
THE PHILIPPINES
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Printed on “Rice Paper” on the
Archbishop's Press
. . . the
Ex-Jesuit Press
(“Alocucion” . . . ). Sancho de Santa Justa y Rufino, Basilio. Alocucion que en el dia veinte de enero del año mil setecientos ochenta y tres, cumpleaños del Rey nuestro señor D. Carlos III (que Dios gu[ard]e.) pronuncio a la Real Sociedad Patriotica de Manila. Manila: En la Imprenta del Seminario Eclesiastico, por Ignacio Ad-Vincula, 1783. Folio (29.5 cm; 11.5"). [1] f., 23, [1] pp.
$5500.00
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After consecration and service in Spain, Sancho de Santa Justa arrived in Manila in 1767 to take up his duties as archbishop, which included
overseeing the expulsion of the Jesuits. He was a native of Aragon and a member of the Society of Scholarum Piarum. In this address on the occasion of Charles III's 67th birthday, he expresses himself no friend of many of the Enlightment's ideas but a staunch supporter of the King, his economic policies, and especially of the newly instituted practice of free commerce in the Spanish empire. On the other hand, he rails against England, its foreign commercial practices, and its ascension as a maritime powerhouse.
As the title states, this was pronounced before “la Real Sociedad Patriotica de Manila.” That august body was “congregada por estatuto en el salon del Real Palacio, y presidida de su protector el muy ilustre señor D. Joseph Basco, y Bargas, Balderrama y Rivera cavallero del Orden de Santiago, capitan de navio de la real armada, gobernador, y capitan general de estas Islas Filipinas, y presidente de su real audiencia, y chancilleria, director g[ene]r[a]l de las tropas de S.M. en estos dominios, superintendente general de la Real Hacienda, y Renta de Tabaco, y subdelegado de la de Correos &c. &c.”
The work is printed on “rice paper” (i.e., Asian paper probably from the mulberry tree) as was common in Manila during the period to ca. 1820. The typography is definitely provincial and plain, using only one decorative woodcut initial and no ornamentation on the title-page. The type is roman in a variety of sizes with a practice of using all capitals for emphasis.
The press on which this work was printed had been that of the Jesuits until Archbishop Sancho de Santa Justa carried out the king's order and expelled them; he then appropriated the press for his private use, as here. What had been only the fourth press to operate in the Islands, now with a new name, became the fifth.
Searches of NUC, WorldCat, and COPAC locate only five copies worldwide (three in the U.S., one in the U.K., one in Spain).
Medina, Manila, 317; Retana, Aparato bibliográfico, 379. Recent marbled paper–covered boards (green and mauve stone pattern); red leather label on front cover. A few minor paper repairs to edges of a few leaves; a very few small pinhole type wormholes, not costing any letters; the brown spotting and staining peculiar to rice paper. Old, brief note lightly red-inked to title-page. Over all a very good copy. (33130)

Cebuano Grammar, 1804
Encina, Francisco. [drop-title] Arte de la lengua zebuana. [Sampaloc?, Manila?]: No publisher/printer, [1804]. 8vo (19.5 cm, 7.75"). 616, [16 (1 blank)] pp.
$7000.00
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The Cebuano (here “Zebuana”) language is an Austronesian language spoken in the Philippines, largely in Central Visayas, western parts of Eastern Visayas, and most parts of Mindanao. This first edition of Encina's grammar of that language is thought by Palau to have been surreptitiously printed at Manila in about 1804; it was done on “rice paper.”
WorldCat locates only four U.S. libraries reporting ownership of this edition (Yale, Harvard, New Mexico, and the John Carter Brown).
Palau 79565; Medina, Manila, 396 bis; Blake, Philippine Languages, 139. Not in Retana, Aparato bibliográfico; not in Walsh, Philippine Linguistics. 20th-century full red morocco, ruled in blind, spine lettered in gilt, all edges gilt; French swirl marbled endpapers. Light wear to binding; pages a bit browned in varying amounts, old repairs to a few leaves and a few with closed tears, one leaf chipped in outer margin; very good. (38104)

Absolutely Essential Bibliography
Retana, Wenceslao Emilio. Aparato bibliográfico de la historia general de Filipinas deducido de la colección que posee en Barcelona la Compañia General de Tabacos de dichas islas. Manila: P.B. Ayuda, 1964. Small folio. 3 vols. I: [3] ff., xcvii, [1 (blank) pp., [1] f., 463, [1(blank) pp. II: [3] ff., pp. 465–1064. III: [3] ff., 1065–1800, [2] ff. Includes facsims.
$750.00
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An essential bibliography of books printed in the Philippines and in Europe about the islands, based on the library of the Compañía General de Tabacos de Filipinas. This is a photolithographic facsimile of the first edition (Madrid, Imprenta de la sucesora de M. Minuesa de los Ríos, 1906).
Publisher's maroon faux reptile, corners bumped, and one volume with a crescent of chipping to base of spine. Staining on endpapers from cello tape; all edges of closed volumes soot-stained but not margins or text. Uncut and mostly unopened. A handsome set of a significant resource. (33135)

Grammar of the Tagalog Language
San Jose, Francisco de. Arte y reglas de la lengua tagala. [Manila]: Imprenta Nueva de don Jose Maria Dayot por T. Oliva, 1832. Small 4to (15 cm, 6"). 919, [1] pp.
$4500.00
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This is only the second edition of San Jose's grammar of the Tagalog language of the Philippines, first published in 1610. WorldCat locates just two copies of the first edition in U.S. libraries (Yale, John Carter Brown) and ten of this (NYPL, Georgetown, Smithsonian, Newberry, Dominican College, Louisiana State University, Yale, Harvard, Johns Hopkins, and the American Philosophical Society).
San Jose was a Dominican priest who arrived in the Philippines in 1595. He is considered the father of Tagalog grammarians, and credited by some with installing the first printing press in the Philippines. Of this edition, Retana notes that his copy was printed on linen paper while all others he had seen were on “rice paper,” as is the present copy.
Leclerc, Bibliotheca Americana, 2423; Palau 292360; Blake, Philippine Languages, 327; Walsh, Philippine Linguistics, 951; Retana, Aparato bibliográfico, 619. Contemporary limp vellum, yellowed, ties lacking; front free endpaper and title-page with old taped repairs; text block (itself strongly intact) loose in binding. Insect tunneling to approximately 50 leaves at front with some loss to print and about 100 leaves at the rear with small losses mostly marginal, not destroying sense of text; else good++ . (38102)

Dictionary of the Tagalog Language
Santos, Domingo de los. Vocabulario de la lengua tagala, primera, y segunda parte. [Manila?]: Imprenta Real de D. Jose Maria Dayot, 1835. Folio (29 cm, 11.5"). [viii], 739, [1 blank], 118 pp.
$4500.00
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Palau gives the date of the first edition of this dictionary and grammar of the Tagalog language of the Philippines as 1703, with the next in 1794, followed by this in 1835. This conforms to the editions found via WorldCat; that same source finds only five U.S. libraries reporting ownership of this edition (NYPL, American Philosophical, Yale, Newberry, and Villanova). The earlier editions are even less well held.
Printed on “rice paper,” i.e., paper made using indigenous fibers.
Provenance: Bookseller's label of Deutsche Kunst und Antiquitäten Messe, München.
Palau 300543; Retana, Aparato bibliográfico, 637; Leclerc, Bibliotheca Americana, 2424; Blake, Philippine Languages, 330; Walsh, Philippine Linguistics, 1095. Recased in old limp vellum, recycled manuscript used for rear endpapers, spine lettered in an early hand; vellum yellowed and cockled. Booklabel as above. Title-page laid down and with old tape repair, closed tears to several other leaves, and some minimal foxing or staining; in fact, very good. (38101)
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