Susanne Schulz-Falster Catalogue Fifteen

floral tooling to each corner, rebacked, corners a little worn; with early
ownership inscription of William Langton to front free endpaper, and
later armorial bookplate of ‘Birks’ to front pastedown.
First edition of a an interesting fencing manual arranged in the form of questions
and answers. Blackwell clearly sees the art of fencing not as a sport or
pastime, but as a vital part of the education of a gentleman. Fencing was lethal
combat, its ultimate aim was to kill. Blackwell assumed that any gentleman
was likely during the course of his life to challenge someone to a duel or
be challenged; and for that occasion it was imperative to be prepared.
Henry Blackwell was a professional Master of Defence from the late seventeenth
to the mid eighteenth century.
ESTC t14873; Thimm p. 31; OCLC lists copies at UCLA, Yale, Library of Congress,
University of Illinois, Metropolitan Museum, in addition to Göttingen and
three copies in the UK; a second edition was published in 1705, some copies of
which have a suite of engravings in addition to the woodcut illustrations.
Viennese Collections
10 BÖCKH, Franz Heinrich ed. Wiens lebende Schriftsteller,
Künstler, und Dilettanten im Kunstfache. Dann Bücher, Kunst- und
Naturschätze und andere Sehenswürdigkeiten dieser Haupt- und
Residenz-Stadt. Ein Handbuch für Einheimische und Fremde.
Vienna, B. P. Bauer, 1822. £1,250
12mo, pp. xii, 551, [1] advertisements, and one engraved plate after p.
432; some light spotting and browning, with faint ink stain to lower
margin of p. 49, and some very light dampstaining to gutter margin of
signatures 9 and 10; uncut in contemporary marbled wrappers, printed
spine label; spine rounded and corners worn.
Comprehensive cultural handbook for Vienna divided into four sections,
covering in turn literature, fine arts, music, and the art trade. The first chapter
records all living authors, with their subject specialisations and addresses,
followed by libraries – both institutional and private – including information
on the Harrach Library or the Schönborn-Buchain and Schwarzenberg
collections. An extensive chapter is devoted to mineralogical, natural history
and scientific instrument collections, with comprehensive details of
holdings (sometimes of provenance) and access.
The second part deals with fine art, covering artists of all categories, collections
of paintings, engravings, objects and statues. Followed by a chapter
on music with listings of musicians, composers, instrument makers and
collections of musical instruments.
The final section gives useful information on the art and artisan trade,
including booksellers, both modern and antiquarian, art dealers, piano
makers, paper and ink manufacturers, bookbinders, lending libraries, scientific
and musical instrument makers etc. – each with their addresses and
specialisation.
catalogue fifteen