An educational and informational site about rare, old and antiquarian books.
The history of paper is well known to anyone dealing with manuscripts, books and other similar material. Paper was the preferred option in Europe due to its cost, which was lower than that of vellum, adopted earlier as the primary writing material. It quickly became known in Western Europe, having travelled from China through the […]
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The first book illustrated by Robert Crumb does not rank as high by his large group of followers, as some of his underground comic magazines. However, the controversial, American cartoonist and musician released his first book as well as the first issue of his first comic book around the same time. The year was 1967 […]
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…And the world’s most expensive book sale in the history of book trades goes to the Bay Psalm Book owned by the Old South Church. It sold for 33 million US dollars to the auction’s high bidder: the new owner of the rare first book to be printed in America, billionaire collector of biblical books, […]
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One of the greatest artifacts of American history, The Whole Booke of Psalmes, commonly known as the Bay Psalm Book, will be auctioned at 7pm on the 26th day of this month at Sotheby’s in New York. The 6-by-5-inch hymnal book’s estimated value was raised by 10 million dollars since the end of last year […]
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Controversy and censorship usually rally positive media support that results in more interest and favorable contribution towards a book’s demand. Publicity from censorship is quite easy to generate in a world where ideological agendas are backed by media organizations and special interests groups. Book censorship has been with us for quite some time and it […]
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Like many people do, I get to visit the local flea-market in Athens every weekend. The first thing I turn my attention to are the piles of books on large cloth sheets lying on the ground. Of course, some book sellers use benches, tables and so forth, but most of them prefer to use something […]
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If you had a choice between copies of the same book that either came with a provenance file or without one, which would you choose? The answer is a no brainer for the majority of we collectors. But what if the price was higher for the provenance file accompanied copy? How much more would you […]
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Unfortunately, sometimes book collectors get a taste of what is considered a bad purchasing experience. Often times they realize that the book that raised their pulse rate did not turn out as expected. Sometimes a book bought online may just not have been adequately described or the smell from fungi present in a book turned […]
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Beyond The Golden Age of Dutch cartography which produced some of the most spectacular Dutch sea charts, or “Pascaartes,” with cartographers Johannes Blaeu and Abraham Ortelius, and Dutch atlas publishers Gerard Mercator and Hondius & Janssonius , the 16th century brought the earliest map to depict America as separate from Asia. The northeast coast of […]
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