Medieval Literature

The ‘Viaticum’ and Its Commentaries, numerous b&w illustrations from paintings, illuminated manuscripts and photographs of artefacts and sculptures, notes, bibliography, general index and subject index, xvi & 354 pp, red cloth in d/w, d/w a little rubbed with slight tears at extremities, otherwise in very good condition, University of Pennsylvania Press (Philadelphia, USA) 1990

22.8 x 14.7 cm, 760g, ISBN 0 81228 142 X

See the description (below) from the dustwrapper flap.

Long out of print, and, judging by the prices asked by other booksellers (ranging from £68 for an ex-library copy to £250 for a copy described as “new”!!), very few copies appear to have been printed.  I feel slightly embarrassed asking £38.50 for this copy, but even a bookseller gotta live . . .

How can a book published in 1990 be described as “new” in 2015?  Garages used to call such parts “new old stock”, but it has to be said the parts had a regrettable tendency to fail spectacularly when fitted to a restored car, having been sitting on a shelf for perhaps thirty years.