Estimate

2.000 - 3.000

Session 2

16 December 2025

Hammer Price

Description

CAMÕES, Luís de, 1524?-1580
Critical-commemorative Edition of the Third Centenary of the Death of the Great Poet. – Published in Porto by Emílio Biel. – Typographia Giesecke & Devrient Estabelecimento Graphico, Leipzig, MDCCCLXXX (1880).

[8 fol.], LVI, 375, XCII p. : il. : (42 cm) : bound. Very good copy, with rare spots of acidity. Bound in magnificent publisher's binding, with leather spine and boards with artistic decorative motifs in blind and gilt. Gilt and gauffered edges with decorative motifs. The copy is presented in an exotic wood box/case lined with velvet on the interior. The lid bears the silver monogram of its owner Lourenço d'Almeida Azevedo (1833-1891), professor at the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Coimbra. Exceptional copy.

Additional Information

Canto, J. 117. - Ameal 402. - Inocêncio XIV, 179

Inocêncio tells us (vol. XIV p. 179-180): "Biel edition, from Porto.

Os Lusiadas de Luiz de Camões. Critical edition commemorating the third centenary of the death of the great poet. Published in Porto by Emilio Biel. Typography by Giesecke & Devrient, graphic establishment, Leipzig, MDCCCLXXX. Fol. of 8 unnumbered) LVI 375 XXXIII XCII pages. With portraits of Camões and the Emperor of Brazil, and allegorical plates.

The dedication to the Emperor of Brazil reads: To His Majesty Dom Pedro II, Emperor of Brazil, Homage of the deepest respect, offered and dedicated by the publisher Emilio Biel.

After the Emperor's portrait (made from a photograph by Fillon), comes a page with these indications:

Introduction, notes, tables of variants and text revision based on the 2nd edition of 1572, and that of 1834 (from Hamburg), revised and retouched by His Excellency José Gomes Monteiro, corresponding member of the royal academy of sciences and member of various foreign academies. Commemorative poem Camões e os Lusiadas (study on the life and works of the poet) by His Excellency José da Silva Mendes Leal, of His Majesty's council, peer of the realm, honorary minister and secretary of state, member of the royal academy of sciences of Lisbon, extraordinary envoy and plenipotentiary minister of His Most Faithful Majesty in Paris, etc. etc.).

Following is the list of artists who enriched this work with their contributions, the commemorative poem Visão! (pages III to XIV), and on the following page come the titles:

Os Lusiadas de Luiz de Camões, critical edition with a study on the life and works of the poet by His Excellency José da Silva Mendes Leal... based on the 2nd edition of 1572, amended by that of 1834 (from Hamburg) revised and retouched by His Excellency José Gomes Monteiro... enriched with 12 original steel engravings, work of the most notable artists of Europe, subjects and designs approved by His Majesty King Dom Fernando. Published by Emilio Biel, Porto.

Then comes the introduction-prospectus (pages XVII to XX), signed by the publisher Biel; the introduction (pages XXI to LXVI) signed by José Gomes Monteiro; the poem with unnumbered chromo-typographic frontispieces for each canto (pages 1 to 375); the justificatory notes (pages I to XXIV); appendix to the introduction and tables of variants: table 1, pages XXV to XXX signed by Tito de Noronha; table 2, (pages XXXI and XXXII); Camões e os Lusiadas (pages I to XC), study dated 1879-1880 and signed by José da Silva Mendes Leal; and note on the distribution of special copies (pages XCI and XCII).

The text of the poem was first printed in Porto, typography of A. J. da Silva Teixeira, revised by Gomes Monteiro. This preparatory printing served as the original for the composition in the Leipzig press.

The plates, excluding the portrait of His Majesty the Emperor at the beginning, are twenty-one, eleven reproduced from the Morgado de Mateus edition and ten of new composition, designed and engraved in Leipzig.

The reproduced engravings (reduced by photography) are Camões in the cave of Macau, and those of cantos I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, IX and X, and the new ones are: that of the frontispiece with the new bust of Camões, and those of cantos I, II, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, IX and X.

To evaluate the photographic reproduction, which in my opinion altered the extraordinary beauty of some of the engravings from the monumental edition of the Morgado de Mateus, I will observe that the plates commissioned by him measure 0.195m in height and 0.158m in width and those of the Biel edition measure 0.190m in height and 0.150m in width. This difference was enough to diminish, in the contour and chiaroscuro, the tone and vigour of the cited engravings, which masters and connoisseurs consider as masterpieces and models in the genre.

Here are the artists who worked on the Biel edition, as I find them cited in the work itself (page II): the oil paintings, which served as the basis for the steel engravings, were executed by Begas, professor of the Berlin art school, Liezen Mayer, director of the academy of fine arts of Stuttgart, Kostka, historical painter from Berlin, the steel engravings by the artists Deininger, Goldberg, Krausse, Lindner, Martin, Nüsser, Pickel, Schultheiss, Wagenmann, the designs for the initials and final vignettes by Ludwig Burger, member of the academy of fine arts of Berlin, drawn on wood by Martin Laemmel and P. Grotjohann, and engraved by R. Brand'amour & Co. and Kaeseberg & Oertel, the photogravures by Emilio Biel & Co., of Porto, the compositions of the title pages (canto frontispieces), chromo type by A. Gnauth, director of the academic school of Nuremberg, and the typographic composition and printing under the direction of Giesecke & Devrient, typographic institute of Leipzig. The paper for the text was supplied by Bohnenberger and Co., of Pforzheim, and for the engravings by B. Siegismund, of Leipzig."