?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 600 - $ 800
Fireworks, Italian Manuscript. Arte di Fare i Fuochi Artificiali con Poca Spesa.
Italy, 1850.
Small format manuscript on wove paper, consisting of twenty-eight pages; purported author identified on title as Garzena Giovanni Battista da Graglia; illustrated limp covers with text and diagrams throughout; sewn through the fold as one signature, some chipping, margins fragile; 5 1/2 x 3 3/4 in.
Illustrations include techniques for rolling up fireworks, cutaway diagrams of the resulting rockets, and sketches of other pyrotechnics, including different methods for rigging the celebratory explosives along lines of rope and into spinning circles of fire. Proportions of ingredients are also covered, with descriptions of the end product when properly prepared. The covers are cleverly decorated with a large diamond design featuring different forms of fireworks displays.
