All prints: BRY Johann Theodor and Johann Israel

DE BRY, Petits voyages, Part VI and XII – 1604, 1628

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First Latin edition of the sixth and twelfth parts of Voyages aux Indes orientales known as the Petits Voyages: 1) Part VI (1604), published by Johann Theodor and Johann Israel de Bry, with the series of 26 intaglio engraved plates (1603); 2) Part XII (1628), published by Wilhelm Fizzer, illustrated with 14 intaglio text-illustrations and 2 engraved and bound maps of the Mughal Empire and China. These two parts are bound in one folio volume (320 x 210 mm). Original vellum binding. Church 213 and 224.

Title-page of part VI and last leaf with text of part XII are missing, but the copy has all the plates, illustrations and maps. Part VI is fine and fresh. Some browning throughout Part XII, as usual in later parts of the Petits Voyages. See collations below.

Each part of the Collection dite des Grands et Petits Voyages, published between 1590 and 1634, is a separate book. Parts devoted to the Americas are usually called the Grands Voyages because they were published in large volumes, while parts dedicated to Africa and Asia were published in a smaller size and are called the Petits Voyages. The twelve parts of the Petits Voyages in the Latin edition were successively published between 1598 and 1628 : some parts were sometimes bound together in order to form a composite volume but complete sets of the first edition of the twelve parts are extremely rare.

The twelfth part of the Petits Voyages is the rarest one: 'Of all the parts of the Petits Voyages, this last part is the rarest and was published in only one edition; that is why it isn’t surprising thatit should be missing from many sets of both Grands and Petits .' (G.-F. Debure, op. cit. p. 186, our translation); 'The twelfth part in the Latin edition is the second rarest volume of the collection after the tenth part in the second edition.' (C. Brunet, op.cit. p. 1342, our translation).

References: G.-F. De Bure, Bibliographie instructive ou Traité de la Connaissance des Livres rares et singuliers (Histoire, tome I, 1768, n° 4230, pp. 67-187) ; A. G. Camus, Mémoires sur les collections de voyages des De Bry et de Thévenot, Paris, 1802, pp. 182-278 ; C. Brunet, Manuel du libraire et de l'amateur de livres (5e éd., Paris, 1860-1865, pp. 1310-1363).

Part VI: 2 blank pp.; title-page missing : [Sexta Pars Indiae Orientalis vera et historica descriptio auriferi regni Guineae ad Africam pertinentis… a Johanne Theodoro et Johanne Israel de Bry fratribus.- Francofurti ad Mœnum, ex officina Wolffgangi Richteri, MDCIV.] ; dedicatory epistle 4 pp. not numbered ; 2 blank pp. ; text 127 pp. (last verso blank) ; plates : title 2 pp. (verso blank) Icones seu Verae et vivae Repraesentationes… Francoforti Ex Officina Typographica Wolffgangi Richteri, Sumptibus Fratrum praedictorum. MDCIII ; 26 plates, each with half-page engraved illustration (133 x 188 mm to the platemark) and its commentary below ; 2 blank pp. without the Appendix Regni Congo which was first published in the second Latin edition. The second plate is mistakenly numbered III (this error isn’t mentioned by A. G. Camus, who informs us that in most copies, engravings in plates II and III are switched : in our copy, engravings in plates II and III are not switched and match the text printed below. As usual some plates are trimmed at the right sheet edge to the border-line or just into the subject. Fresh and fine condition. Very fine impression of the 26 plates.

Part XII: title 2 pp.: Historiarum Orientalis Indiae Tomus XII. In tres Libros sive Tractatus distributus… Francofurti, apud Wilhelmum Fizzerum Anglum, Bibliopolam, Anno MDCXXVIII.; dedicatory epistle 2 pp.; 2 double-page engraved maps of the Mughal Empire and China ; 206 pp. (2 pp. missing); (2) blank pages. 14 engraved text-illustrations : p. 26, 31, 91, 94, 95, 97, 130, 132, 134, 147, 152, 160, 163, 202. A. G. Camus mistakenly mentions an illustration p. 153: it is printed p. 160. The two maps are bound after the dedicatory epistle and before the text itself, as mentioned by G.-F. Debure (op. cit. p. 186) and not after p. 10 and 68 as in the copy described by A. G. Camus and again by Brunet. Some browning as usual in the later parts of the Petits Voyages ; some small tears : first page of the text, p. 26 bottom, in the margin of p. 49, at the bottom of p. 56; p. 201 is torn out; pp. 207-208 are missing.