Details
PHILOSTRATUS, Flavius. Les Images ou Tableaux de platte peinture des deux Philostrates Sophistes grecs et les statues de Callistrate. French translation by Blaise de Vigenère. Paris: the widows of Abel l'Angelier and M. Guillemot, 1614 [1615].
2° (398 x 265mm). Engraved frontispiece after Jaspar Isaac (neat repair to tear from lower margin into image area), engraved headpiece to dedication, 68 large engraved illustrations after Isaac (10) and Antoine Caron (58), woodcut initials and decorations. (Occasional light spotting.) 18th-century French mottled calf, spine gilt (joints a little weak). Provenance: Jean Raviot (inscription dated 1619); Benigne Raviot ("son arriere-petit-fils", 1719).
A FINE COPY. In this work Philostratus uses the rhetorical device of painting pictures with words, describing 65 pictures reputedly displayed in a Neapolitan villa. Vigenère's translation was first published without illustrations in 1578, while the 1609 edition contained 58 illustrations. These are here re-issued with the addition of 10 newly commissioned images from the Amsterdam artist Isaac. The suite was to prove extremely influential throughout the 17th century. There has been some confusion regarding the date of this edition. A fifth numeral appears to have been added by hand to the engraved title-page (thus reading MDCXIIIII), while the colophon is dated old-style 2 January 1614. Brunet IV: 620; Landwehr Romantic Emblem Books 586; Praz p.128.
2° (398 x 265mm). Engraved frontispiece after Jaspar Isaac (neat repair to tear from lower margin into image area), engraved headpiece to dedication, 68 large engraved illustrations after Isaac (10) and Antoine Caron (58), woodcut initials and decorations. (Occasional light spotting.) 18th-century French mottled calf, spine gilt (joints a little weak). Provenance: Jean Raviot (inscription dated 1619); Benigne Raviot ("son arriere-petit-fils", 1719).
A FINE COPY. In this work Philostratus uses the rhetorical device of painting pictures with words, describing 65 pictures reputedly displayed in a Neapolitan villa. Vigenère's translation was first published without illustrations in 1578, while the 1609 edition contained 58 illustrations. These are here re-issued with the addition of 10 newly commissioned images from the Amsterdam artist Isaac. The suite was to prove extremely influential throughout the 17th century. There has been some confusion regarding the date of this edition. A fifth numeral appears to have been added by hand to the engraved title-page (thus reading MDCXIIIII), while the colophon is dated old-style 2 January 1614. Brunet IV: 620; Landwehr Romantic Emblem Books 586; Praz p.128.