Bidspirit auction | João de Deus

João de Deus - Flores do Campo, 2ª Edição - João de Deus, 1876. Published in 1876 in Porto by Livraria Universal de Magalhães & Moniz, Editores (Largo dos Lóios), this unusual and esteemed second corrected edition (”2nd Corrected Edition”) of ”Flores do Campo, ” by the celebrated poet João de Deus, is one of the most influential and pure works of Romantic lyricism in the Portuguese language. The copy, in octavo format (19.3 x 12 cm) with 270 pages, stands out for its magnificent period binding in brown half-leather with corners, masterfully executed and signed in gold lettering on the back cover by the historic and renowned Persil workshop - Porto (Guilherme Persil), which gives it an exceptional bibliographic pedigree and attests to a common provenance with the prestigious lots 95 and 96 of this catalog. The binding features a richly ornamented ribbed spine with delicate gilded tooling and rosettes, two contrasting leather labels (red for the author and black for the title), covers lined with handmade marbled paper in shades of red, black, and yellow with a gold transition border, white silk satin endpapers with reflections, and the top edge of the pages painted red, with the remaining margins entirely untrimmed. The volume is in excellent overall condition and perfectly firm, containing in the text block the normal and expected acidity and oxidation stains resulting from the nature of the paper of the period and, on the previous page, a discreet handwritten mark in pencil (”2nd ed.”). This makes it an indisputably valuable collector's item due to its rarity in one of the coveted bindings by the master Persil.