GROOTE (Alexander von). Lot n° 132

Neovallia dialogo (...), nel quale con nuova forma di fortificare piazze s'esclude il modo del fare fortezze alla regale, come quelle che sono di poco contrasto. Munich, Anna Berghin, 1617, infolio, [5] ff. n. ch. (engraved title-frontispiece, dedication to Duke Maximilian of Bavaria, bound poems), with 43 engraved plates (33 of them double-page), all previously stamped, fawn calf, ornate ribbed spine, double gilt fillet on the boards, edges speckled with red (period binding). Covers and corners trimmed, a lateral tear to a double plate, traces of moisture "in fine", but a good copy. Original edition of this unusual book, which was not translated into German until the following year. The object of the work is the suppression of the method of fortifying by bastions (metodo di fortificare alla reale), to which the author attributes the weak defensive capacity of the places. Jordan, 1515. Marini, p. 64. Cockle, 808. A copy of Leonor d'Estampes de Valençay (1589-1651), with abbatial iron pushed into the center of the plates (OHR 1663-3), which dates the possession to before 1620, when the young man was elevated to the see of Chartres, and thus took his episcopal arms. Overloaded with commendatory abbeys, he was then archbishop of Reims (1641 to his death). The work later passed into the library of Shirburn Castle, of the Earls of Macclesfield, with an ex-libris vignette pasted on the first endpapers.