ROJAS RUIZ, Miguel de (fl.1639) - photo 1
ROJAS RUIZ, Miguel de (fl.1639) - photo 2
ROJAS RUIZ, Miguel de (fl.1639) - photo 3

ROJAS RUIZ, Miguel de (fl.1639)

Lot 145
12.07.2023 00:00UTC +00:00
Classic
Starting price
£ 25 000
AuctioneerCHRISTIE'S
Event locationUnited Kingdom, London
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The auction is completed. No bids can be placed anymore.
Archive
ID 993166
Lot 145 | ROJAS RUIZ, Miguel de (fl.1639)
Estimate value
£ 25 000 – 35 000
ROJAS RUIZ, Miguel de (fl.1639)

Jardin de ensayadores que ensena a aquilatar, y dar el valor a la plata conforme a las leyes reales. Lima: Por Pedro de Cabrera, 1639.

A fine crisp copy of an extremely rare work on valuing silver in the New World. The author was the chief assayer of the Peruvian mint and this was the first Spanish guide ‘for Assayers that teaches how to examine and evaluate silver according to the royal edicts’. The tax on silver from the New World was one of the Spanish crown’s main sources of revenue, so the ability to correctly value silver was of great importance. The author explains the Spanish laws and rules for valuing the precious metal and discusses the main units of currency including ‘pieces of eight’. This was an early publication for the publisher Pedro de Cabrera who printed in Lima between 1638 and 1649 which may explain why this work is not found in the standard bibliographies. The seventeen printed tables of values and measures at the end of this work must have been a challenge for the compositor. Only one other copy has sold at auction since 1975. Not in Palau or Medina (Lima).



4to (206 x 145mm). Woodcut device on title, full-page coat of arms, tail-piece and initials, 17 full-page letterpress tables (minor dampstain to upper blank corner of text, mostly in gatherings L and M, tip of one corner of title restored). Contemporary limp vellum (minor stains, remains of ties). Preserved in a velvet-lined modern black morocco-backed blue cloth folding box. Provenance: Joseph A. Freilich (booklabel; sale Sotheby’s New York 10-11 January 2001, lot 466).





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Place of origin:South America
Auction house category:Printed books
Address of auction CHRISTIE'S
8 King Street, St. James's
SW1Y 6QT London
United Kingdom
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12.07.2023 – 12.07.2023
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