Veuve de Nicolas-Bonaventure Duchesne

Measuring the Mountain: Deluc on the Summit of the Buet

New edition, the second after the original Geneva edition of 1772, published in Paris in 1784 by the widow Duchesne, in four octavo volumes. Illustrated with six folding plates engraved by G. Dheulland and C. G. Geissler, depicting barometers, thermometers, and various measuring instruments, together with a folding table comparing atmospheric heights calculated according to the formulae of several scientists, including Mariotte, Halley, Cassini, Daniel Bernoulli, and Bouguer.

Contemporary full mottled polished calf. Smooth...

New edition of the translation by Alain-René Le Sage, revised by Pons-Auguste Alletz, some forty years after its initial publication. Two frontispieces decorate each volume. As we learn from the Avertissement, this classic, which flowed from the pen of the author nicknamed the "Divine Spaniard" by his compatriots, was then, in the 1770s, unknown to a large part of the French youth.

Contemporary binding in full brown tree calf, smooth gilt spine with four compartments separated by traditional and dotted...

Second edition, revised and enlarged, illustrated with 7 superb copper-engraved plates by Laurent after drawings by David Massil and Antoine Favray, including 4 folding plates (6 plates in the first volume, 1 in the second).

See Contominas 315. Blackmer 655 (the 1783 edition erroneously records 9 plates). Absent from Atabey.

Contemporary full mottled calf, smooth spines richly gilt with floral and typographic ornaments, red morocco lettering-pieces, green morocco volume labels, the latter partially rubbed, gilt rolls to the spine ends partly worn, blue endpapers and pastedowns, red edges.

Some restorations to the spines and joints, occasional foxing.

This second...

First edition. A frontispiece-portrait by Gabriel de Saint-Aubin.
Full marbled calf binding. Smooth spine decorated. Red morocco title-label. Gilt fillets framing the boards. Fine Louis XV binding. Good copy.
The historical eulogy, which extends to p. 70, continues with the thoughts and witticisms of Saint-Foix. Saint Foix served until age 36 with the musketeers, and was famous for his duels. He was royal historiographer and playwright. His most celebrated work remains the Historical Essays on Paris.
Engraved armorial bookplate, the arms are those of the de Bréda family. Motto: Dominus protector vitae mea a quo trepidabo.
Label beneath the bookplate: Former library of the...

Rare first edition of the French translation prepared by Pingeron, who enriched it with notes (cf. Attabey, 1127. Not in Chadenat, Hage Chahine or Blackmer. Monglond, I, 466. Brunet, V, 317. Quérard, IX, 98). Only one copy recorded in Italian public collections (Ravenna).

Our copy is preserved in its original blue-grey wrappers, the spine plain with contemporary manuscript titling, entirely uncut.

First French edition of this uncommon work: other writings by Sestini are encountered more frequently (perhaps owing to its date of publication?).

With a dedicatory epistle to the comte de La Billardrie d'Angivillier.

Abbot Domenico Sestini (1750–1832) was a numismatist...