Cours complet d’agriculture théorique, pratique, économique et de médecine rurale et vétérinaire ; suivi d’une méthode pour étudier l’agriculture par principe ou Dictionnaire universel d’agriculture

First edition, complete with the two posthumous volumes issued in 1800 and written by Chaptal, Parmentier, Biot, and others. It is illustrated with 248 plates, several of them folding, a frontispiece in volume 10, and a map of France in volume 1; together with several folding tables. Text printed in double columns.

Contemporary full brown calf. Spines with raised bands, decorated with two grotesque compartments and two urn tools. Black calf lettering and volume labels. Losses to the headcaps of volumes 9 and 10. In volume 1, the outer margin trimmed over approximately 10 cm. In volume 1, the headcap partly worn, and a brown dampstain in the upper margin of the final leaves. Two or three corners bumped, three edges trimmed. General rubbing. A few stains, some plates browned, but overall in fairly fresh condition.

François Rozier, known as Abbé Rozier, agronomist, director of the Royal School of Veterinary Medicine, and editor of the Journal de Physique for ten years, conceived this dictionary of agriculture as a unique compendium of contemporary knowledge. Many of the entries are true treatises, such as the article opening the first volume on bees, and the whole constitutes a genuinely encyclopaedic undertaking in keeping with the spirit of the age.