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230 - [BROCHURE BINDING – DUKE OF LORRAINE].
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Estimate €600 - €800
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Description
[BROCHURE BINDING – DUKE OF LORRAINE]. MAIOLE D’ASTE (Simon). *Les Jours caniculaires*, that is to say: twenty-three excellent discourses on natural and supernatural matters, embellished with examples and stories, both ancient and modern, sacred and secular, delivered by a theologian, a philosopher and a gentleman. Composed in Latin by Sir Simon Maiole d’Aft, Bishop of Valtourre, and comprising many other utterly marvellous things that occur in the air, at sea and on land, throughout Europe, Asia, Africa, and throughout all the newly discovered lands, along with everything remarkable that human ingenuity has ever devised. Translated into French by R. de Rosset. A rare first French edition, dated 1609, of this curious work featuring three symbolic characters. Paris, Robert Foüet, 1609. In-8, full red morocco, covers framed with gilt fillets and decorated at the four corners of each cover with the coat of arms of Charles Alexandre de Lorraine, gilt edges. Bound copy, 4 unnumbered folios. (title page and dedicatory epistle), 1,029 pages, 30 unnumbered folios (tables). Initial letters, headbands and footers engraved in black, 1 illustrated publisher’s vignette on the title page. Upper cap missing, small tears at the joints, joints rubbed, spine creased, minor stains and small wormholes on the covers. Title page restored, some foxing. First French edition, dated 1609. Two further volumes followed, published in 1610 and 1612. A rich encyclopaedia of nature, a compendium of all the knowledge and opinions on natural history of the time, devoting a substantial portion to the supernatural. This brilliant and outlandish compendium deals as much with meteors, birds and plants as it does with magic, dragons born of the mating of eagles and wolves, a woman who gave birth to 300 children ‘in a single labour’, the Devil, or even a tree that has stood alive in Memphis since the creation of the world. This vast exposition of knowledge and speculation takes the form of a dialogue between a philosopher, a theologian and a gentleman. Simon Maiole d’Ast was Bishop of Volturara in the Capitanata. He published the *Dierum canicularum* in Latin for the first time in Rome in 1597. Binding decorated with the coat of arms of Charles Alexandre of Lorraine (1712–1780), brother of the Holy Roman Emperor Francis I (O.H.R., plate no. 48). A charming vignette engraved by Léonard Gaultier on the title page. A fine copy, in a superb morocco binding bearing the coat of arms of the Dukes of Lorraine. (Brunet III, 1323; not listed in Caillet; Dorbon Aîné, ‘Bibliotheca esoterica’, no. 2856, p. 299, 1904). Provenance: from a member of the family or the library of the Dukes of Lorraine.
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About the sale Collectors’ books for sale – First editions – Illustrated editions – Varia IV
Auction location
Auction time 11/02/2026 at 2:00 PM
Pictures credits: Contact the Auction House
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