Hold this leaf to the light and you are holding a page from the book that put people on the rack. Martín Antonio Del Rio's Disquisitionum magicarum libri sex was first printed in 1599, and for the better part of a century it sat on the desks of inquisitors and judges as the working manual of the witch trials, spoken of in the same breath as the Malleus Maleficarum. Del Rio (1551–1608), a Jesuit theologian born in Antwerp and an adviser to the Council of Troubles, the tribunal so feared in the Low Countries that it was nicknamed the "Tribunal of Blood," poured into these six books a lifetime of humanist reading and an unbending orthodoxy. He set out to refute superstition, and in the process he cataloged it: sabbaths, spells, charms, pacts, divination, astrology, necromancy, and the slippery middle ground of what the learned called "natural magic." It became, almost against its own intentions, a compendium of everything the educated world feared and could not stop writing down.
The Latin runs dense and unbroken, an inquisitor's argument built citation by citation, and it sits inside the edition's characteristic double woodcut rule border with running heads that name the book, question, and section. This is a text from the machine itself, the plain working prose of a book that shaped how a whole continent thought about magic, printed small enough to have once traveled in a saddlebag.
This is an uncommon and affordable way to own an original leaf of one of the most notorious and learned handbooks of demonology ever printed, at a small fraction of the cost of a complete antiquarian volume, which we are finding is more and more seldom in commerce intact and is now largely held in institutions.
DELRÍO, Martín Antonio (1551–1608). Disquisitionum magicarum libri sex, in tres tomos partiti. [Ursel]: Prodit ex Archiepiscopatus Moguntinensis officina Ursellana, impensis Iacobi König, 1606. Later (revised) edition; Tomus unus of three, here dispersed as individual leaves.
Physical Description: A single original printed leaf, Latin text in roman and italic types with occasional Greek, each page enclosed within a double woodcut rule border and headed with running titles (e.g. Disquisitionum Magicarum; Libri II. Q. XXVII. Sect. II). Approx. 7 x 4.5 in. / 17.5 x 11 cm.
Binding: None; issued as a disbound single leaf.
Condition: Age-toning, scattered foxing and light soiling, deckle and untrimmed edges; some leaves with edge wear, chipping, or short tears consistent with a volume that did not survive intact (see note below). Text clear and legible. Sold individually; each leaf will vary and is chosen from the plainer pages of the volume. Additional shipping and handling charges apply.
A note on these leaves
Sadly, many antiquarian volumes simply do not survive the ravages of time. This is especially true for works of esoterica, which are so often hunted, smuggled, or made to endure life in an alchemical lab, and a great many have been destroyed outright in the persecution of occult knowledge.
These volumes reached us in a state in which preservation of the entire book was simply not possible: destroyed internal structure, failed binding, a great many missing pages, and otherwise orphaned, among many other catastrophic faults. Put simply, they have come to us either as individual leaves or in a condition beyond saving as intact, singular books.
After consulting several experts in the field, we have opted to make individual leaves of these important volumes in esoteric history available. This is a rare opportunity to own a piece of occult history for a fraction of the price of a complete antiquarian volume. This listing is for our more plain pages, still extraordinary refugees from the earliest days of esoteric printing. Pages featuring printer's devices, woodcuts, or other extraordinary elements are offered separately.
Hold this leaf to the light and you are holding a page from the book that put people on the rack. Martín Antonio Del Rio's Disquisitionum magicarum libri sex was first printed in 1599, and for the better part of a century it sat on the desks of inquisitors and judges as the working manual of the witch trials, spoken of in the same breath as the Malleus Maleficarum. Del Rio (1551–1608), a Jesuit theologian born in Antwerp and an adviser to the Council of Troubles, the tribunal so feared in the Low Countries that it was nicknamed the "Tribunal of Blood," poured into these six books a lifetime of humanist reading and an unbending orthodoxy. He set out to refute superstition, and in the process he cataloged it: sabbaths, spells, charms, pacts, divination, astrology, necromancy, and the slippery middle ground of what the learned called "natural magic." It became, almost against its own intentions, a compendium of everything the educated world feared and could not stop writing down.
The Latin runs dense and unbroken, an inquisitor's argument built citation by citation, and it sits inside the edition's characteristic double woodcut rule border with running heads that name the book, question, and section. This is a text from the machine itself, the plain working prose of a book that shaped how a whole continent thought about magic, printed small enough to have once traveled in a saddlebag.
This is an uncommon and affordable way to own an original leaf of one of the most notorious and learned handbooks of demonology ever printed, at a small fraction of the cost of a complete antiquarian volume, which we are finding is more and more seldom in commerce intact and is now largely held in institutions.
DELRÍO, Martín Antonio (1551–1608). Disquisitionum magicarum libri sex, in tres tomos partiti. [Ursel]: Prodit ex Archiepiscopatus Moguntinensis officina Ursellana, impensis Iacobi König, 1606. Later (revised) edition; Tomus unus of three, here dispersed as individual leaves.
Physical Description: A single original printed leaf, Latin text in roman and italic types with occasional Greek, each page enclosed within a double woodcut rule border and headed with running titles (e.g. Disquisitionum Magicarum; Libri II. Q. XXVII. Sect. II). Approx. 7 x 4.5 in. / 17.5 x 11 cm.
Binding: None; issued as a disbound single leaf.
Condition: Age-toning, scattered foxing and light soiling, deckle and untrimmed edges; some leaves with edge wear, chipping, or short tears consistent with a volume that did not survive intact (see note below). Text clear and legible. Sold individually; each leaf will vary and is chosen from the plainer pages of the volume. Additional shipping and handling charges apply.
A note on these leaves
Sadly, many antiquarian volumes simply do not survive the ravages of time. This is especially true for works of esoterica, which are so often hunted, smuggled, or made to endure life in an alchemical lab, and a great many have been destroyed outright in the persecution of occult knowledge.
These volumes reached us in a state in which preservation of the entire book was simply not possible: destroyed internal structure, failed binding, a great many missing pages, and otherwise orphaned, among many other catastrophic faults. Put simply, they have come to us either as individual leaves or in a condition beyond saving as intact, singular books.
After consulting several experts in the field, we have opted to make individual leaves of these important volumes in esoteric history available. This is a rare opportunity to own a piece of occult history for a fraction of the price of a complete antiquarian volume. This listing is for our more plain pages, still extraordinary refugees from the earliest days of esoteric printing. Pages featuring printer's devices, woodcuts, or other extraordinary elements are offered separately.
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