30 fine color paintings & 24 black ink drawings of various parts of the bamboo. 50 leaves. 4to (275 x 206 mm.), modern bright silk brocade wrappers, stitched as issued. [Probably Japan: late Edo].

A beautiful album of finely rendered drawings of bamboo, accompanied by explanatory text. There has been a long tradition in both China, since the eighth century, and Japan of illustrating bamboo, with much thought given to composition and the painting of the stems, knots, branches, and leaves. A number of treatises were written on the subject.

This handsomely painted manuscript contains many illustrations, all finely painted... More

Seven engraved plates (several folding). viii, 177 pp. Large 4to, early 19th-cent. half-calf & marbled boards (some scuffing), flat spine gilt, red morocco lettering piece on spine. London: Printed by W. Bulmer for G. Nicol et al., 1795.

First edition of the Board of Agriculture’s famous report on the potato. During the final four decades of the 18th century Britain experienced a number of corn harvest failures with a resulting rise in the price of wheat. The Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce, the Board of Agriculture, and various private individuals advocated the adoption of the potato... More

59 leaves, enumerating the names of grapes, cereal crops, and oils and their prices for nearly two centuries. Small folio (273 x 178 mm.), 18th-cent. vellum over boards (tail of spine defective), two (of four) ties lacking. Burgundy: 1622-1792.

A fascinating and rare survival, which details the precipitous rise in the prices of Burgundian wine and the emergence of a hierarchy among regions and vintages over a 170-year period. This document, consisting of three gatherings (28; 28; 3 leaves), bound together and written in several legible hands, provides a wealth of information on grain harvests in the region, which varied... More

One hand-colored engraved plate. xix, 51 pp. 8vo, attractive antique calf-backed marbled boards (some foxing), spine gilt, red morocco lettering piece on spine. London: C. Dilly & J. Phillips, 1787.

“Second edition” (but see below) of this translation of Commerell’s work on the mangel wurzel, an uncommon beet developed in the 18th century as a fodder crop for livestock and, when harvested young, an excellent source of nutrition for humans. Commerell (d. 1799), chaplain to the Princess of Lowenstein in the German Lorraine and a member of the Société d’Agriculture de Paris, was interested in husbandry and wrote a monograph... More

Seven folding engraved plates. 1 p.l., iv, [2], 103 pp. 8vo, cont. mottled sheep (head & foot of spine a little defective), spine gilt. Paris: Saugrain le jeune, 1770.

First edition in French of the great economist’s Della Perfetta conservazione del Grano. Discorso (Naples: 1754). Like the first edition, ours was published under the name of Bartolommeo Intieri (1676-1757), economist, engineer, and mathematician, who had furnished his friend Galiani with the ideas on methods to prevent grain from being contaminated by insects. Intieri proposed that grain be dried in a heated kiln. This process would dissipate bad odors, eliminate humidity... More

Three double-page woodcut illus. 12 folding leaves. 8vo, orig. wrappers embossed with bamboo motifs, orig. printed label (quite rubbed), orig. stitching. Kyōto: Kanaya yoshibe’e 金屋吉兵衛, 1832.

First edition of this book arguing for the use of bamboo grass (Sasa veitchii) as a food source. The book is rare, with only one copy in North America.

“In the spring of Tenpō 3 (1832), Sasa veitchii flowered and ripened in the area of Takayama in Hida [in today’s Gifu prefecture], yielding up to 250,000 koku. The author rejects the theory that the seeds of bamboo grass and bamboo are poisonous... More

Title within typographical border (shaved at foot). 2 p.l., 14 pp., one blank leaf. Small 4to, attractive antique panelled calf (some shaving to bottom line or catchwords on several pages), spine gilt, red morocco lettering piece on spine. London: Printed by J.C., 1651.

First edition. “The Reformed Husbandman…is sometimes attributed to Speed, although it was probably written by Cressy Dymock…It is a pamphlet of some 16 pages and full of moral reflections, a melodious exhortation to industry.”–Fussell, I, p. 45.

“The most visible impact of Hartlib’s circle lay in the numerous pamphlets that he published…They comprised letters and treatises solicited... More

177 leaves. 8vo (234 x 158 mm.), later wrappers. [Japan & China]: ca. 1925-26.

In the mid-1920s, a group of 28 students at the Agricultural School of the then-named Tokyo Imperial University, led by Prof. Takaishi Hajime 高石発, made a tour of northeastern China to study the state of agriculture. They departed from the port of Kobe and arrived at Tianjin. Thereafter, they visited Beijing, Dalian, Fushan, Mukden (today’s Shenyang), and finally Harbin before travelling by land through Korea to Japan. At that time, there was a considerable Japanese presence, both military and industrial, in this area of the country... More

199 finely lithographed plates (the plate “Irrigations, No. 6“ in Vol. I was not published). Lithographed title, 48 printed leaves of text including final leaf listing plates; one lithographed leaf of “Prospectus,” lithographed title, 45 leaves of text incl. final leaf listing plates. Two parts in one vol. Large 4to, cont. green half-sheep (joints very carefully repaired), spine gilt. Paris, “á l’Etabissement lithographique du Comte de Lasteyrie, Rue du Bac No. 58,” 1820-21.

First edition of one of the most extensive and important lithographic works published in the early days of the medium. Lasteyrie (1759-1849), agronomist, industrialist, and philanthropist, was... More

Woodcut vignette on title, one full-page woodcut, & several smaller woodcuts in the text. Black letter. 11 p.l., 88, [10] pp. Small 4to, late 18th cent. calf (upper joint cracked but strong, small paper flaw on blank outer margin of title, fore-edges faintly dampstained), spine lettered in gilt. London: J. Wight, 1575.

The third edition of the first English gardening manual; the first edition appeared in 1569 and all 16th-century printings are rather rare on the market. Mascall took most of his text from David Brossard’s Art et Manière de Semer et Faire Pépinières de Sauvageaux (Paris: 1552) with certain... More

39 folding leaves, using pre-printed paper. 8vo (260 x 183 mm.), orig. patterned blue wrappers, new stitching. [Japan]: Preface dated 1791 but this is a later copy, probably early Meiji.

A fine manuscript copy of the unpublished work by the doctor and botanist Senshun So (1758-1834), on the varieties of mushrooms found throughout Japan. So devotes much of the text to the medicinal uses mushrooms have. At the end, So discusses how to identify poisonous mushrooms and their antidotes.

So was responsible for the Seikei zusetsu [An Illustrated Book of Agricultural Things], the great agricultural and botanical work, issued in... More

Many full-page & double woodcut illus. Eight vols. 8vo, orig. blue patterned wrappers (somewhat discolored), orig. block-printed title labels on upper covers, new stitching. Osaka, Kyoto, Edo: Kawachiya Mohei et al., 1859.

First edition of a very scarce book, completed in 1844 but published 15 years later. This work is a summary of the author’s agricultural and technological writings over a 55-year period. Ōkura 大蔵 (1768-1856?), was one of the three most eminent agriculturalists of the Edo period. A reformer, he wrote more than 20 books on all aspects of agricultural improvement and technology; they were among the best of... More