1582 ARGOTE DE MOLINA CAZA Libro Montería Discurso sobre libro Montería Sevilla PRIMERA EDICION

Uno de los mas importantes libros de caza de la historia si no el que mas, primera edicion del año 1582 impreso en Sevilla. Primera referencia a la caza en America con grabados y al toreo.

Libro, de la Monteria que mando escrevir el muy alto y muy poderoso Rey Don Alonso de Castilla, y de Leon, ultimo deste nombre.

Seville, Andrea Pescioni, 1582. Folio (29x19 cm). 2 parts in 1 volume. [6], 91, 23 (as 1-13, 9, 17-25), [1 blank] ll. With the woodcut arms of Philips II on title-page and 35 half-page woodcuts.

First edition of the first Spanish book on hunting, describing hunting practices in the Americas for the first time. “The most extensive venatory treatise produced in medieval Spain” (Seniff), with very detailed information on hunting dogs, falconry and mountainous hunting. It is a compilation of Spanish hunting chronicles dating back to Alfonso X el Sabio (1221-1284), closely following the Arabic Moamin Et Ghatrif treatise on the care of hunting dogs and falconry. Philips II ordered the manuscripts to be published for the first time. Editor Argote de Molina added chapters from his own hand on hunting in the Americas. The work is illustrated with 35 woodcut illustrations showing the hunt of various large animals. Particularly interesting are the parts about the Americas, which are the first descriptions of hunting in the New World and the accompanying woodcuts are the earliest depictions of American hunting scenes (Schwerdt). They show indigenous Americans hunting jaguar with bow and arrow and a royal hunt for guanaco in Peru. The America chapters describe bull hunting on Puerto Rico, Cuba and Santo Domingo; Andean ostrich, guanaco, vicunas and llama in the Chaco and Callao areas in south Peru (“the llamas have a very funny gaze”); "tiger" (jaguar) in the mountainous area of Popayán (Colombia).

Other chapters describe the hunt of big game such as lion, elephant, rhinoceros and giraffe in Africa. and in the “kingdom of India” there is an abundance of lion, elephants, rhinoceros, jaguars, tigers, porcupine, gazelles, dromedaries and camels. The woodcuts depict the hunt for boar, bear, birds, elephant, rabbit, deer, lion, wolf and a bullfight in an arena.

The chapters on Spain give detailed information on the ecology of certain mountainous areas. Valverde points out in his 2009 annotated study Anotaciones al Libro de la montería del rey Alfonso XI that the descriptions of the Spanish hunting areas provide an important source for the history of biodiversity and climate change.

The book was widely popular and well-read, making complete copies in good condition a great rarity. James Edmund Harting calls the book in his Bibliotheca accipitraria of “extreme rarity”.