Fine 18th Century Illustrated Books

First edition from the Imprimerie Royale, complete in nine quarto volumes with all 262 black-and-white engraved plates.

Contemporary full mottled calf, spines with raised bands decorated with guilloche tooling and gilt ornaments in the compartments, red morocco lettering-pieces and numbering-pieces, triple gilt fillet border on boards, double gilt fillet on board edges, marbled endpapers and pastedowns, marbled edges. Minor variations in the tooling on volume 3.

In this set, some headcaps missing, 6 cm joints split at foot of volume 1, 6.5 cm and 6 cm at foot of volume 2, 3.5 cm at head of volume 3, corners bumped, scratches and minor restoration to boards, including a more significant...

Second edition, illustrated with a macabre engraved frontispiece (cf. Quérard II, 516; Cioranescu, XVIII, 13544, for the original 1712 edition).

Contemporary handwritten annotations on the title leaf.

Full brown calf binding, spine with five raised bands richly gilt in compartments with decorative tools, red morocco title label largely missing, gilt fillet framing the covers, sprinkled edges, corners rubbed, contemporary binding.

Headcaps worn down, some rubbing to spine and boards.

Second edition of this highly engaging work of early “libertine” philosophy, in the original sense of the term.

The project of the Réflexions was inspired by a remark from Montaigne: “Si j'estoy faiseur de livres, je...

First and only edition of the author's sole work.

Adorned with a fine engraved portrait of Jacques-Nicolas Colbert (1655–1707), youngest son of the minister and Archbishop of Carthage, to whom the book is dedicated.

Bound in full red morocco, spine with five raised bands, richly gilt compartments decorated with gilt fleurs-de-lys, gilt fillets, and Du Seuil-style panels on the covers; gilt tooling to headcaps and board edges, all edges gilt. Contemporary binding.

Some foxing, small wormholes at head and foot of spine, three black spots at the head of the upper cover.

Provenance: from the library of Alfred Massé (1911–1951), Radical-Socialist deputy for Nièvre under the Third Republic, with his...

Very rare first French edition of this translation, illustrated with a folding plate.

Full mottled tan calf binding, spine with five raised bands decorated with gilt fleurons and typographic motifs, red morocco title label, gilt rolls at the head and tail, gilt fillet along the edges, lightly rubbed corners, marbled edges, contemporary binding.

A pleasant copy.

The only French translation of the Libellus, quo demonstratur : Colchici autumnalis radicem non solum tuto posse exhiberi hominibus, sed et ejus usu interno curari quandoque morbos difficillimos, qui aliis remediis non cedunt (Vienna, Trattner, 1763), which was also issued in an English version.

An Austrian physician, Anton von Störck...

Edition published one year after the original, illustrated with four fine copper-engraved plates by Charles Eisen depicting Nordic types (Icelandic women, a bear hunt, Samoyeds, a Laplander in a sleigh) engraved by Le Mire, one folding map by Bellin, thirteen maps, plans, or views (eight of them folding) engraved by Croissey, as well as a charming engraved title vignette and a headpiece by Le Gouaz.

See Sabin, 37616; Chadenat, 1633; Boucher de la Richarderie, I, 380.

Full mottled calf binding, smooth spine richly gilt in compartments decorated with gilt fleurons and geometric motifs, sometimes slightly rubbed, red morocco label, restorations to spine and joints, gilt roll tooling on the...

First edition. Quérard I, 271 lists only one edition: "Paris, Née de La Rochelle, 1789." Kress B.1163; Goldsmiths 13858. Not in Einaudi."

With loose printed title pages for each volume, dated 1789.

The first volume, with an engraved pictorial title after Meunier, contains 52 double-page or folding plates inserted into the pagination, without following its numbering logic.

The second volume has an engraved pictorial title by Zaveris after Meunier and includes 154 etched plates of coins.

Full mottled calf, spines with six raised bands, gilt fillets and double gilt panels, red morocco lettering-pieces, green morocco numbering-pieces, gilt rolls on the headcaps, double blind-ruled borders on...

First edition, illustrated with an engraved portrait of Magellan as frontispiece and four folding maps and plans of the Strait of Magellan. Cf. Sabin, 16765; Leclerc, 1971; Chadenat, 552; Palau, 352513; Aguilar Piñal, VIII, 2443.

The present copy does not include the separately published appendix issued in 1793, devoted to the supplementary survey carried out by the packet vessels Santa Casilda and Santa Eulalia, a supplement only rarely found together with the main work.

Modern full brown calf, executed in an eighteenth-century style, spine with five raised bands gilt in compartments with decorative tools, gilt rolls to the spine ends, marbled endpapers, red edges, gilt edge-rolls.

An...

The ‘Kehl edition’, the most renowned edition of Voltaire's works, illustrated and published on deluxe paper. It was printed on five different types of paper, and only the deluxe editions, such as ours on laid paper, feature engravings. These are naturally the most sought-after and rarest copies.

Binding in full painted sheep decorated with a “honeycomb” motif, smooth spine tooled with gilt fleurons, fillets and compartments, light beige calf lettering and volume pieces, gilt chain-roll border on covers, marbled endpapers, gilt roll on edges, all edges marbled, contemporary binding. Two volumes (nos. 50 and 70) with slight variations in gilt tools on the spines and with orange morocco...

Illustrated edition with 2 folding maps and 10 engraved plates outside the text (see Garrison & Morton 71; DSB 613-614).

Contemporary full marbled calf binding, spine with six raised bands decorated with double black panels stamped with blind typographic motifs, burgundy shagreen title label, marbled endpapers and pastedowns, red edges.

Some restoration to the binding, spine rebacked; evidence of waterstaining to the upper margins of the leaves in the second volume.

Giovanni Maria Lancisi (1654–1720), an Italian physician trained at the University of Rome, produced significant work on mosquitoes and malaria (he introduced the term), as well as on cardiovascular diseases and aneurysms. These...

Very rare first edition illustrated at the end with 4 folding plates (cf Quérard VII, 190).

Modern binding in half mottled sheep with small vellum corners, smooth spine decorated with double gilt fillets, red morocco title-piece, marbled paper boards.

The author was a lawyer and architect in Lunéville.

Chapters on fire, the causes of fires, stoves and chimneys, floors, partitions, staircases, roofing, etc.

Pleasant copy.

First edition of this important work on Marseille's colonial trade, published anonymously in Avignon in 1764 under the designation "par un Citadin" [by a Citizen]. The work has long been attributed to Chambon, described by the Bibliothèque nationale as a collector for the royal tax farms, while Barbier identifies him as a receiver-general of finances.

Two volumes, quarto. Volume I: engraved title, 4 unnumbered leaves comprising title, advertisement and table of chapters, 615 pp., with errata on the verso of the final page, 7 maps and 7 plates. Volume II: engraved title, 4 unnumbered leaves comprising title, advertisement and table of chapters, 618 pp., one unnumbered errata leaf, 3 maps...

New edition, adorned with a portrait of the author by Daullé, three headpieces by de Sève engraved by Juste Chevillet, twelve plates engraved by Jacques Aliamet, Jean-Jacques Flipart, Noël Le Mire, Louis-Simon Lempereur, Dominique Sornique, and Jacques-Nicolas Tardieu, and thirteen vignettes and sixty tail-pieces, all by de Sève engraved by Jean-Charles Baquoy, Jean-Jacques Flipart, and Louis Legrand.

A superb copy of the first luxury edition of Racine, among the most sought-after, bound in the most sumptuous red morocco.

Contemporary full red morocco, spine with five raised bands and gilt compartments, triple gilt fillet border, corner fleurons, yellow morocco lettering pieces and volume...

First edition of the French translation, illustrated with a folding copper-engraved frontispiece by Bénard: "Mort du Capitaine Cook à Owhy-hée, Fevrier 1779," and a folding map titled "Carte montrant la route suivie par M. Cook… dans son troisième et dernier Voyage."

See O'Reilly and Reitman, 419. See also Hill, p. 253, for the first English edition. Forbes, Hawaiian National Biography, 45.

Contemporary binding in half marbled calf with vellum-tipped corners, spine decorated with gilt floral compartments, red morocco title label, marbled paper boards, red edges.

Restored loss to the title page. The half-title is lacking in our copy; the boards are modern.

"An apocryphal account of the third...

First edition, illustrated with a frontispiece by Ozanne depicting the frigate *L’Aurore*, engraved by Haussard, four plates of instruments, and one folding map at the end of the volume (cf. Polak 2098).

Contemporary-style binding in bronze half calf, flat spine decorated with double gilt fillets, bronze morocco title label with some rubbing, marbled paper boards, modern binding.

In 1767, Coutanvaux was commissioned by the Académie des Sciences to undertake a voyage to the North to test various marine timekeeping systems.

Some light foxing, not affecting the text.

Deluxe edition of the Works of Salomon Gessner, published in Paris between 1786 and 1793 in three large quarto volumes, finely printed on wove paper and preserved in handsome uniform contemporary green morocco bindings.

Smooth spines decorated with four gilt cornucopia tools and ornamental rolls, gilt roll borders to the boards, board edges and turn-ins, pink paper pastedowns, all edges gilt. Some rubbing, darker areas to the boards of the second volume, spines uniformly faded, occasional foxing.

The illustration comprises three engraved titles, a portrait, a frontispiece, 72 plates, 4 vignettes and 66 tailpieces, all designed by Jean-Jacques-François Le Barbier the Elder. The...

First and unique edition of this work, illustrated with 9 plates engraved by Benard after drawings by Penevert (cf Polak 8371).

Binding in half mottled tawny basane with vellum corners, smooth spine decorated with gilt friezes, black basane title piece partially torn, some rubbing and small holes on the spine, marbled paper boards with small paper losses, contemporary binding.

Some restorations on the spine, corners rubbed.

This work is one of the volumes of the *Description des Arts et Métiers* published at the initiative of the Académie des Sciences.

Author of numerous works on navigation and ships, Romme was a professor of mathematics at the School of Marine Guards of Rochefort. He developed...

First edition, first issue, exhibiting all the bibliographical points recorded by Cohen-de Ricci (nos. 769–772): an engraved frontispiece, three dedication plates, four title ornaments, thirty vignettes and a final tailpiece, together with one hundred and forty full-page illustrations, including the frontispiece, numbered 2 to 140 and distributed 48, 33, 37 and 22 across the four volumes. The illustrations are after designs by Boucher, Eisen, Gravelot, Le Prince, Monnet and Moreau, and engraved by, among others, Baquoy, Basan, Binet, Duclos and de Ghendt. The frontispiece, three of the four title ornaments and the majority of the vignettes are the work of Pierre-Philippe Choffard, while the...

First edition of this excellent maritime dictionary, later reprinted in 1780, 1797, and 1799.

The work is complete in all its parts and includes 31 engraved plates by Le Gouaz after the author's drawings.

Contemporary full mottled calf binding, spine with five raised bands decorated with gilt compartments and floral tools, red morocco title label, headcap worn down, marbled endpapers and pastedowns, red edges, upper corners worn.

Small loss to the upper left corner of the front free endpaper, tears to the left margin of the title page, occasional foxing, otherwise a pleasant copy internally.

Born in Lyon on 5 November 1743, Daniel Lescallier entered naval service in December 1765 as a writer in...

Second edition of the French translation, expanded with a few remarks and illustrated with a map of the North Atlantic and 9 folding plates outside the text (natural history, views, Inuit types, etc.), cf. Sabin 22312n. "European Americana" 750/110. See Leclerc 717 for the first French edition published a year earlier.

The plates are captioned in both French and Dutch; the original English edition was published in London in 1748; the first French edition appeared in Paris in 1749.

The work opens with a historical account of earlier attempts to discover a route to the East Indies via the Northwest Passage.

Contemporary binding in full marbled calf, spine with gilt compartments decorated with...

Second illustrated edition, with 68 wood engravings within the text.

The first leaf bears, on its verso, a few lines of music (the recto is blank). On the final leaf, the same score reveals, when folded, lines of writing: "Les notes musicales qui servent de Frontispice à cet Ouvrage, ressemblent parfaitement au Discours & à la Musique ci-dessus. C'est la manière de plier le papier qui fait paraître l'un & disparaître l'autre" (cf. Fechner, p. 152).

Paris: Chez l'Auteur, Granger, Bailly, Lesclapart, Hardouin & Gattey, Varin, Lagrange [Printed by Veuve Hérissant], 1786. Octavo (in-8), 2 ff. n. ch., pp. [v] to xix, 328 pp., 1 folding unnumbered leaf in accordion format, 68 woodcuts in the...

Rare first edition of this elementary Arabic grammar, the author's first publication, composed at the beginning of his teaching career in Oriental languages at Jena by the pastor and theologian Heinrich Eberhard Gottlob Paulus (1761–1851), who would later become known primarily for his systematically rationalist interpretation of the Scriptures.

Illustrated with 5 folding tables.

We have identified only three copies in the CCF (Bulac, Strasbourg, and Chambéry).

Some occasional foxing, small loss of leather to the lower left corner of the upper board.

Contemporary full tree calf binding, spine with gilt fillets, garlands and floral tools, cherry-red morocco label, gilt roll tooling to headcaps...

First edition of the French translation, illustrated with a portrait of the author and 29 engraved plates depicting objects, ornaments, coins, plants, and animals (cf. Cordier, Bibl. Japonica, 447. Gay, 3151. Brunet, V, 850).

Contemporary full marbled calf bindings, flat spines richly decorated with gilt typographic tools, gilt roll tooling at head and tail, brown morocco title-pieces, dark green morocco volume labels, gilt roll-tooled borders on boards, marbled endpapers and pastedowns, gilt fillets on board edges, yellow edges.

A Swedish botanist and naturalist, Carl Peter Thunberg (1743–1828) studied medicine and natural history at Uppsala and became one of Linnaeus’s most brilliant...

Second edition of Lucas’s third journey to the Near East, undertaken between 1714 and 1717 (first published in 1729); cf. Gay, 2122. Chadenat, 5090. Atabey 734. Blackmer, 1038.

The illustrations include two folding maps (Anatolia and surrounding regions by de l’Isle; Lower Egypt and the course of the Nile by Lucas) and 32 plates outside the text: monuments, picturesque views, architectural plans, archaeological artefacts, various inscriptions, etc.

Contemporary half tawny sheep, smooth spines ruled in gilt with triple fillets, headcaps stained, some rubbing, marbled paper boards, sprinkled edges, some wear to the edges of the first volume. 19th-century bindings.

Pleasant internal...

First edition of the French translation, illustrated with 12 folding plates and maps outside the text, and 11 folding tables included in the pagination (cf. Sabin 62574).

Contemporary full mottled calf binding, spine with five raised bands decorated with double gilt panels, floral tools and gilt medallions, red morocco title label with some loss and partially lifting, gilt garland frame on covers, marbled endpapers and pastedowns, all edges yellow.

Some minor foxing, one joint fragile.

Famous account of this "unfortunate expedition which served to demonstrate the impossibility of crossing the Polar ice" [Hoefer]. Pages 187 to 208 are devoted to natural history, with 2 plates [XI and XII]...

Rare first edition of this "relation (...) much sought after for its accuracy", illustrated with 19 folding plates, including 2 maps (cf. Sabin 3604, Leclerc 119).

Full marbled tan calf binding, spine with five raised bands, gilt compartments decorated with gilt floral motifs, small chip at foot of spine, scuffing to covers, red edges, bumped corners, gilt fillets along the board edges, contemporary binding.

The author, a physician and botanist born in Perpignan in 1690—where he held a post at the military hospital—was introduced by Antoine de Jussieu to the Conseil de la Marine in August 1721 and appointed royal physician and botanist in French Guiana. He landed in Cayenne at the end of 1721...

First edition, illustrated with 3 hors-texte plates (cf. Rodrigues 1357. Borba de Moraes I, 381. See INED 2496 for the 1774 edition).

The plates depict: Brama, god of the Indians – View of a pagoda tower – Snake charmer.

Contemporary-style binding in marbled tawny calf over vellum-tipped corners, spine with five raised bands, ruled in gilt, brown calf lettering-piece, marbled paper-covered boards, red sprinkled edges, modern binding.

Coromandel Coast, European trading posts, military strongholds, Indian religion, medicine, anatomy, caste system, Indian manners, dress, dwellings, gardens, food (and temperance), wedding rituals, funerals, Indian morals, fauna, flora, etc.

Pages 3 to 21 are devoted...

Edition published in Paris by A. Nepveu in 1815, in six small octavo volumes, illustrated with 54 hand-coloured plates depicting twelve views, more than sixty different costumes, monuments and various picturesque scenes, including bullfights, most of them after drawings made in 1809 and 1810. Cf. Colas 439; Lipperheide 1214, the latter reference still requiring direct verification in the printed bibliography; Brunet I, 1226, no. 3; Quérard I, 506. The title itself calls for the 54 plates and records the recent origin of many of their designs.

Contemporary half blond calf, spines with four false bands decorated with triple gilt and black fillets, gilt rolls at head and foot, marbled paper...

TASSO, Torquato. Jérusalem délivrée, poëme du Tasse. Nouvelle traduction. Paris: Musier fils, 1774. 2 volumes, 15 × 24 cm. (2) leaves, viij, 341 pp.; (2) leaves, v, 328 pp., (4) leaves.

First edition of Charles-François Lebrun's anonymous prose translation of Tasso's Jerusalem Delivered, illustrated with the celebrated compositions by Hubert-François Gravelot, originally produced for the Italian edition of 1771.

The illustrations comprise two fully engraved title-pages by Drouet, each with an ornamental vignette, two frontispieces with medallion portraits of Tasso and Gravelot, twenty engraved plates, twenty headpieces depicting the principal characters of the poem, and twenty-eight...

New collected edition, following the first complete edition published in 1682. It is illustrated with a portrait and 33 plates (one frontispiece to each play) by Punt; these captioned plates are reductions of Boucher's quarto plates, which first appeared in the celebrated deluxe edition of 1734. Punt's charming plates are dated 1738 or 1739. Title pages printed in red and black.

This edition appears to be the first to use the reduced Boucher plates. It also follows the famous quarto edition by only a year, and is rather well printed. These reduced plates were reused in several later editions, notably that of 1765, which includes Voltaire's notes. The Life of Molière runs to some hundred...

Edition illustrated with two frontispieces, one of them a portrait of Fénelon, and twenty-four full-page plates, one for each of the twenty-four books of the Avantures de Telemaque. Copy printed on thick Dutch laid paper.

Bound in full red straight-grain morocco, covers framed with dotted borders, smooth spines decorated with seven dotted fillets, gilt titles and volume numbers, dotted rule on board edges, gilt inner roll-tooled borders, marbled paper pastedowns, all edges gilt. Some very slight rubbing and soiling to bindings, spines sunned, some foxing, offsetting from the plates onto the half-titles.

Bookplate of Thomas Pares (1716-1805), a lawyer in Leicester and owner of Hopwell Hall...

First complete edition.

It is illustrated with two frontispieces, twenty-four full-page engravings, and a folding map of Telemachus's travels. The portrait of Fénelon serving as frontispiece to the first volume is signed Baillieul and Duflos; the second frontispiece, together with the plates, is signed Bonnart fils and Giffart, while the map is drawn by Rousset and engraved by Berey. A few head-pieces, bandeaux, and ornamental initials. 

Bindings in full red morocco signed Chambolle-Duru, richly decorated covers, spine with five raised bands ruled in gilt, gilt panels and fleurons between the bands, author, title, volume number, place and date lettered in gilt on the spines, doublures in...

New edition of this ancient pastoral romance, illustrated with a frontispiece and eight full-page engravings. With several headpieces, decorated initials and tailpieces.

Dark yellow morocco, spine with five raised bands, author, title and date lettered in gilt, gilt fillets to board edges and headcaps, gilt inner dentelle, all edges gilt; tan morocco case by Riviere & Son, spine with five raised bands, author, title and date lettered in gilt, blind-tooled fillets. Raised bands lightly rubbed, with a few scuffs to the slipcase, otherwise a handsome copy.

Mortimer L. Schiff's guilt red morocco bookplate on the front pastedown.

Revised and enhanced edition, illustrated with a frontispiece, an allegorical composition on the title page, and four full-page engravings by Bernard Picart. An allegorical figure within the text, several headpieces and tailpieces.

Contemporary mottled brown sheepskin binding, spine with five raised bands decorated with gilt motifs, red morocco title label, gilt roulette to the board edges, marbled paper pastedowns, red edges. Corners and headcap rubbed, some scuffing and losses at the joints, trifling soiling to a few leaves. Manuscript ex-libris "Messieurs Falconet et Lancelot" and ink date "8bre [October] 1785" on the title page. Manuscript note in ink on a front flyleaf, before the...

First edition, illustrated with 4 plates, one folding, and a large vignette on the dedication leaf.

Contemporary full fawn calf, smooth spine gilt in compartments with gilt floral tools, olive-green shagreen lettering-piece, minor rubbing to the joints, boards framed with triple gilt fillets, marbled endpapers and pastedowns, gilt fillets to the board edges, all edges gilt.

Contemporary ownership inscription on a free endpaper.

Internally in pleasing condition.

First edition of the French translation, illustrated with an engraved frontispiece and a folding plate.

Bradel binding in half red morocco-grained shagreen with small corners, smooth spine richly decorated in the grotesque style, orange paper-covered boards with a few small areas of paper loss and some staining, yellow edges.

A few minor spots of foxing.

After witnessing the plight of enslaved Black people in the West Indies, the Danish botanist Paul Erdmann Isert returned from his travels as a fervent abolitionist. His writings prompted Prince Frederick of Denmark to abolish the triangular trade throughout his dominions in 1803.

First edition of this celebrated illustrated issue featuring artwork by Le Barbier, with the plates engraved under his supervision. Engraved frontispiece portrait of the author by Le Mire and 15 finely engraved full-page plates after drawings by Le Barbier. 
Contemporary full glazed red Russia leather binding, attributable to Bozérian l'aîné. Smooth spine tooled with four small concentric ornaments and gilt rules. Gilt fillet border to covers. Wine-coloured tabis silk endpapers. Gilt inner dentelles. All edges gilt. Light rubbing to the binding. Small loss of paper at the upper right corner of the title page in Volume I. Occasional foxing, particularly in the margins of several plates.
A very...

A fine large-paper copy on vellum of the 1796 edition, which contains several previously unpublished texts by the author, a frontispiece portrait, 13 illustrations and 2 maps, engraved by Pierre-Alexandre Tardieu, Claude-Nicolas Malapeau, P. F. Tardieu, A. Girardet, Jean Louis Charles Pauquet, François Denis Née, Emmanuel-Jean-Népomucène de Ghendt, Charles Emmanuel Patas, Noël Le Mire and Vincent-Marie Langlois (in order of appearance).

Contemporary half long-grain red morocco bindings, smooth spines divided by hatched gilt fillets forming false panels, each decorated in gilt with the author's name, the volume number, and at the foot the binder's name, red-pink marbled paper boards...

A complete set of the astronomical writings of Jean Sylvain Bailly, partly in first edition. This is the main work of the author,  first Mayor of Paris, elected during his lifetime to three French academies, a distinction previously achieved only by Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle.

The present set comprises the second edition of the Histoire de l'astronomie ancienne, the new edition of the Histoire de l'astronomie moderne, and the first edition of the Traité de l'astronomie indienne et orientale. All three were published during the author's lifetime.

It is moreover complete with all 21 plates, engraved by Pierre Claude de La Gardette and Yves-Marie Le Gouaz. The three plates belonging to the...

Second edition, the "most complete of this work" (baron Pichon sales catalogue, 3rd part, no. 5531) containing a map of Dauphiné, an engraving by Berey fils, and six plates depicting seals.

Full marbled brown sheep bindings, spines with six raised bands framed by gilt fillets and compartments richly decorated with gilt floral motifs, red morocco title labels, green morocco volume labels, blind fillets on the board edges, red edges; contemporary bindings.

Tiny wormholes at the joints and in the margins of the boards, restorations to the spines and joints, surface scuffing to the boards; the upper portion of the second volume further presents a few small stains and browning.

Foxing, browning...

First edition, first printing, complete with its engraved title page and dedication page, as well as its 59 maps, most of them multicoloured, all mounted on guards. Our copy is bound with the "Catalogue des ouvrages, tant anciens que modernes, du fonds du Sr Desnos, Ingénieur-Géographe pour les Globes & Sphères" for the year 1765.

Contemporary binding in full tree-calf, spine with five raised bands and gilt-tooled compartments decorated with pomegranate fleurons, red morocco lettering-piece, triple blind-ruled fillet border to boards, double gilt fillet to board edges, blue sprinkled edges, shell-pattern marbled pastedowns and endpapers. 

Headcaps missing, joints worn and split for several...

First edition, at one time attributed to Bernard Le Bouyer de Fontenelle, on the loves of a shepherd of illustrious lineage: Mirtil, son of Venus and Adonis. Complete copy with its engraved title page by Louis Legrand and its six plates drawn by Hubert François Gravelot and engraved by Louis Legrand.

Half marbled calf binding, spine with five raised bands decorated with dotted gilt fillets, five compartments richly gilt with fillets and fleurons, pebble-pattern marbled paper boards, red edges, pastedowns and endpapers also in pebble-pattern marbled paper, pastiche binding in fine condition.

A few discreet marginal dampstains.

First edition, illustrated at the end of the volume with 28 hors-texte plates of Chinese ideograms (cf. Cordier, Sinica, 1735-36; Backer & Sommervogel II, 1168 (2)).

The table of plates lists 27; Backer records 29; our copy contains 28, whereas most copies indeed call for 27.

Modern half fawn calf, smooth spine ruled in gilt with double fillets and gilt floral tools, brown speckled paper-covered boards, speckled top edge. The sole edition of a work thoroughly informed on the ideogrammatic origins of Chinese characters, thereby contradicting the thesis advanced by the English orientalist Needham concerning the supposed analogy between Chinese writing and the Egyptian hieroglyphs discovered on a...

First quarto edition, complete with all volumes and plates, commonly referred to as the “Third Edition” of the Encyclopédie, and also known as the “Encyclopédie de Pellet” or “Encyclopédie de Lyon” or “Encyclopédie du Lac” by Simon-Nicolas-Henri Linguet.

Full marbled and polished brown sheepskin contemporary bindings, spines with five raised bands and four gilt compartments decorated with pomegranate gilt tools, two gilt decorative rolls at foot, title and volume lettering-pieces in red and green morocco, boards twice framed in blind, board edges gilt, all red edges, marbled pastedowns and endpapers.

Discreet restorations to a small number of spine-ends and joints, a few minor and...

Rare illustrated first edition, with 5 copper-engraved plates hors-texte, including 2 folding plates (cf. Barbier II, 302. Schwab, 517. Hage Chahine, 4320. Wilson, 200. Absent from Blackmer and Atabey.)

Our copy lacks the two dedication leaves to Rouillié, often missing, with repairs to the joints and one corner, and a manuscript ex-libris on the title-page.

Contemporary full mottled fawn calf, spine with five raised bands gilt and decorated with gilt compartments and floral tools, tan calf title-label, gilt fillets to the edges partly faded, speckled edges.

Sanson, a zealous apostolic missionary, tireless traveller and accomplished diplomat, arrived in Persia in 1683, learning Armenian...

First edition of the French translation of this account, originally published under the title: "An Account of the Island of Ceylon" in London in 1803 (cf. Boucher de La Richarderie, V, 135. Brunet, IV, 490 and Quérard, VII, 43 mention an edition published by Dentu, 1804).

Contemporary full mottled calf bindings, smooth spines decorated with gilt compartments and gilt tools, red morocco lettering pieces, green calf volume labels, gilt rolls at the head and tail partly worn, fragile joints, marbled paper endpapers and pastedowns, bookplates pasted to the pastedowns, gilt fillets on the board edges, speckled edges.

Bindings rubbed, small losses at the foot of the joints, a few light foxing...

New edition of the French translation of this work, originally published in 1731 in two quarto volumes (see Brunet IV, 456).

This edition is illustrated with 8 folding plates, comprising 3 maps and 5 views.

Contemporary full marbled tan calf bindings, smooth spines richly decorated with gilt floral panels, bronze calf lettering- and volume-pieces, small wormholes to the spines, gilt rolls to the caps, single blind fillet framing the boards, marbled endpapers, gilt fillets to the board edges, red edges, bindings of the period.

Repairs to the joints, a few occasional spots of foxing.

The translator of this French version, written "en un style aisé, clair, même élégant", was Abbé Nicolas Gédoyn...

Rare first edition, illustrated with an engraved frontispiece, two copper-engraved plates, and twenty-five woodcut figures in the text (cf. Rosenthal, Bibliotheca Magica et Pneumatica, 8648, which records only an edition of 1788).

A few light spots of foxing; two dampstains affecting some leaves.

Contemporary half tan calf, the smooth spine faded and decorated with gilt rolls, fillets and floral tools, gilt initials at the foot; some rubbing and two small black stains to the spine; marbled boards, marbled endpapers and pastedowns, marbled edges.

Rouen edition published by Jean-Baptiste Machuel le Jeune in 1715 for volumes I, III, IV and V. Volume II, entitled Suite du voyage autour du monde, avec un traité des vents qui regnent dans toute la zone torride, comes from the Amsterdam edition issued by the widow of Paul Marret and is dated 1711. Titles printed in red and black. The set is illustrated with 66 hors-texte plates and maps, most folding: 3 frontispieces, 39 plates and 24 maps. These include a world map, maps of islands and coastlines, coastal profiles, views of ports and islands, monuments, battle scenes, a shipwreck, and numerous representations of flora and fauna. Cf. Sabin, 18382; Borba de Moraes, I, 243-244; Leclerc, 416...

First edition of Étienne Bourdet’s major treatise, published in Paris in 1757 in two volumes, eleven years after the second edition of Pierre Fauchard’s Le Chirurgien Dentiste. The work is illustrated with 13 folding engraved plates depicting instruments, appliances and dental procedures.

Contemporary full mottled tan calf. Spines with five raised bands outlined in gilt and decorated with gilt floral compartments; bronze calf lettering-pieces, the volume-numbering pieces partly rubbed away; gilt rolls to the headcaps, blind fillet borders to the boards, gilt rules to the board edges, marbled edges. A few worn corners and occasional minor foxing.

Copy of J. Pilane, doctor of medicine in...

First edition illustrated with 8 engraved plates outside the text by Le Bas after Oudry, including a frontispiece and 6 hunting plates depicting stag hunting scenes (cf. Cioranescu, 60 125. Thiébaud 836-39. Cohen 952, with the often fanciful collation characteristic of this bibliography).

A fine copy complete in all its parts, notably retaining leaf Diij, which is sometimes found supplied in facsimile or replaced by a cancel leaf.

Contemporary full mottled tan calf, spine with five raised bands gilt-ruled and richly gilt in compartments with floral tools, gilt rolls to the spine ends, marbled endpapers, two engraved bookplates pasted to the endpapers and pastedowns, gilt fillets to the board...

Rare first edition of the French translation of the Journal of the Resolution (London, 1775), illustrated with a large folding copper-engraved map by E. Dussy, issued without legend.

Cf. O'Reilly & Reitman, 380: "Traduction de la relation apocryphe de Marra". See Hill, 60.

Scattered occasional foxing, a few abrasions to the boards.

Contemporary full marbled tan sheep, spine in five raised bands richly decorated with double gilt compartments, gilt fillets to bands partly rubbed, red morocco lettering-piece, gilt decorative tool at foot of spine, gilt rolls to board edges largely rubbed, marbled endpapers, single gilt fillet to edges, corners worn, marbled edges.

This is an apocryphal account of...

First edition illustrated with 3 plates (Cf. Rodrigues 1357; Borba de Moraes I, 381; see INED 2496 for the 1774 edition).

Modern binding in brown mottled half calf, spine with four raised bands, gilt rules at head and foot, gilt initials at foot, red calf lettering-piece, marbled paper boards, sprinkled edges.

Stamp of a religious institution on the title page; old bookseller’s label pasted to the facing page.

The Coromandel Coast, European trading settlements, military strongholds, Indian religion, medicine, anatomy, the caste system, Indian manners, clothing, dwellings, gardens, food (and temperance), marriage rites, funerary customs, morality, fauna, flora, etc.

The plates depict: Brahma...

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 edition includes additional...

First edition illustrated with an allegorical frontispiece by J. Goeree engraved on copper, as well as a copper-engraved armorial vignette at the opening of the text (cf. Barbier, III, 560. Quérard, III, 212. Not held at the BnF. Not recorded in Fossati Bellani.)

Contemporary half tawny calf binding, smooth spine decorated with gilt friezes and blind-stamped fleurons now almost entirely faded, red morocco title label, a restoration to the head of the spine, marbled paper boards, early 19th-century binding,

A small black ink stain to a blank endpaper.

The work discusses, among other subjects, the Republic’s losses in Greece, the battles of Lepanto and the Dardanelles, Cyprus, the Morea...

Second edition, issued with the date of the original, which bears the imprint of Michallet in Paris (cf. Willems 1899. Blackmer 325 (our edition) and 326 (third, 1679). Atabey 222 (third edition).

Illustrated with a frontispiece and, at the end of the volume, a large folding view of the battle of Khotin.

Full polished brown calf, spine with five raised bands, decorated in blind with fillets and panel compartments, gilt rolls to the spine ends, covers framed with triple fillet and blind palmette tools, comb-marbled endpapers, gilt garland frame to the pastedowns, double gilt fillets to the edges, red-speckled edges, gilt garland frame to the pastedowns, 19th-century binding.

Some rubbing to the...

First edition illustrated with 1 folding plate consisting of a copper-engraved reproduction of the Choiseul Marble by Poisson (cf. Monglond II, 651.)

A restored tear to the verso of the folding plate.

Bradel binding in full marbled paper-covered boards, smooth spine, brown shagreen lettering-piece, red edges, modern binding.

A pleasing copy.

Illustrated edition, with 6 plates bound at the end of the volume.

Our copy is preserved in its original plain wrappers.

Spine with tears and losses.

From the "Description des Arts et Métiers" published by the Académie des Sciences.

First edition, illustrated with 4 large engraved plates printed on separate leaves and bound at the end of the volume.

Our copy is offered in its original wrappers, under contemporary plain paper covers.

Spine worn with tears and losses, internally in good condition.

From the "Description des Arts et Métiers" (1761-1776).

Celebrated edition entirely engraved both images and text, richly illustrated with 6 engraved titles, a frontispiece and an engraved half-title for volume I, together with 243 figures, 473 vignettes and tail-pieces engraved by Fessard.

The illustration of the first three volumes is the work of Monnet, and in the last three by Fessard after Bardin, Bidauld, Caresme, Desrais, Houel, Kobell, Le Clerc, Leprince, Loutherbourg, and Meyer. The text is entirely engraved by Montulay and Drouet within decorative borders.

Contemporary red morocco bindings, flat spines gilt in a lattice design with floral gilttooling, beige morocco volume and title labels, triple gilt fillet framing the boards, gilt...

New edition, partially original as it is augmented with three new stories and the life of the author (previously published in 1744; before this date, editions included only 10 stories).
The false title of the second volume bears the title "Diverse Works," these two volumes, although sold separately, could be placed after the six-volume Don Quixote. The original title "Exemplary Novels" was used concurrently in other editions.
Translation by Abbé Martin de Chassonville. It is illustrated with a portrait of the author engraved by Gentot after Kent, and 13 plates, of which 12 are engraved by Aveline after Folkema, and one by Daudel. The engravings are charming and pleasing, with typical interiors...

First Dutch edition of Dom Augustin Calmet’s Dictionnaire historique, critique, chronologique, géographique et littéral de la Bible, published in Leiden by Samuel Luchtmans in 1725-1727 in two large folio volumes. Mattheus Gargon, a Reformed minister and rector of the Latin school at Vlissingen, did more than translate the French work first issued in 1722: he enlarged it and added his own annotations. The Dutch undertaking was later completed in 1731 by a two-volume supplement prepared by Jakob van Ostade and Arnold Heinrich Westerhoff.

Titles printed in red and black, each with an engraved vignette. The first volume opens with a frontispiece signed “Ph. a Gunst fecit”, accompanied by a...

First edition of the French translation. First published in English in 1712 under the title A cruising voyage round the world. Illustrated with 2 engraved titles, 14 engraved plates and 7 maps including 2 large format (Paraguay and Chile - mainland Peru and Brazil and the Land of the Amazons) and a world map.
Bound in full brown sprinkled calf, spine elaborately gilt, gilt roulettes on the edges, all red speckled edges. Expertly restored (corners, upper and lower part of joints). Two small restored tears on the world map, not affecting the image.
Ex-libris in ink "Sr Remy" to the upper left margin of the title-page.
A tear to the world map, not affecting the engraving.
The book that brought...

First edition, with 18 engraved maps et 5 folding engraved plates.
Contemporary tan calf, skillfully restored tear to the first folding map, some marginal restorations to the map “Troisième division - Archipel des navigateurs”. Falkland Islands map expertly rebacked on the outer margin as well as the Magellan Strait map. Map of the Buton Strait with a small marginal tear and a second restored with a strip of paper.
Bougainville undertook the first official French circumnavigation and scientific expedition. Starting from Nantes in November 1766, he sailed to the Falklands, made a stopover in Buenos Aires and then crossed the Magellan Strait and the Pacific through the East Indies. The...

Paris, Émery, Saugrain and Pierre Martin, 1730. Four large folio volumes.

Second, revised, corrected and enlarged edition of Dom Augustin Calmet's Dictionnaire historique, critique, chronologique, géographique et littéral de la Bible, and the first to incorporate into a single alphabetical sequence both the text of the 1722 edition and the two supplementary volumes published in 1728. It thus gave this vast exegetical undertaking its definitive form, in four volumes covering A-D, E-M, N-T and V-Z.

The Paris edition of this complete recasting, in large folio, should be distinguished from the counterfeit issued in the same year at Geneva by Marc-Michel Bousquet, in four quarto volumes and...

New edition revised by the author, illustrated with 4 copper-engraved plates by Morel after drawings by Chaudet (Cohen, col. 927). A sumptuous publication from the press of Pierre Didot l'aîné, the foremost printer of his day. This edition is distinguished from all previous ones by its entirely renewed illustration in a neoclassical spirit, in keeping with the aesthetic of the Directoire period. It is the first to have been revised by the author himself.
Contemporary binding in full red morocco, spine with five raised bands richly decorated with gilt dentelles, fillets and fleurons, boards framed with a double gilt dentelle, gilt roll on the turn-ins and headbands, pastedowns and doublures —...

Rare illustrated reissue of Giovanni Battista Mascolo’s Encomia Coelituum, published jointly in Vienna and Augsburg between 1753 and 1755. First published in Naples in 1638, the text is here expressly reprinted “ob raritatem & elegantiam” and enriched with a remarkable series of 366 engravings, one for each day of the year. Most of the compositions are by Johann Wolfgang Baumgartner, alongside Franz Sigrist and other artists active in Augsburg; the plates were engraved by several burin engravers from this artistic circle.

Contemporary half brown calf. Spines with raised bands and gilt rules, green calf lettering- and numbering-pieces. Skilful restorations to the joints and headcaps...

First edition of this ambitious illustrated history of France, published by François-Anne David in five volumes between 1787 and 1796. The illustration comprises five engraved titles and 140 full-page plates, here printed in sanguine on stout paper, each volume with a different ornamental border devised to correspond to the historical period it covers. The plates were engraved by David, chiefly after designs by Nicolas Lejeune. This copy belongs to the deluxe issue on wove paper with the plates printed in "bistre sanguin anglais", a format specifically advertised by David in 1794 alongside the ordinary issue printed in black.

The impressions are richly inked, producing a particularly deep...

Illustrated first edition. Faerno's verses appeared for the first time in 1564, and Perrault's version in 1699. This edition gives for the first time Faerno's original text followed by Perrault's translation. It is illustrated with a frontispiece by Claude du Bosc representing Aesop among animals, and 100 unsigned headpieces (9 x 11 cm). The preliminary leaves contain some poems by the neo-Latin poet and some letters.

Full aubergine morocco binding from the late 19th century signed Chatelin in the frieze. Richly ornamented spine with raised bands. Title, date and place in gilt. Central framing à la Du Seuil with fleurons in the corners and 4 large fleurons inside the rectangle. Triple fillet...

First illustrated edition with 3 title vignettes and 3 figures by Eisen in volume I (as well as 3 pages of engraved music) plus 3 tailpieces and 1 figure by Marillier, 2 by Barbier and 3 title vignettes by Marillier in volume II, plus 3 tailpieces. All engraved by Fessard, Longueil, Née, Delaunay and Halbou. Very fine illustration, very elegant.
Contemporary full calf binding with scale pattern. Spine with raised bands decorated. Red morocco title labels, and green morocco volume labels. Triple-ruled frame on boards. Edges gilt. Small lack to upper joint at head of volume I. Signs of rubbing. Pale scattered foxing. One lack to margin of p. 479. The binder has inverted the volume numbers...