks expounds his corpuscular or emission theory of light, and first contains his important optical discoveries in collected form. It also prints two important mathematical treatises (omitted in later editions) describing his invention of the fluxional calculus, which are the... Learn More£85,000.00Stock Code: 137818
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NIJINSKY - BARBIER, Georges, & Francis de Miomandre. Dessins sur les danses de Vaslav Nijinsky.Paris : 1913
First edition, number 260 of 340 copies on wove paper, from an edition of 390. Barbier's first book was inspired by the impact of the Ballets Russes' first seasons in Paris, and of their phenomenal male lead in particular. "We have our despair, our sadness, our violated love and this thing, the most dread of all - the passing of the days between our... Learn More£5,000.00Stock Code: 136225
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PICASSO, Pablo - BALZAC, Honoré de. Le Chef-d'oeuvre inconnu.Paris : 1931
Limited edition, number 171 of 240 copies printed on Rives paper, from a total edition of 340 copies (of which 65 were printed on imperial japon and signed, and 35 for private distribution and numbered using roman numerals).
In 1926 Picasso was commissioned by the publisher Ambroise Vollard to do a series of illustrations for Balzac's novella... Learn More£25,000.00Stock Code: 136550
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RICARDO, David. On the Principles of Political Economy, and Taxation.London : 1817
First edition of Ricardo's fundamental contribution to the science of economics. Ricardo is credited with the first systematic and scientific approach to economics; his exact mathematical approach and careful deductive methods provided a model for future texts in the field. Ricardo's interest in political economy was aroused in 1799 by a chance reading... Learn More£28,500.00Stock Code: 130054
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SALVIN, Francis Henry, & William Brodrick. Falconry in the British Isles.London : 1855; revised in 1872
Author's heavily revised and expanded proof sheets in preparation for the second edition. Falconry in the British Isles by Francis Henry Salvin (1817-1904), with plates by William Brodrick (1814-1888), is the most important work on the subject produced during the nineteenth century, and an essential standard work. The first edition was published in... Learn More£45,000.00Stock Code: 137081
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SHAKESPEARE, William. Comedies, Histories and Tragedies.London : 1685
A notably tall and handsome copy of the Fourth Folio, the last of the 17th-century editions of Shakespeare's works, and the most grandly produced.
The 1623 first folio was edited by John Heminge (d. 1630) and Henry Condell (d. 1627), and seven plays were added by Philip Chetwin (d. 1680) for the third folio of 1663, of which only one, Pericles,... Learn More£185,000.00Stock Code: 133696
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SPYRI, Johanna. Heidi's Lehr- und Wander-Jahre.Gotha : 1880-81
First editions of both parts in the original German. Throughout the 1870s Johanna Spyri (1827-1901) published stories for adults and children based around her reminiscences of growing up in rural Switzerland. But huge success came with the publication of Heidi, the most important Swiss contribution to children's literature after the "Swiss Family Robinson"... Learn More£6,500.00Stock Code: 120814
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![Divân-ı Zâtî ("Diwan of Zati"); [together with:] Sawanih al-nawadir fi ma'rifat al-anasir ("Rare Thoughts about Knowledge of the Elements").](https://d3dzzbbvj9im7s.cloudfront.net/media/catalog/product/cache/ae0834d12b7cf129fc73bcc000ea526a/1/2/126850.jpg)
ZATI, Suleyman. Divân-ı Zâtî ("Diwan of Zati"); [together with:] Sawanih al-nawadir fi ma'rifat al-anasir ("Rare Thoughts about Knowledge of the Elements").Istanbul : 1841
First edition. Scarce, with only 11 locations on WorldCat. A lavishly produced copy the first edition of these works by Suleyman Zati, clearly specially produced for presentation, since the printers have deliberately omitted the opening title device and a new design has been hand painted in its place. The attractive binding bears the seal of the reigning... Learn More£3,500.00Stock Code: 126850
