Traité de la police, Où l'on trouvera l'Histoire de son Etablissement, les Fonctions et les Prerogatives de ses Magistrats, toutes les Loix et tous les Reglemens qui la concernent. On y a joint une Description historique et topographique de Paris

New edition for the first two volumes, the third volume is in first edition. The illustration comprises 3 title vignettes repeated with arms, 2 title headpieces for the epistle and preface, and 2 initial letters; 6 title headpieces and initial letters for the text; all engraved by Audran. The eight folding plates of Paris are missing. Title pages in red and black. The first volume of the Traité de la police appeared in 1707, volume 2 in 1710, volume 3 in 1719, and a fourth volume (De la voirie), written by Delamare's secretary, appeared posthumously in 1738.
Contemporary full calf binding, worn. Decorated spine with raised bands. Brown morocco title and volume labels. First 3 compartments of the first two volumes missing, same for the first compartment of volume III. Tail headcaps torn off. Title and volume labels missing from the first 2 volumes. Interior with fine freshness.
The treatise on police, while secondarily being a history of regulations in Antiquity and the exercise of police, contains all the ordinances and rules in all domains, that is to say everything relating to public law (food, commerce, spectacles, prisons...) for the city of Paris. The first volume also deals with the various police forces and their administration. It was in 1667 that Lamoignon, First President of the Parliament of Paris, suggested the idea to Nicolas Delamare of writing a work describing police methods in a large city; Colbert's archives and rich library were opened to him for this purpose. "This work is not," says the author, "a simple collection of ordinances, as I had initially proposed; these are dissertations on all matters of police; it is a history of all laws and all regulations since the establishment of the most ancient of republics until the present." From the first pages of his Treatise, Delamare gave a broad definition of police, as an "art of procuring a comfortable and tranquil life." Delamare's original plan provided for 12 books, only 6 appeared. The first book deals "with police in general and its magistrates and officers," the second "with religion," the third "with morals," the fourth "with health," and the fifth "with provisions."