Prev / Next

NAPOLI 2500: History of a city and its territory

Monday 29 September 2025, 03:00 PM • Rome

95 Cataloghi di libri

Consul Joseph Smith (Isolani, Giulio Cesare)

Bibliotheca Smithiana, seu Catalogus Librorum D. Josephi Smithii Angli per cognomina authorum dispositus, 1755

Estimate

€ 400 - 800

Sold

€ 490

The price includes buyer's premium

Do you have a similar item you would like to sell?

Information

Venice, Jo. Baptistae Pasquali, 1755. In 4°. Title page in red and black with Smith's bookplate engraved in copper and repeated in the beautiful engraved headpiece on fol. A1r, published with Addenda, & corrigenda in superior catalogo bibliothecæ Josephi Smith, woodcut decorations, light foxing, contemporary parchment binding, gold title on the spine, minor defects. § Porcelli, Giuseppe Maria, Catalogo de' libri italiani, latini e greci cui si aggiunto un catalogo de' libri francesi, ed Inglese, Naples, (Giuseppe Maria Porcelli), 1787. Restoration on the title page, light foxing, light water stain, later binding in half parchment and cardboard, manuscript title on the spine.

Specialist Notes

Work I: Third edition, but the first complete, of the famous catalog of the library of British Consul Joseph Smith (c. 1682–1770), a refined collector, patron of Canaletto, and financier of the Pasquali printing house in Venice. The work formed the foundation of the King's Library at the British Museum, now housed in the British Library. Of particular value is the extensive appendix, which reproduces the prefaces to all the incunabula in the collection.