Beschreibung:

BRY, Johann Theodor de (1561-1623) and Johann Israel de (d. 1611). Emblemata saecularia, mira et iucunda varietate saeculi huius mores ita exprimentia... Weltliche lustige neuwe Kunststck der jetzigen Welt lauff frbildende, mit artlichen... Reimen geziert, fasst dienstlich zu einem zierlichen Stamm und Wapenbchlein . Frankfurt: [for the authors], 1596. 4 o (175 x 136 mm). Letterpress title within engraved allegorical border incorporating 10 blank medallions and one medallion with a device, 19 text leaves with verse descriptions of the emblems in Latin, German, French and Dutch, 101 (of 102?) engraved plates by Johann Theodor de Bry about 16 after Pieter Brueghel the Elder, the remainder after Hieronymus Bosch Hans Bol Martin de Vos, and others, consisting of an introductory plate showing Minerva seated with blank shield, 50 numbered plates of emblems and 50 (of 51?) unnumbered plates of blank escutcheons (including repeats), all with decorative mounts, a few accompanied by equestrian figures, the emblem and escutcheon plates bound in to face each other. (Title-leaf cut down to engraved borders and mounted, marginal dampstaining to a few text leaves, one or two headlines shaved, some light marginal discoloration to plates.) Contemporary green-stained vellum over pasteboard, covers panelled with unidentified central gilt arms (chevron between 3 mullets with swan supporters and coronet above), repeated gilt monogram in compartments of spine, title lettered in second compartment, edges stained red (covers slightly bowed, joints and corners a bit rubbed, small crack along center of spine). Provenance : unidentified 17th-century ?Dutch or Flemish owner (binding); 18th-century ?initials Z C P and shelfmark on front pastedown. FIRST EDITION of the de Brys' second emblem book, in which the emblems are used as ornaments for Alba amicorum . The de Bry emblem books are the most famous representatives of this form of emblematic printed Stamm-und Wappenbcher , fashionable in Germany in the second half of the 16th century. Of Theodor de Bry's Emblemata nobilitati , the first of the series, published in 1592 and reprinted in 1593, only a handful of copies are known. The Emblemata saecularia , finely illustrated with engravings by Theodor de Bry's sons, was reprinted with additional engravings in 1611. The contents of recorded copies of the present edition seems to vary: some, like the present copy, are described as having an equal number of escutcheons and emblem plates, while others are described as containing 51 or 52 blank escutcheons: these totals may, however, include the Minerva plate, presumably intended for the owner's arms. RARE. No copies have appeared at auction since the Saks copy sold in these rooms in 1980; there are no copies in NUC; RLIN lists a single imperfect copy at the National Gallery; and there are no copies in the British Museum or the Bibliothque nationale. Adams B-2980 (56 plates only); Brunet I, 1309; Hollstein IV, 240-287 (conflating the editions of the Emblemata saecularia and the Emblemata nobilitate ); Landwehr German 154; Praz, Studies in Seventeenth-Century Imagery (1964), pp. 47-50 and 290. [ Bound with :] [BRUCK, Jacobus ]. Emblemata pro toga et sago . Nuremberg: widow and heirs of Paul Frst, [ca. 1690]. 4 o. Typographic title printed in red and black, 44 (of 45) unnumbered engraved plates of emblems, the Latin captions engraved beneath. (Occasional marginal foxing, foremargin of 4th plate extended). A selection of plates from Bruck's Emblemata Moralia & Bellica , 1615 (56 plates). Landwehr German 149; Praz, p. 287.