First Book on Economics Printed in Spain
Elementos de economia politica con aplicacion particular a Espana
Notes: The first book on economics written by a Spaniard and published in Spain (a critical edition was published by the Instituto de Estudios Fiscales in 1989). Elementos was an official university textbook for a generation, drawing on the work of Adam Smith, Jean-Baptiste Say, and K. H. Rau. This first edition was reportedly just 500 copies (see The Economics Reader: Textbooks, Manuals and the Dissemination of the Economic Sciences..., p. 163). The book "is divided into a theoretical section, which synthesizes Smith and Say, and a section containing applications to the Spanish case" (ibid.). The only earlier Spanish treatise on economics is Alvaro Florez Estrada's Curso de economia politica, published in London a year earlier. Very scarce in commerce.
xx, 315 pages, two parts, with separate title pages but continuous pagination.
Edition + Condition: First edition (first printing). With initial and terminal blanks and the half-title. In a 19th-century traditional Spanish binding, with a morocco label on the spine. Fore-edge stained yellow; marbled endpapers. A very attractive copy of a scarce book.
Publication: Madrid: Imprenta de Don Ramon Verges, 1829.
Item No: #5043
Price: $1,250