L'espion dans les cours des princes chrétiens

New edition. This edition was successively expanded and 1684 is given as the date of the original, certainly in 2 volumes. It is illustrated with 21 attractive figures, of which 5 are folding (portrait of Mehmet; a view of Constantinople, of Perpignan, portraits of Richelieu, of the Knights of Malta; figures of Chinese, Tartars, Arabs...
Plates on Morocco, inhabitants of the Antilles etc.). Title pages in red and black. One often observes a significantly different number of plates from one edition to another, and according to dates.
Contemporary full brown speckled and glazed sheep bindings. Spines with raised bands richly ornamented and finely decorated. Red morocco title labels and volume labels. Red edges. Headcap of volume I worn, and heads of volumes II, III and IV with lacks. A lack at foot of volume I and volume V. A crack at the first raised band of volume VI. About ten corners slightly bumped. A dampstain at end of volume I. Despite some defects, handsome set, very appealing.
The Turkish Spy is the first work whose particular form would have prestigious followers, of which Montesquieu with the Persian Letters is undoubtedly the most illustrious, but one could also cite Boyer d'Argens and his Jewish Letters, Chinese Letters... A foreign observer, sent by his country, bears witness to the European world and history. The fact that here it concerns a Turk foreign to European customs makes the shift of his perspective even more pertinent. Very many things will be discussed in this book, beyond European history and its events; for the narrator, in his multiple letters, establishes an account of everything he encounters, of what happens in England, in Germany, in the colonies, in Africa... and even in the sciences (notably discussing Descartes's world), entertainments and Belles-Lettres, and the great figures of the time. According to Brunet, Marana would only be responsible for the first four volumes, Cotolondi would be one of his followers.
Prestigious provenance: bookplate of the Château de Rosny, "La Solitude," being the library of the Duchess of Berry (then Lebaudy Library).