Mar 26, 2009 - Sale 2174

Sale 2174 - Lot 360

Price Realized: $ 7,800
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 4,000 - $ 6,000
(MEXICAN IMPRINT.) [Veracruz, Alonso de]. [Speculum Coniugiorum]. Chart of consanguity on page 307, woodcut initials. 4to, later 1/4 calf, worn, covers nearly detached; some worm holes, a bit of faint marginal dampstaining, closed tear on leaf kk6. With the final blank, but lacks title page and 7 interior leaves (pages 275-286); title page provided in poor facsimile. [Mexico, 1556]
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Additional Details

First edition of the first book on marriage written and published in the New World, also the first book printed in italic type in America. Printed by Juan Pablos, the first printer in Mexico, using fonts cut and cast in his shop by Antonio de Espinosa.
Veracruz (1507-1584) was a leading Augustinian missionary and educator. "His best single contribution to the missions of Mexico . . . is the Speculum Coniugiorum, a book on moral theology, and especially the canon laws of matrimony, with the particular and very valuable purpose of providing a guide for solving the complicated cases concerning the newly converted Indians . . . The second part . . . discusses the nature and validity of marriage among the infidels of the New World and the nature of polygamy . . . The third part is composed of twenty articles on divorce"--Ennis, Fray Alonso de la Vera Cruz (1957), pages 67-72. García Icazbalceta 27; Medina Mexico 31; Palau 459149; Sabin 98919; Sotheby''s New York, 5 May 1981, lot 522 (this copy).