Asia - Gift Ideas

First edition of the French translation, illustrated with a portrait frontispiece and a folding map of Beloutchistan and Sindhy, together with parts of Kotch, Sedjistan, Khorasan, and Persia (cf. Quérard VII, 300).

Traces of removed bookplates on the pastedowns.

Half blond sheepskin bindings, smooth spines decorated with gilt fillets and garlands, title and volume labels in fawn sheep, upper cap of the second volume lacking, small loss to the upper cap of the first volume, traces of rubbing to the spines, corners in green vellum, marbled paper boards, sprinkled edges, contemporary bindings.

Rare first edition.

Spine and boards slightly sunned along the margins.

Dated and signed autograph inscription from C. Martin Saint-Léon to Baron Hulot, Secretary General of the Société de Géographie, on the front free endpaper.

The character and spirit of the Vietnamese as seen from a French perspective.

First edition, only two copies listed in the CCF (Archives nationales, Arras).

Spine split with some losses. 

Complete with the two successive reports (1 February 1862; 6 June 1863).

First edition.

Half blue shagreen, spine with four raised bands decorated with gilt floral tools within blind-ruled compartments, blind fillet borders on indigo percaline boards, boards with marginal soiling at foot, brown paper endleaves and pastedowns, modern bookplate affixed to a pastedown, contemporary binding.

Some scattered foxing, a black ink stain on the edge not affecting the text.

First complete edition, constituting vol. 15 of the Archives d'études orientales published by J.-A. Lundell (9 copies recorded in the CCFr, including 1 in Lyon and 8 in Paris).

The work was originally a doctoral thesis defended in 1915, later expanded with supplements issued up until 1926.

Publisher’s binding in half blue cloth, smooth spine with minor rubbing, silver lettering on the spine, brown paper-covered boards, Chinese red ink stamps on the title and half-title leaves, corners bumped.

Some small angular paper losses on pp. 241, 243, and 707, without loss of text.

New edition illustrated with numerous engravings in the text: plants, animals, musical scores, geometrical figures, electrical devices, assorted objects, etc.

The table on p. 1323 presents the periodic classification of the elements; the figure on p. 1483 illustrates the path of light rays passing through lenses.

Publisher’s binding in half black percaline, spine titled in Chinese characters, sand-coloured boards slightly soiled at the margins, corners rubbed, endpapers partially toned.

The Cihai, or "Sea of Words," is a Chinese encyclopedic dictionary, work on which began in 1915 and which was first published in 1936.

Fourth edition of the French translation (cf. Cordier, Sinica, 1696).

Bilingual Chinese-French text. With a loose leaf of Corrigenda (1 p. in-12). Shanghai, Catholic Mission Press, T'ou-Sè-Wè Orphanage, 1906.

Half purple percaline binding with corners, smooth spine decorated with double gilt fillets, black cloth boards, minor superficial scratches to the covers, sprinkled edges, contemporary binding.

The first French edition appeared in 1887: it was an adaptation of a conversation guide intended for Japanese students of Chinese in Peking.

Its success lay in its practical nature, which led to further editions in 1893, 1901, 1906, and 1919.

The present edition comprises 4 parts: 1. Essential conversation formulas. – 2. Mandarins and merchants discussing business. – 3. The usual style of commands. – 4. Dialogues between mandarins. The Jesuit Henri Boucher (1857-1939), the translator, was successively a missionary in Kiang-Nan and in Japan.

Modern manuscript ex-libris "Jean-Marien Blondet" at the head of a flyleaf.

First edition published in book form, expanded with the French translation established by G. Pauthier. (cf. Cordier, "Sinica", 1399-1340.)

A portion of the work had first appeared in 1832 in the "Revue Encyclopédique" of May–June, and was also issued separately in a 23-page printing.

The text is presented in French with a Latin version and the Chinese text facing.

The Chinese characters were produced using movable types engraved on steel punches and cast by Marcellin-Legrand, engraver to the Royal Printing Office.

A small angular loss at the foot of the lower cover required a minor restoration on the last page of the volume; slight, inconsequential tears at head and tail of spine.

Very rare collection comprising offprints of original editions of articles and reviews first published in the Journal des savants or the Bulletin de l'École française d'Extrême-Orient.

Bradel binding in green bottle cloth-backed boards, flat spine decorated with a central gilt ornament and double gilt fillet at foot, red morocco title label, marbled paper boards, some original wrappers preserved, modern binding signed Boichot.

Most of the fascicles are by the Indologist Auguste Barth (1834–1916), one of the founders of the École française d'Extrême-Orient, and the originator of Indochinese epigraphy through his studies of Sanskrit inscriptions in Cambodia. He was also a specialist in Indian religions.

The collection includes the following items:

I. Die Religion des Veda, von Hermann Oldenberg. Berlin, Wilhelm Hertz, 1894 (September 1896, 55 pp.).

II. Le pèlerin chinois I-Tsing. Edouard Chavannes: Voyages des pèlerins bouddhistes (...). Paris, Ernest Leroux, 1894 (November 1898, 52 pp.).

III. Le Mahavastu, Sanskrit text published for the first time with introductions and commentary, by E. Senart. 1882–1897 (October 1899, 41 pp.).

IV. Grundriss der indo-arischen Philologie und Altertumskunde, edited by Georg Bühler. Strasbourg, Karl-J. Trübner, 12 fascicles published from 1896 to 1899 (September 1900, 82 pp.).

V. Le Cambodge. Le Royaume actuel, by Etienne Aymonier, Paris, Ernest Leroux, 1900 (August 1901, 17 pp.).

VI. Kaccayana's Pali Grammar, by Satis Chandra Acharya Vidyabhusana, London and Calcutta, 1901 (October 1902, 16 pp.).

VII. Lunet de Lajonquière, Inventaire descriptif des monuments du Cambodge, Paris, Imprimerie nationale, E. Leroux éditeur, 1902 (July 1903, 4 pp.).

VIII. On the Origin and Diffusion of Fables. Francesco Ribezzo: Nuovi studi sulla origine e la propagazione delle favole indo-elleniche comunemente dette esopiche. Napoli, Francesco Giannini, 1901 (January 1904, 29 pp.).

IX. L'École française d'Extrême-Orient (Hanoi, Imprimerie F.-H. Schneider, n.d. [1900], 11 pp.).

X. Stele of Vat Phou, near Bassac (Laos) (1902, 2 unnumbered ff., 6 pp., one folding plate).

XI. The Doublets of the Stele of Say-Fong. Letter to the Director of the École française d'Extrême-Orient (1903, 7 pp.).

XII. FOUCHER (Alfred): Report to the Governor-General of Indochina on the work of the École française d'Extrême-Orient during the year 1901 (1902, 10 pp.). – XIII. LEVI (Sylvain): Chinese Notes on India (1902, 2 unnumbered ff., 10 pp.).

XIV and XV. FINOT (Louis): Notes on Epigraphy (n.d. [1902], and 1903, 36 pp., one unnumbered leaf of errata and 4 photogravure plates).

XVI. SPECHT (Edouard): On the Deciphering of Sindo-Ephthalite Coins (Paris, Imprimerie Nationale, 1901, 43 pp.).

Most of the pamphlets bear a signed presentation inscription from the authors to Father Boyer.

First edition of each volume.

No copy of this series listed in the CCF.

Contemporary bindings in quarter bottle-green or black sheep, flat spines decorated with double gilt fillets, marbled paper boards, endpapers and pastedowns of combed or tub-marbled paper; the first volume bound at the time of publication.

Some rubbing to the headcaps of the first two volumes.

 I. Minutes of the twenty-sixth [- thirty-ninth] meeting, 18 January 1932 [26 October 1932]: 6 pp., 7 pp., 9 pp., 11 pp., 5 pp., 3 pp., 3 pp., 4 pp., 2 pp., 6 pp., 9 pp., 4 pp., 3 pp., 4 pp. II. Minutes of the fortieth [forty-eighth] meeting, 7 February 1933 [21 December 1933]: 8 pp., 4 pp., 4 pp., 6 pp., 11 pp., 4 pp., 3 pp., 4 pp., 4 pp. III. Minutes of the forty-ninth [eighty-sixth] meeting, 18 January 1934 [23 December 1935]: 4 pp., 6 pp., 8 pp., 4 pp., 4 pp., 5 pp., 6 pp., 11 pp., 6 pp., 2 pp., 5 pp., 4 pp., 7 pp., 8 pp., 3 pp., 4 pp., 7 pp., 2 pp., 6 pp., 5 pp., 27 pp., 12 pp., 5 pp., 7 pp., 8 pp., 11 pp., 6 pp., 6 pp., 5 pp., 9 pp., 8 pp., 6 pp., 8 pp., 2 pp., 2 pp., 4 pp., 3 pp., 8 pp. IV. Minutes of the eighty-seventh [one hundred fourteenth] meeting, 7 January 1936 [29 December 1936]: 4 pp., 4 pp., 3 pp., 7 pp., 5 pp., 4 pp., 4 pp., 3 pp., 10 pp., 6 pp., 3 pp., 2 pp., 6 pp., 5 pp., 2 pp., 2 pp., 3 pp., 5 pp., 5 pp., 5 pp., 2 pp., 4 pp., 4 pp., 2 pp., 4 pp., 4 pp., 3 pp., 2 pp.

First edition, without volumes III to V, which were published posthumously in 1957.

Volume I: Energy (points, meridians, circulation), illustrated with 100 plates, including 44 in two colors.

Volume II: The use of energy, with 17 illustrations.

The diplomat and sinologist George Soulié de Morant (1878–1955) introduced the practical application of acupuncture to France in 1929, overcoming considerable resistance from the academic establishment.

Endpapers slightly and marginally soiled; two repaired tears to the head and foot of the spine of the second volume; otherwise, a pleasing set.

Copy from the library of Maurice Peyrache, with his ink stamps on the endpapers.

Very rare original edition illustrated with 2 folding maps out of text.

Two small losses at the head and foot of the spine, otherwise an agreeable interior condition.

The work was composed with the collaboration of Dr. Mougeot.

First edition, printed in 500 numbered copies on Arches wove paper, adorned with 48 black illustrations within the text and 32 full-page plates after drawings by Iacovleff, printed in bistre and black. A superb album, produced under the direction of Jacques de Brunhoff with the collaboration of Sergueï Grigorievitch Elisseeff (1889–1975).

In 1917, the Russian painter Aleksander Evgenevitch Iacovleff (1887–1938) spent six months on the Japanese island of Izu Ōshima, following a stay in China. He would never return to Russia, where the Soviets seized power that same year, but emigrated to France, where he would pursue the rest of his career. He became the official painter of the Croisière Noire and later the Croisière Jaune. His fascination with the Far East inspired several illustrated albums, including Dessins et peintures d’Extrême-Orient (1920), Le Théâtre chinois (1922), and finally, the present work.

Minor losses at head and foot of spine, restored tear to head of spine, small tears and stains to lower board, final endpaper slightly and partially toned with some marginal foxing; a well-preserved copy overall.

First edition, printed in very limited numbers, of this offprint from the Revue archéologique, illustrated with 12 textual figures and 3 plates; only two copies listed in the CCF (Quai d'Orsay and Strasbourg).

Contemporary Bradel binding in olive green cloth-backed marbled boards, smooth spine with red morocco title label, original wrappers bound in.

Christophe-Edouard Mauss (1829–1914), architect to the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, was entrusted with several archaeological missions in the East (Thessaloniki, Smyrna, Alexandria), and was later sent by the French government to Jerusalem (1862–1874) to oversee the restoration of the Church of Saint Anne. He also developed a keen interest in ancient metrology, to which he devoted several monographs.

Bound at the end, three additional works by the same author:

• I. Note pour faire suite au tracé du plan de la Mosquée d'Omar, published June–July 1888. Paris, Ernest Leroux, 1889, 6 pp.
• II. Note sur une ancienne chapelle contiguë à la grand'salle des Patriarches et à la rotonde du Saint-Sépulcre à Jérusalem. Paris, Ernest Leroux, 1890, 23 pp., 12 textual illustrations.
• III. L'Église de Saint-Jérémie à Abou-Gosch (Emmaüs of Saint Luke and Castellum of Vespasian), with a study on the stadium in the time of Saint Luke and Flavius Josephus. Paris, Ernest Leroux, 1892, 54 pp., then pp. 55–106, 25 textual figures.
• The first two works bear signed autograph inscriptions from Christophe-Edouard Mauss to the archaeologist Alban-Emmanuel Guillaume-Rey (1837–1916, also known as Guillaume Rey or Emmanuel Rey, though the correct surname is Guillaume-Rey).
• His many travels in Syria made him a most suitable interlocutor for such scholarly exchanges.

Very rare first edition of the earliest French–Annamite vocabulary (see Cordier, Indosinica IV, 2287–2288).

Contemporary modest binding in brown half sheepskin, flat spine lacking at foot, partially covered with a handwritten label—partially torn—bearing the author's name and title; marbled paper-covered boards, pink endpapers.

Scuffing; boards and endpapers renewed.

On the origins of printing in Bangkok (1839), see Michael Winship, "L’imprimerie thaïlandaise : des origines à 1851," in: Le livre et l’imprimerie en Extrême-Orient et en Asie du Sud, 1986, pp. 265–280.

A wide-margined copy enriched with numerous early handwritten annotations in black and purple ink, and pencil.

First edition of the French translation, illustrated with two folding plates hors texte.

This is an abridged translation (unusually, this is stated) of the major work Reise durch Sibirien, published in Göttingen in 1751–1752 in four quarto volumes richly illustrated. It recounts a major scientific expedition to Siberia that took place from July 1733 to February 1743. Johann Georg Gmelin (1709–1755) held the chair of chemistry and natural history at the Saint Petersburg Academy of Sciences.

Despite the erratic pagination of the second volume, the set is complete.

Contemporary full marbled tan calf, flat spines decorated with gilt compartments, red morocco title and volume labels, gilt rolls at head and tail, marbled endpapers and pastedowns, gilt fillets on board edges, marbled edges, corners somewhat rubbed.

Some light foxing.

Armorial bookplates from the 18th century, with the handwritten note “Longeville.”

First edition of this continuation of the series Lettres édifiantes et curieuses, documenting events from 1767 onward in the missions led by the Society of Foreign Missions of Paris (M.E.P.) in Sichuan, Tonkin, Cochinchina, Siam, and along the Coromandel Coast. (cf. Cordier, Sinica, II, 953–957; Cordier, Indosinica, III, 1970–1978; Sabin 40704.)

Contemporary full speckled tan calf, smooth spines richly decorated with gilt garlands, fillets and floral tools, red morocco labels for title and volume number, gilt roll tooling at headcaps, marbled paper boards, marbled endpapers and pastedowns, single gilt fillet on board edges, yellow edges.

Spines slightly sunned, headcaps trimmed, some rubbing to spines and boards with occasional paper loss, bumped corners, occasional light spotting, internally a very good copy.

Rare first edition, complete with its 17 plates, including 2 maps, 2 colored facsimiles of Japanese view and plan (view of Yedo, plan of Nagasaki), and 13 colored facsimiles of natural history drawings. (See Cordier, Japonica, 549 and Sinica, 2128. Numa Broc, Asie, 89-90.)

Some minor foxing, a faint dampstain on the final leaves, small restorations to the verso of the facsimiles.

Contemporary half green shagreen, spine slightly faded, with raised bands framed by gilt fillets, double gilt compartments with decorative tools, boards framed with a blind-stamped fillet, marbled paper boards slightly soiled, combed endpapers and pastedowns, painted edges.

A career diplomat, Charles de Chassiron (1818–1871) was part of Baron Gros’s diplomatic mission to Japan in 1858. He boarded the corvette *Laplace* with the other members of the mission in Shanghai on September 6, 1858, arrived at Shimoda on the 14th at 10 a.m., left during the night of September 19, landed in Edo (Tokyo) on the 26th, stayed until October 12, and departed the country from Nagasaki on October 22.

Chassiron’s *Notes* are a nearly verbatim transcription of the journal he kept during his stay; the appendix contains the text of the Franco-Japanese treaty signed on October 9. His travel journal thus represents an important milestone in the history of Franco-Japanese relations. His entries concerning Edo are particularly valuable for their care, precision, and integrity. Throughout Chassiron’s text runs a tension between the anxious caution of a disoriented diplomat and the observations of a traveler fascinated by Japan’s social order and industrial arts. The French, more perplexed than the British before Japanese reality, nonetheless allowed themselves to be charmed by it, bringing back the image of a feudal Japan rooted in espionage, and that of an artistic Japan. (Cf. Numa Broc.)

Collected edition, bringing together in a single volume the Grammar of the Annamite Language, first published in 1864, and the Vocabulary, issued as early as 1861. (cf. Cordier, Indosinica IV, 2297.)

Spine restored, with minor losses at head and foot; some occasional foxing within.

A naval officer and Orientalist, frigate captain Gabriel Aubaret (1825–1894) served as the first French consul in Bangkok in 1863. His true mission, however, was to negotiate with the imperial court of Hué for the cession of the provinces of Cochinchina to France. On June 21, 1864, Aubaret signed in Hué a new treaty aligned with the terms desired by the court of Annam. The three eastern provinces were returned to the court of Hué in exchange for a French protectorate over all six provinces of Cochinchina. While the Emperor’s suzerainty was upheld in the treaty, a specific clause stated that this did not imply vassalage.

First edition, illustrated with a frontispiece portrait of the Emperor of Annam.

Modern binding in full flexible boards, covers in cat's-eye patterned paper, smooth black cloth spine without title, original wrappers preserved in poor condition and laid down.

Désiré Lacroix was a naval artillery captain.

Pleasant and scarce copy, lacking the atlas containing 40 plates.

First edition illustrated with 39 aquatint engravings, 37 of which are hand-colored (cf Atabey, 624. Hage-Chahine, 2388.)

Finely engraved and colored, the illustrations evoke the design of Persian miniatures: portraits (Fath Ali Shah, Abbas I, Nadir Shah), figures in costumes (Persian women, slave and eunuch from the harem, Persian rider…), views and ancient monuments (Tehran, ruins of Persepolis), scenes of daily life (Persian meal, village entertainments, writing master and his pupil, Persians in prayer…), musical instruments, etc.

Half dark green shagreen bindings, smooth spine decorated with double gilt fillets, gilt friezes on the head and tail, cat’s-eye paper boards with some marginal wear, endpapers and pastedowns made of handmade paper, speckled edges, slightly later bindings.

Some foxing, frontispiece of volume 4 restored, detached ex-libris mark on the pastedown of the first volume.

The orientalist Amable Louis Marie Michel Bréchillet-Jourdain, known as Jourdain (1788-1818), was a student of Sylvestre de Sacy before becoming assistant secretary at the School of Oriental Languages. He studied Persian and Arabic and was a secretary at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Rare copy.

First edition of the French translation, illustrated with a lithographed frontispiece portrait, six engraved plates by Ambroise Tardieu, and a large folding map, all outside the text (cf. Schwab, p.48, no. 360).

Some foxing, mainly affecting the beginnings and ends of the volumes, otherwise a handsome and attractively bound copy.

Contemporary binding in half aubergine shagreen, spines slightly faded, with five raised bands, decorated with black fillets and gilt floral tools, gilt dates at foot, marbled paper-covered boards, comb-marbled endpapers and pastedowns, marbled edges, a few surface abrasions.

The original edition, A History of Persia, was first published in 1815.

A major work on Persia, in which the author "carefully consulted all European authors of note who had written on the history and literature of Eastern peoples", and gathered information from various specialists and diplomats.

A Scotsman in the service of the East India Company, John Malcolm (1769–1833) personally led two missions to Persia, assisted by capable officers such as Captains Grant and Christie, Lieutenant Pottinger, Major Pasley, Captains Frédéric and Josias Stewart, John Briggs, John M'Donald Kinnier, Messrs. Henry Ellis, Andrew Jukes, and others.

First edition, one of 50 copies printed on pur fil du Marais, the only deluxe copies along with a few not-for-sale copies.
A handsome copy.

First edition, illustrated with 3 hors-texte plates (cf. Rodrigues 1357. Borba de Moraes I, 381. See INED 2496 for the 1774 edition).

The plates depict: Brama, god of the Indians – View of a pagoda tower – Snake charmer.

Contemporary-style binding in marbled tawny calf over vellum-tipped corners, spine with five raised bands, ruled in gilt, brown calf lettering-piece, marbled paper-covered boards, red sprinkled edges, modern binding.

Coromandel Coast, European trading posts, military strongholds, Indian religion, medicine, anatomy, caste system, Indian manners, dress, dwellings, gardens, food (and temperance), wedding rituals, funerals, Indian morals, fauna, flora, etc.

Pages 3 to 21 are devoted to Brazil. The author made a stop at Bourbon Island (pp. 25 to 27).

Provenance: from the Breitenbauch library, with its armorial bookplate pasted on the endpaper.

A pleasing copy.

New edition, intended as a supplement to the various collections of *Lettres édifiantes* (see Backer & Sommervogel II, 1075; Cordier, Japonica, 424).

Some foxing, minor scuffs, and small paper flaws on the boards.

Contemporary half grey calf bindings, flat spines decorated with blind-stamped romantic arabesques and gilt fillets, gilt decorative rolls at foot, small green vellum tips, boards covered with geometric-patterned paper, marbled endpapers and pastedowns, marbled edges; romantic period bindings.

First reissue of the *Histoire de l'établissement, des progrès et de la décadence du christianisme dans l'Empire du Japon*, originally published in 1715 in three 12mo volumes. The Louvain edition (1828–1829) is a later Belgian counterfeit, published after our edition.

This was the first work by the Jesuit Pierre-François-Xavier de Charlevoix (1682–1761), compiled from existing sources (notably Crasset and Daniele Bartoli) before his own travels in North America. It should not be confused with his *Histoire et description générale du Japon* (1736, 2 vols. 4to).

A handsome copy in contemporary romantic binding.

First edition in French, one of 1,000 numbered copies on Annonay rag paper, the only deluxe paper copies.

Illustrated with numerous photographs. Preface by Maurice Herzog. Foreword by the Duke of Edinburgh.

Publisher’s full flexible boards binding. Lacking slipcase, spine sunned with minor tears at head and foot.

Rare and handsome autograph inscription, dated and signed by General John Hunt: "A M. Robert Moch vous témoignant notre reconnaissance de nous avoir préparé la trace jusqu'au sommet du signal de l'Iséran le 3 janvier - et pour vous exprimer nos regrets de ne pas l'avoir suivie ! John Hunt 7/1/54."

This copy is further enhanced with the handwritten signature of Edmund Hillary beneath the inscription.