Robert Frew Ltd

Robert Frew Ltd Fine & Rare Books, Prints & Maps.

A fine edition of Aesop’s fables, with excellent engravings by the leading British birds & beasts illustrator of his day...
21/05/2026

A fine edition of Aesop’s fables, with excellent engravings by the leading British birds & beasts illustrator of his day, Francis Barlow, said to be the only English artist worthy of his continental peers. The verses are by the pioneering Restoration playwright Aphra Behn, knows as Astrea, beloved of Virginia Woolf, who urged all women to let flowers fall on her tomb. This copy includes the b***y plate showing female nudity, often excised or defaced - swipe left to catch a glimpse!

(BARLOW, Francis); AESOP; BEHN, Aphra.

Æsop’s Fables with his Life: In English, French and Latin. Newly Translated. Illustrated with One Hundred and Twelve Sculptures. To this Edition are Likewise added, Thirty One New Figures Representing his Life. By Francis Barlow.
London: Printed by H. Hills jun. for Francis Barlow... 1687.

Thank you 🙏 🙏 until next year.
18/05/2026

Thank you 🙏 🙏 until next year.

is now open!
14/05/2026

is now open!

A SCARCE WORK ON ISLAMIC ART WITH A DISTINGUISHED PROVENANCEMIGEON, Gaston. Exposition des Arts Musulmans au Musée des A...
09/05/2026

A SCARCE WORK ON ISLAMIC ART WITH A DISTINGUISHED PROVENANCE

MIGEON, Gaston. Exposition des Arts Musulmans au Musée des Arts Décoratifs. Paris: Librairie Centrale des Beaux-Arts, Émile Lévy, Éditeur, [1903].

A fine collection of collotypes showcasing in fine details the most important pieces the Islamic Art exhibited at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris from May to June 1903. The exhibition is seen as a foundation for Islamic art history as a formal discipline, breaking from purely “Orientalist” views to a more scholarly, comprehensive approach. The catalogue includes Mamluk doors, Ayyubid brassware, Iznik earthenware, Ayyubid brassware, and Persian ceramics, etc.

Ex libris Frederick DuCane Godman (1834-1919) with his bookplate to front pastedown, included are several handwritten or typed letters from his personal correspondence with renowned academics such as A. F. Kendrick (medieval and fiberworks authority at the V&A), Bernard Rackham (specialist on ceramics and stained glass and curator at the V&A), and A.B. Skinner (Egyptologist and Director of the Art Museum division of the V&A), etc. Godman, one of the major donors to this exhibition, was a distinguished collector of Iznik and Hispano-Moresque pottery, whose collection of 600 pieces is now held in the British Museum.

Gaston Migeon (1861-1930) was a significant French art historian, curator, and scholar renowned for his pioneering work in introducing and classifying Islamic, Chinese, and Japanese arts at the Louvre Museum. He served as a curator at the Louvre, championed Eastern decorative arts, and published extensively on Islamic architecture and decorative arts, establishing himself as a leading authority in these fields.



We are delighted to present the centrepiece for our display at , the first edition of David Roberts’ monumental work, “T...
07/05/2026

We are delighted to present the centrepiece for our display at , the first edition of David Roberts’ monumental work, “The Holy Land, Syria, Idumea, Arabia, Egypt and Nubia” (1842-49), a complete, magnificent set in the preferred deluxe format, with all the plates finely coloured by hand and mounted on card in imitation of watercolours, as issued, and bound in contemporary full uniform red morocco.

“Roberts’s Holy Land was one of the most important and elaborate ventures of nineteenth-century publishing, and it was the apotheosis of the tinted lithograph” (Abbey Travel).

No publication before this had presented so comprehensive a series of views of the monuments, landscape, and people of the Middle East. These were offered in three formats: single tint lithographs in paper wrappers; proofs in portfolios; and, this the grandest and most expensive format, coloured and mounted on card. The list of 606 subscribers is headed by Queen Victoria. 

SUPERB POCHOIR PLATES BY THE MASTER OF THE FORMATWe’re excited to be bringing a copy of Séguy’s “Insects” with us to the...
21/04/2026

SUPERB POCHOIR PLATES BY THE MASTER OF THE FORMAT

We’re excited to be bringing a copy of Séguy’s “Insects” with us to the , being a suite of twenty vibrant pochoir plates, each with a striking composition of five different insects. “The depictions of insects in the illustrations are remarkably detailed, revealing Séguy’s unique interest in their scientific study as a source of inspiration for artistic creation” Metropolitan).

The French illustrator Eugene-Alain Séguy, known as E.A. Séguy, was one of the most important exponents of the Art Deco and Art Nouveau movements of the 1920s. His work inspired a generation of artists throughout Europe. Séguy produced eleven albums of nature themed illustrations and patterns, drawing inspiration from papillons (butterflies) and other insects, flowers, foliage, crystals and animals. Séguy was one of few artists that successfully combined both Art Deco and Art Nouveau styles in his work.

The scene of Christ’s crucifixion from the first edition of the Yaysmawurk (1706), a collection of stories of the lives ...
06/04/2026

The scene of Christ’s crucifixion from the first edition of the Yaysmawurk (1706), a collection of stories of the lives and martyrdom of the Saints, in the history of Armenian printing.

The book is intended for Armenians, other peoples, and all Christians. It is a liturgical calendar designed to be read daily, containing the lives of saints and their testimonies.

It was published in Constantinople at the printing house of Grigor Marzvanetsi in 1706 (according to the Armenian era: ՌՃԾԵ), adorned with magnificent engravings and ornaments. The book includes full-page illustrations, smaller engravings, as well as headpieces, marginal ornaments, and decorated initials.

A selection of creative and eye-catching plates from Émile Séguy’s suite of pochoir plates ‘Prismes’ (1931), which draw ...
25/03/2026

A selection of creative and eye-catching plates from Émile Séguy’s suite of pochoir plates ‘Prismes’ (1931), which draw their inspiration from the vegetable, mineral and animal kingdoms. This is Séguy’s final work. It is considered a quintessential example of Art Deco design, showcasing Séguy’s transition from the organic curves of Art Nouveau to the bold, geometric abstraction of the 1930s.

A COMPLETE AND ACCURATE ATLAS OF THE HUMAN BODYLoder’s ‘Tabulae Anatomicae’ was produced in 1803 as a complete and accur...
18/03/2026

A COMPLETE AND ACCURATE ATLAS OF THE HUMAN BODY

Loder’s ‘Tabulae Anatomicae’ was produced in 1803 as a complete and accurate atlas of the human body with 181 engraved plates. The work was intended as a pedagogical tool for teachers and students of anatomy and as such it displays the material of man in precise and unflinching detail.

Justus Christian von Loder (1753-1832) was a German physician and anatomist from Riga. In 1778 he became professor of anatomy, surgery and obstetrics in Jena; after 1809 he became professor of anatomy and surgery in Moscow. According to Frank and Choulant’s History and Bibliography of Anatomic Illustration, Loder began working on this compilation in 1794, supported by the Bureau of Provincial Industries in Weimar, with the aim to compile in one work “all the best representations then known in all the different branches of anatomy, supplemented by representations of original preparations”. In 1810 he became personal physician to Czar Alexander I, and he later led the military hospital in Moscow. He died in Moscow on April 16, 1832 and the Russian government bought his anatomic collection for 50,000 silver rubles.

LODER, Justus Christian. Tabulae Anatomicae quas ad Illustrandum Humani Corporis Fabricam. Weimar: Landes-Industrie-Comptoir, 1803.

“The most sumptuous and costly of British bird books” (Mullens and Swann). It’s always a pleasure to have a se of John G...
17/03/2026

“The most sumptuous and costly of British bird books” (Mullens and Swann). It’s always a pleasure to have a se of John Gould’s “Birds of Great Britain” (1862-1873) in stock, this example being bound in beautiful contemporary morocco and comprising 367 finely hand-coloured lithographs.⁣
⁣
Gould was especially proud of this work, and it ‘was seen - perhaps partly because its subject was British, as the culmination of [his] ... genius’. The text is longer than in any of his other works, and the illustrations, many of them prepared from freshly killed specimens, include many more depictions of chicks, nests and eggs. Josef Wolf, the German natural history painter who drew 57 of the plates, had accompanied Gould on an ornithological tour of Scandinavia in 1856, and was responsible for persuading Gould and Richter to adopt a livelier treatment of the illustrations.⁣
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