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The Life and Age of Woman

Albert Alden, The Life and Age of Woman. Stages of Woman’s Life from Infancy to the Brink of the Grave (Barre, Massachusetts, ca. 1840). A large, scarce broadside with wood-engraved illustrations depicting a woman at various ages, from child to crone, and elucidating her characteristics and duties. At age 12, “the feet of the Antelope are not more swift nor the spirit of the Lark more buoyant than the Girl’s,” while at 50, “her home is her castle where the time not spent in providing for her household is devoted to counseling her children…”

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Wahre abcontrafactur eines Erschröcklichen Wunderthiers

Heinrich Ulrich, Wahre abcontrafactur eines Erschröcklichen Wunderthiers (Vienna, 1619).

Ultra-rare “wonders of nature” engraving of a monstrous stillborn piglet, designed to attract avid Renaissance collectors of bizarre images and specimens for their “cabinets of curiosities,” also those who believed these to be harbingers of natural disaster or impending political doom.

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Nota delle relique insigne

Nota delle relique insigne (Ancona, ca. 1675). A unique broadside with arms of the Archbishop of Ancona, possibly the long-time incumbent Giannicolò Conti (1666–98). Likely produced on a Jubilee pilgrimage year, this ephemeron for purchase by a pilgrim to this coastal city of the Papal States usefully enumerates the cathedral’s holy relics in the cathedral St. Ciriaco, including a piece of the True Cross, a thorn from the Crown of Thorns, the heads of Sts. Peter and Paul, and the immaculate body of St. Ciriaco himself (d. ca. 360 CE).

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