The Lusiad, or, Portugals Historicall Poem: written In the Portingall Language by Luis de Camoens; and Now newly put into English by Richard Fanshaw Esq;
THE FIRST EDITION IN ENGLISH OF THE PORTUGUESE ODYSSEY
THE BOOTHBY–FANSHAWE-BONCHRISTIANO COPY
London: [Thomas Newcombe for] Humphrey Moseley, 1655. First edition in English.
Folio in 4s (10 7/8” x 7”, 276mm x 178mm): A4 a4 b4(–b4) B-Ff4 [$2 signed; –A1; Bb2 as “B2”]. 123 leaves, pp. [22] (title, blank, 3pp. dedication, 14pp. verses from Petronius’ Satyricon (Latin facing English), translator’s postscript, blank, verses from Tasso) 1-224. With 3 engraved plates: a portrait frontispiece of Camões, a folding portrait of Prince Henry of Portugal and a folding portrait of Vasco da Gama.
Bound in contemporary speckled calf (re-backed), with the crest of the Boothby baronets gilt to the boards within a blind quadrilobed panel with corner fleurons. On the spine, four raised bands. All edges of the text-block speckled red.
Re-backed. The boards pitted, with infill to the front board. Mildly but evenly tanned, with a very few passages of foxing. The front free end-paper re-attached. Damp-stain to the lower fore-corner of the first ten leaves as well as the engraved plates. Splits to the edges of the plate of Vasco da Gama, with a repaired stub-tear. A worm-track in the bottom margin, occasionally touching a quire-signature. Armorial bookplate of Basil Thomas Fanshawe to the front paste-down, with a manuscript note on its completeness and earlier provenance, with catalogue descriptions (of other examples) pasted either side; below, the ex-libris of António Bonchristiano. Ink presentation inscription to the front paste-down: “Aubrey Fanshawe/. From his. Father.” with Aubrey Fanshawe’s ownership signature to the recto of the first free end-paper. Ink ownership signature of William Boothby to the title-page, indicating the price (7 shillings) and a shelf-mark. Graphite marginalia, ranging from manicules and side-lining to notes to a dozen pages.[1]
When in 1499 Vasco da Gama (ca. 1460–1524) returned from his voyage from Portugal to India via the Cape of Good Hope, he opened a chapter in the age of exploration no less significant than the discovery of the Americas. A sea route to India from Europe dealt the death-blow to the Silk Road, and diminished the role of the Ottomans and the Venetians in trade with Asia. Da Gama was lauded and ennobled, serving as the second viceroy of Portuguese India, which in the XVIc and XVIIc included most of the coast of the subcontinent.
Da Gama’s place in Portugal’s pantheon was cemented by Luís de Camões (ca. 1525–1580), the Shakespeare of the nation and the language. Os Lusíadas (1572), The Lusiad(s), takes the old Roman province of “Lusitania” and patterns it after the Iliad, Homer’s epic of the Trojan War. Camões (often rendered “Camoens” in English, as here) took as his model the other Homeric epic, the Odyssey (as well Vergil’s Aeneid, itself derivative of the Odyssey) casting da Gama in the place of Odysseus or Aeneas as the nation’s great explorer-hero. The Lusiad, written during Camões’s exile in Macau, is Portugal’s national epic and its most celebrated work of literature.
The poem, written in ottava rima (the meter of Boccaccio and Tasso), received its first translation into English in the present work by Sir Richard Fanshawe (1608–1666). Fanshawe was an ardent royalist who emerged at the restoration of the monarchy as a favorite of Charles II. In addition to his knowledge of modern languages (including Spanish; whether he knew Portuguese remains unclear) and his merit as a poet in his own right, Fanshawe was ambassador to Portugal 1662–1666, as well as to Spain 1664–1666. In that capacity he superintended the marriage of the king to Catherine of Bragança (from writing her love-letters to bringing her Charles’s portrait) — and with it her dowry, including Bombay. This was the beginning of British colonization in India (although at first the king leased it to the East India Company).
The binder of the volume was Sir William Boothby (1637–1707), who was created a baronet in the Restoration and served as High Sheriff of Derbyshire 1661–1662. His library at Ashbourne Hall grew to some six thousand volumes and was dispersed by his descendants, including Sir Brooke Boothby (1744–1824), sixth baronet and an intimate of Rousseau’s. By the end of the XIXc the volume was owned by Basil Thomas Fanshawe (1857–1944), who had a tea plantation in Sri Lanka (Ceylon). This branch of the Fanshawe family is connected via Sir Richard’s father Thomas (1533–1601), who had children from two marriages. The book was given by Basil to his son Captain Aubrey Fanshawe (1893–1973), who was the recipient of the Portuguese Military Order of Aviz, underscoring the long-standing connection of the family to Portugal.
Antônio Bonchristiano (b. 1967) is a Brazilian-born entrepreneur and investor, co-CEO of the private equity firm GP Investments. A graduate of the University of Oxford, Bonchristiano has been a major donor to the Bodleian Library. In October 2025, some of Bonchristiano’s treasures of exploration — including the earliest obtainable illustrated edition of the Columbus letter, which sold for $1.651M — were auctioned at Christie’s New York. The present volume was lot 119 at a Christie’s London 8 July 2026 auction.
ESTC R18836; Grolier, Wither to Prior 349; Pforzheimer 362.
[1] Pp. 57, 61, 74, 95, 99-100, 104, 106-107, 116, 119 and 127.
Item #JLR0886
Price: $27,500