Rare Works by Schubert and Brahms Shine as Highlights of Books & Manuscripts Sale

Rare Works by Schubert and Brahms Shine as Highlights of Books & Manuscripts Sale

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  Four hand-coloured lithographs illustrating the original set designs for Bizet’s “Carmen”, 1875.
  Estimate £8,000-10,000.
  

  The four hand-coloured set designs for the original production of “Carmen", as hired by provincial opera houses. The original drawings are lost and these hand-coloured lithographs of them were, until relatively recently, completely unknown. Unlike costume designs, they were never produced for general sale, but had to be returned by opera houses to the publishers in Paris.
  

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  Jean d’Enghien, Le livre des croniques de Brabant, late fifteenth century.
  Estimate £30,000-50,000.
  

  A lavishly illustrated copy, one of only four surviving manuscripts of an unpublished text; this copy was begun for Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, and completed for his successor, Charles the Bold.

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  La Fontaine, Fables, Paris, 1755-1759, in a Derome binding.
  Estimate £40,000-60,000.
  

  A magnificent large paper copy in a splendid red morocco binding by Derome, with the binder’s ticket still present.
  

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  Zwingli, Autograph manuscript relating to the Berne Disputation, 1528.
  Estimate £10,000-15,000.
  

  A very rare autograph manuscript by Zwingli, relating to the Berne Disputation which was held in January 1525 and resulted in a triumph for Zwingli and his fellow Reformation supporters (Bucer, Oecolampadius and Capito also spoke during the Disputation). The outcome was the adoption of the Reformation by the Berne government, which used the conclusions of the Disputation as the basis of its confession of faith, subsequently published in 1528.

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  Brahms, Fine autograph manuscript of the song “Es liebt sich so lieblich im Lenze”, Op. 71 no. 1, signed and inscribed.
  Estimate £50,000-70,000.
  

  Brahms is one of the greatest nineteenth-century composers and complete autographs by him are rare at auction. This manuscript (from 1877) was always thought lost, as is the contemporary copy used for the first edition. Some of the words differ here from the published scores of this song.

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  Schrader, Monumentorum Italiae, 1592, in a red morocco binding for Nicolas Fabri de Peiresc.
  Estimate £6,000-8,000.
  

  A fine example of a binding made in Aix-en-Provence for Fabri de Peiresc’s substantial library, together with an autograph letter in Italian written by Peiresc in July 1626 to his friend, the scholar Girolamo Aleandro, one of Peiresc’s many correspondents.

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  King David, miniature by the Master of the Houghton Miniatures.
  Estimate £50,000-70,000.
  

  One of two exquisite paintings by the Master of the Houghton Miniatures in this sale, depicting, with astounding detail, King David kneeling in prayer in his garden beside his monumental palace; this composition was subsequently imitated by other illuminators for the next two generations.

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  Wagner, Autograph manuscript prose draft for the three-act opera “Wieland der Schmied” [WWV 82], signed and dated, 1850.
  Estimate £30,000-50,000.
  

  This is Richard Wagner's detailed scenario for an opera designed to enshrine his revolutionary "Music of the Future" in 1850. More than a mere synopsis, such manuscripts constitute draft librettos in prose form, describing the action and including a considerable amount of dialogue. Wagner made such prose drafts for all four operas of Der Ring des Nibelungen.
  

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  Witelo, Peri optikes, id est de natura, ratione, & proiectione radiorum visus, Nuremberg, 1535.
  Estimate £60,000-80,000.
  

  The first edition of Witelo’s monumental work on perspective, in a fine contemporary German binding. Witelo’s text greatly influenced both mathematicians and artists, until Kepler’s Ad Vitellionem paralipomena of 1604 both acknowledged Witelo’s influence in the subject and rewrote the science of optics.
  

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  Schubert, Autograph manuscript of the songs “Tischerlied”, D.274, and “Totenkranz für ein Kind”, D.275, 1815, regarded as “lost” in the Schubert Thematic Catalogue.
  Estimate £50,000-70,000.
  

  The autograph manuscript of two complete songs by Schubert, described in the catalogue raisonné of his works as 'lost'. Both Tischlerlied ('Carpenter's Song') and Totenkranz für ein Kind ('Wreath for a Dead Child') were products of Schubert's annus mirabilis, 1815, when the eighteen-year-old composer produced around one hundred and forty-five songs, all displaying his inexhaustible lyrical genius.
  

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