Early Printing & Manuscripts / Manuscripts & Documents

[THOMAS À BECKET]. [Diego Afonso de MIRANDA, translator]. Historea da vida e martyrio do glorioso Sancto Thomas Arcebispo, Senhor de Cantuaria, Primas de Inglaterra, legado perpetuo da sancta see apostolica, trelada da novamente de Latim em lingoagé Portugues.
(Colophon: Coimbra, João Alvarez, printer to the University, 12 November) 1554. 4to. With several woodcut decorated initials. With the 4 preliminary leaves in facsimile. 20th-century Portuguese tree calf, gold-tooled spine, red spine label, brown sprinkled edges, marbled endpapers. [8], “CCCI” [= 303], [1 blank], [20] pp. Full description

[ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPT - BOOK OF HOURS (DIOCESE OF UTRECHT)]. [Incipit a1r:] Wi aenbeden di christi en ghebendien di want du overmits dijn heilighe cruus die werlt verlosset hebste ...
[North-Holland (Haarlem?)], ca. 1450/70]. Small 8vo (ca. 11 x 8 x 3.5 cm). Manuscript book of hours in Dutch, written in black ink on vellum (leaf ca. 11 x 7.5 cm; text block ca. 7 x 4.5 cm) in two clear and attractive gothic hybrida hands (21 lines/page for the first hand, 18 lines/page for the second hand and 17 for the calendar). 18th-century half calf, brown sprinkled paper sides, gold-tooled spine, black morocco spine label with title ("Oud getydenboek M.S.S.") in gold, 18th-century endpapers. [240] ll. Full description

JOÃO I, King of Portugal. [Judgement in a legal suit, incipit:] Dom Johann ... Rey de Portugal ...
Coimbra, 3 April 1388. Document in Portuguese, written in brown ink on sheepskin parchment (23 x 44 cm) in an upright gothic cursive, with 16 full lines of text (plus one word on a 17th line and the signatures of the two judges). Full description

MAURITS, Prince of Orange. [Declaration for Jan de Roo].
[The Hague], 4 December 1589. 1mo (41 x 31.5). Document written in brown ink on one side of a whole sheet of paper in an upright gothic cursive hand, with the autograph signature "Maurice de Nassau" and with his armorial seal (3 x 2.5 cm) stamped on a slip of paper over red sealing wax. With (separately added) Maurits's signature clipped out of another document and mounted on a paper slip. [1] leaf, written on one side. Full description

[AUTOGRAPH]. MELANCHTHON, Philipp. [Autograph letter, signed, from Philipp Melanchthon to Sebastian Boetius].
[Wittenberg], Easter [14 April 1555]. Folio (19.5 x 32 cm). In Latin. [2] pp. Full description

[MINIATURE - GERMAN]. [The Arrest of Christ].
[Flanders (Bruges?), or Nürnberg, ca. 1520]. Miniature painted on vellum (7.8 x 5.6 cm) in numerous colours, highlighted with gold and in a gold border, probably from a book of hours, but with no text. Full description

[MANUSCRIPT]. PHILIP (FELIPE) II, King of Spain. [Mortgage agreement, granting Jan Hanneman, Steward General of North Holland, the rights to the tithes of the King's lands of Voorburg and Voorschoten].
The Hague and Brussels, 1557 (with additions to 1565). Folio (36 x 25.5 cm). Manuscript mortgage agreement, signed by King Philip's representatives, written in brown ink on parchment in a nearly upright cursive gothic hand. With a typescript transcription of the main text and an interlinear translation in Spanish. [2 blank], 9, [1 blank] pp. Full description

AL KHITAB AL-QAZWINI [Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-Rahman Khatib al-Dimashqi al-Qazwini]. Talkhis al-miftah.
[Tokat in eastern Turkey?, by the scribe Sharaf al-Samarqandi al-'Arabi, AH 733 or 738 = AD 1332/33 or 1337/38]. Arabic manuscript in naskh script in black ink on Persian paper, keywords in red, with 12 lines to the page. Copious notes in the margins.
19th-century blind-tooled brown morocco with a closing flap, decorated endpapers. With two loosely inserted Arabic manuscripts, each written in naskh script in black ink on both sides of a single leaf of paper, one ca. 17th-century (ca. 18 x 15.5 cm), folded and inserted before the front endleaf, and the other ca. 16th-century (ca. 11.5 x 7.5 cm), inserted between leaves 23 & 24. 70 ll. Full description