Biblioteca de Autores Españoles Desde la Formación del Lenguaje Hasta Nuestros Días -- Obras Escogidas

Madrid: Ediciones Atlas, 1957. Hardcover. Edited by Juan Pérez de Tudelo and Emilio López Oto, with critical essays by Tudelo. Complete 5-volume set. Small 4to. Blue buckram with gilt spine lettering. clxxxviii, 502pp; 617pp; xxxii, 470pp; 472pp; xxiii, 557pp. Frontispieces. Very good overall. Binding lightly rubbed but clean and strong; endpapers a bit age toned, else texts all tight and nice; small mended tear to single leaf in Volume II. First of this modern edition, entirely in Spanish in two-column format, of the '"Obras Escogidas" (selected works) of the Spanish colonialist in Central and South America (1484-1566) turned Dominican friar, social reformer and writer who spent decades as a missionary combating slavery and the abuse of indigenous peoples. Volumes I-II contain "Historia de las Indias" ("History of the Indies," first published 1561), Volumes III-IV contain "Apologética Historia" ("The Apologetic Summary History of the People of These Indies," published 1556), and Volume V contains "Opúscules, Cartas y Memoriales" (shorter works, letters and memorials). Front and rear pastedown of each volume bear the bookplate of Edward James Schuster (1908-98), a noted Iowa professor of foreign languages and prolific writer on educational topics; heavily involved in Latin American affairs, he was often a visiting professor of history and political science at the Ibero-American University in Mexico City. In addition to scholarly books, he authored the essay "Judicial Contributions of las Casas and Vitoria," published in "Revista de Historia de América" in 1966; clearly he used this set for research, for occasional pages and sections in Volumes I, II and V bear light, neat underlining in red. A nice set of this scarce and massive reference. (Inventory #: 51230)