Notre-Dame de Paris

Notre-Dame de Paris [The Hunchback of Notre-Dame]
Eugène Renduel, Paris 1836, 13x21,2cm, 631pp., bound.
First illustrated edition known as “Keepsake edition”, first issue, in a single volume.
A steel-engraved frontispiece title and 10 full-page plates printed on papier de chine appliqué by Alfred & Tony Johannot, Louis Boulanger, Camille Rogier. Well printed in a spaced typography with large margins, similar to the first edition published in 1831. Without the plate “De l'utilité des fenêtres” [On the usefulness of windows] like most first issue copies, as it was not finished when printing began.

Publisher's “Rocaille” binding in brown morocco, signed Boutigny at bottom of spine, the signature has been mistakenly stamped upside down, covers with ornaments and foliage motifs stamped in blind, central gilt title on the upper cover and gilt cipher of Eugène Renduel on the lower, all edges gilt, traces of discoloration to the spine, scattered foxing on most leaves.

For this new and perhaps most beautiful of edition of Notre-Dame de Paris, Eugène Renduel commissioned several deluxe copies in cathedral and “rocaille” bindings made by Boutigny. This one in “maroquin du Levant, gros grain, avec plaque en or et en noir” [Levant morocco, large grain, paneled in gilt and blind] is the most luxurious, sold for 30 fr. according to the publisher's catalog.

Our copy also includes a rare particularity: a cipher of Eugène Renduel – famous publisher of the whole generation of Romantic writers and of Victor Hugo in particular – gilt stamped in the center of the lower cover, a particular feature we did not find on the other deluxe copies.

A very nice copy in the most luxurious publisher's binding.