Königstein (Taunus), October 2011. - In September of 1847, Brussels hosted a ‘Free Trade Congress’, then the equivalent of a WTO-conference. Even Karl Marx requested to speak, but the Congress closed before he got the floor. In his speech, Marx surprisingly advocated the free trade system, but only because it would hasten the social revolution. The first edition of this important speech, published in early 1848 at about the same time as the ‘Communist Manifesto’, is a great rarity. One of the few copies now extant will be auctioned in Königstein im Taunus, on the edge of the Frankfurt Rhine Main Region, in the course of this year’s Fall Auctions of Reiss & Sohn, which will be held from November 1st to 4th. More than 3.900 rare books, manuscripts, maps, views and decorative prints are offered for sale and listed in three richly illustrated catalogues. Marx’s pamphlet is estimated in the catalogue at € 2.500, but the free market will determine the price.

120 Books from Gutenberg’s Time - Natural History Estimated at € 250.000

This year, the auction house celebrates his 40th anniversary. On this occasion, Reiss & Sohn has published a special catalogue of about 160 exquisite objects, including more than 120 incunabula, predominantly from two European private collections. The oldest printed item offered in the catalogue is a vellum bifolium from the fourth printed book, Guillelmus Duranti’s ‘Rationale’, published by Johann Fust and Peter Schöffer in Mainz on October 6th, 1459 (estimate € 7.500). Other incunabula of importance include the first edition of Vegetius’ ‘De re militari’ from about 1473, the most influential treatise on Roman warfare and military principles (€ 40.000), and the beautiful ‘Schatzbehalter’ by the Franciscan preacher Stephan Fridolin, published in 1491 in Nuremberg by the greatest early German printer, Anton Koberger, and lavishly illustrated by Albrecht Dürer’s teacher Michael Wolgemut (€ 100.000). Koberger was also the publisher of Hartmann Schedel’s famous Nuremberg Chronicle of 1493 (€ 50.000). However, the most exceptional and valuable item of the Reiss auctions is without any doubt the first vernacular edition of  Pliny’s ‘Natural History’, an Italian translation, printed in 1476 in Venice. This unique copy was delicately illuminated for a member of the Venetian Zancaruolo family by a contemporary Italian artist, and splendidly bound by René Simier in dark-blue morocco (€ 250.000). Besides incunabula, the special catalogue contains a number of extraordinary manuscripts, including an early 15th century compilation of theological and legal texts in a magnificent ‘cuir-ciselé’ binding, a method in which the design is cut into the dampened leather (€ 120.000).
The two regular auction catalogues contain a lot of exceptional and valuable material, including several remarkable colour-plate books as Baron Nicolaus von Jacquin’s ‘Florae Austriacae’ (Vienna 1773), one of the greatest works on Austrian flora (€ 35.000), John Nash’s ‘Views of the Royal Pavilion’ (London 1826) with 31 splendid aquatints (€ 10.000) and Charles Bodmer’s famous illustrations of the ‘Old West’ issued 1839-1841 to illustrate in Prince Maximilian ‘Travels in the Interior of North America’ (€ 35.000) .
The geography section includes the adventurous travel account of the ‘German Robinson Crusoe’ Michael Heberer, illustrated with extremely rare maps of Cyprus and Malta and published in 1610 in Heidelberg (€ 30.000). Léon de Laborde’s ‘Voyage de l'Arabie Pétrée’ (Paris 1830) is a very important work, as Laborde was the first to be able to make plans, views and maps of the area (€ 15.000). About 20 albums with early photographs are offered for sale, including an impressive series of photos of Yosemite by Eadward Muybridge, known for his pioneering work in the use of sequence photography (€ 6.000).

Early Maps and Atlases - 80.000 Euros for a 440-Year-Old World Map

One of the highlights of the atlas section is Vincenzo Coronelli’s magnificent and extremely rare collection of globe gores from 1701, consisting of 123 plates to make up ten globes, terrestrial and celestial, ranging from 5 cm to 110 cm in diameter (€ 75.000). The map section, which contains about 1.900 items, includes Paolo Forlani’s extremely rare world map of 1570, finely decorated with ships and sea monsters (€ 80.000), and Antonio Lafreri’s equally rare broadsheet map from the same year to illustrate the course of the Christian armada from Crete to Cyprus, where they were going to confront the Turks (€ 30.000). A map of the island Terceira, dated 1582, marks the beginning of the collaboration between Abraham Ortelius and Luis Teixeira. The so far third copy known of this map is estimated at € 3.000. Nicolas de Fer’s grand wall map of France (c. 1 x 1.5 m), published by his son in law Bernard in 1722, marks a milestone in French cartography (€ 8.000). About 290 lots, including more than 170 from an important European private collection, refer to the Americas. The most important item may be a map of Mexico and the entire south western United States by one of the first native-born American publishers, Henry Schenck Tanner, published in 1825 and expected to raise € 18.000.

Richly illustrated catalogues for all sales are available on request. The complete catalogue with additional illustrations throughout in colour and a full text search engine is available on our website. For more information please contact:

Reiss & Sohn, Adelheidstraße 2, 61462 Königstein (Taunus), Germany, telephone +49(0)617492720, fax 06174-927249, reiss@reiss-sohn.de.