Asian History

Boston: J.B. Millet Company [1910], a numbered copy from a limited edition of 750. (Limp leather) 324pp. Very good. Black pebble-grained leather with gilt emblem on the spine. Top edge gilt, decorated endpapers, decorated title page, color frontispiece, photographs, index, some pages still uncut. L. Beling Tetens is also cited as the publisher on the title page. Edited with annotation by Charles Welsh. Publisher series: Oriental Series Ambassadors' Edition. Locale: Turkey. (History, Description and Travel, History, Politics, Revolution).

London: J. Cross, 1833. First Edition. Hard Cover. Very Good. A monument erected at St. Johns Church, Calcutta reads, "To the memory of JOHN ADAM, eldest son of the right honorable, William Adam, Lord Chief Commissioner of the jury court in Scotland. He arrived in Bengal in 1796 and passed through the highest offices in the civil service of the East India Company. Placed in the supreme council in 1819, he was again appointed to that station when the usual term of holding it had expired. From January to August 1823 he acted as Governor-General of India. Bad health compelled him to embark for England in March 1825. But he died on the 4th of June in the 47th year of his age, and his remains were committed to the ocean." This copy of John Adam's memoir is an association copy, inscribed by John Adam's mother, Katherine Adam to the Rev. James Hill, who was one of her son's closest friends in India, and who had written the letter to her describing her son's death, which is printed… Read More

New York: Columbia University Press [0-231-03351-6] 1971, 2nd printing. (Hardcover) 372pp. Very good, no dust jacket. Blue cloth with silver lettering. Map endpapers, notes, bibliography, glossary, tables, index. Translated by John Andrew Boyle. (History--Asia, History--Asia, Khan Dynasty, Mongol Empire).

London: T Becket , 1774 A fair copy of the 3rd edition of this scarce work, in contemporary binding with folding frontispiece. Holwell (1711-1798) was an employee of the East India Company and a surgeon. He became a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1767 and was temporary Governor of Bengal. He survived the incident known as the 'Black Hole of Calcutta' and this work contains an account of his experiences together with other works. With folding frontispiece 'representing the Monument erected at Calcutta, in Memory of Sufferers in the Black-Hole Prison'; title page; dedication pp i-vii; half title and text 432pp. The full leather binding is complete but the front board is detached and the title label to the spine is damaged. There is some edge wear and scuffing but the binding could be easily repaired. The stitching is sound. The frontispiece is complete - with a small repaired tear where it is attached to the book. The text is complete and in good condition. There is general light brown… Read More

Many wears, especially at book spine.

New York: Barnes & Noble, 1974. Hardcover. Near Fine/Very Good. Cloth in DJ; 622pp; DJ clean, intact & protected by mylar sleeve, boards square, clean & bright, text unmarked, binding is tight, Near Fine/VG condition. History of relations between England and China from 1600 to 1843 with a summary of later developments. First published in 1909. Includes illustrations and foldout maps.

1600s Japanese Woodblock Shikyo Shitchu ZHU XI Chinese Poetry Philosophy 7v


Translated from Chinese into Japanese this rare collection of notes and commentary on Chinese poetry by the famous philosopher Zhu Xi is highly desirable.

Zhu Xi (1130 – 1200), was a Chinese philosopher, politician, and writer of the Song dynasty. He was a Confucian scholar who was the leading figure of the School of Principle and the most influential rationalist Neo-Confucian in China. His contributions to Chinese philosophy including his assigning special significance to the Analects, the Mencius, the Great Learning, and the Doctrine of the Mean (the Four Books), his emphasis on the investigation of things, and the synthesis of all fundamental Confucian concepts, formed the basis of Chinese bureaucracy and government for over 700 years.

"The second most influential thinker in Chinese history, after Confucius himself." (Slingerland)

Item number: #5700
Price: $599
XI, Zhu [朱熹]
MATSUNAGA, Akiraeki [松永昌易]… Read More

[China].: 國民政府軍事委員會政治訓練部. [Guo min zheng fu jun shi wei yuan hui zheng zhi xun lian bu].. [1926].. Chinese Kuomintang propaganda poster printed in blue on white paper, folded. Issued by the Political Training Department of the Military Affairs Commission, a head portrait of Chiang Kai-shek in military uniform is featured at the top of the poster. A large blank section in main body of the poster has been left for the addition of text or images. Traditional Chinese lower section. Some light creasing mainly upper section, light wear edges, some staining upper and lower sections of sheet but overall very good. Text in traditional Chinese. Sheet measures 77.1 x 27.3cm. 軍事委員會政治訓練部 "The Political Training Department of the Military Affairs Commission", a very short-lived yet powerful department, was established in March 1926 by 2nd Central… Read More

[南京].[Nanking].: 南京特別市農民協會.. [1928].. Chinese Kuomintang (KMT) propaganda poster stencilled in blue and red, appears to have been issued folded with 4 neat horizontal folds visible, some other minor creasing, small closed tear from margin, archival repair to lower left corner, small stain lower corner. Issued by the Peasants' Association of Nanking Special Municipality, the party emblem of KMT is centrally placed at the top of the poster with skulls and crossbones just below, calligraphic text takes up the majority of the poster with the characters for "five" and "three" highlighted, lower edge dripping blood, overall very good. Text in traditional Chinese. Sheet measures 78 x 26cm. In the final stage of the Northern Expedition, Chang Kai-shek's National Revolutionary Army (NRA) entered Jinan, the capital city of Shandong Province in April 1928. The two characters "five" and "three" so graphically depicted on this poster… Read More

1885 Japanese Samurai History Nihon Gaishi Tokugawa Shogunate Genpei War Japan

An interesting Edo woodblock-print of 'Nihon Gaishi,' a 19th-century book on the history of Japan by Rai San'yo, a confucianist philosopher, historian, and poet of the Edo era. The whole work of 'Nihon Gaishi' was the first comprehensive study of samurai history, covering Japanese history, from the emergence of the Minamoto clan and the Genpei War, through to the reign of Tokugawa Iemitsu in the Edo era. His history was later banned in several provinces because it encouraged strengthening the authority of the Emperor and was a major influence on the Sonnō jōi movement, a movement to overthrow the Tokugawa shogunate during the Bakumatsu period. It became part of the private studies of Chinese people in meiji Japan and in their curricula became one of the most read history books from the end of the Edo period to the Meiji era. (Mehl)
This rare 1885 edition is written in Kanbun in a column handwritten format.

Item number:… Read More

1970 McGraw Hill first edition. Uncommon as a true first.The author was born in 1930, and tells the story of Japan in World War Two from a child's perspective. The book includes an account of the Hiroshima nuclear bomb, which injured the author, and killed her mother.Condition of the book is Very Good. The binding is straight and sound. Inside pages are complete and unmarked. The top edge of the text block shows some light soil.Condition of the dust jacket is Very Good. The DJ is complete, not price clipped. It is protected in a new mylar cover.Please message me with any questions

Nanking: Nanking Women's Club, 1933. 2nd, revised edition. wrappers. [6], 62 pp. With 10 illustrations from photographs on 6 plates; 3 maps, one folding at rear plus large folding laid in loose. 22.8x15.5 cm (9x6"), stapled red wrappers printed in black. The large folding map measures 34x46.5 cm (13½x18¼"), has a key on the verso to 82 locations; it was supposed to be in a separate folder, but is here laid in loose. Sticker on front cover, with chipping and wear to wrappers, rear wrapper and map detached; very good. Ships from Hawaii with free Priority Mail upgrade. Scarce little description of Nanking, with much of the information taken from Père Gaillard's "Nankin d'alors et d'aujourd'hui", revised and enlarged under the auspices of the Literary Section of the Nanking Woman's Club.

Mee-seen Loong Fine Art LLC, 2014. As New. Still in publisher's shrink wrap. Photo is of the copy we have at Barbed Wire Books.

Garden City: Doubleday, 1953. First edition. Hard cover in dust jacket. Published Garden City: Doubleday, 1953, first printing. 8vo. 352pp., illustrated with b/w plates, map endpapers. Pale blue cloth with blue and white titles. Offset toning to two pages from laid in book reviews, minor dust foxing on top edge, else fine in near fine dust jacket. . 1st. Hard. Near Fine/Near Fine. 8vo.

London: Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1949. First edition. Hard cover in original cloth. Published London: Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1949, first printing. 8vo., x+336pp., illustrated with maps. Green cloth with gilt spine titles. Minor, light dust foxing on edges, offset toning to fly leaves, else very good plus, clean, bright, attractive. Front flap of dust jacket laid in. "The fall of Singapore on 15 February 1942, was a great and unexpected blow both to Britain and to her Allies, a blow all the more unlooked-for because the defences of the island fortress had been generally believed to be impregnable. As a result, accusations against the military and civil leadership were immediately made, the greater part of them based on an almost total lack of detailed information. In this book, Lieutenant-General A. E. Percival, who was General Officer Commanding in Malaya from 1941 to 1942, has at last been able to present an authoritative account of the fighting in Malaya and of the events immediately leading… Read More