Details
MONSTRELET, Enguerrand de (d. 1453). Le premier [second, tiers] volume de enguerran de monstrellet. Ensuyvant froissart na gueres imprime a Paris des cronicques de France, dangleterre, descoce, despaigne, de Bretaigne, de gascongne, de flandres. Et lieux circonvoisins. Paris: for Antoine Vérard, [1503 and/or 1504].
3 volumes bound in 2, super-chancery 2° (317 x 223mm). PRINTED ON VELLUM. Collation: v.1 ã10 (title, prologue, table of contents), a-e8 f10 g-u8 x8 (-5 blank cancelled) y-z & aa-mm8 n6 oo8 (text); v.2 A8 (title, prologue, table of contents), B-U x-z & \\n8 \\g10 (text); v.3 AA6 (title, table of contents),χ1 (recto blank, verso miniature), BB-RR8 (text). V.1: 312 leaves (of 313, x3 facsimile); v.2: 210 leaves; v.3: 135 leaves (χ1 not inserted in paper copies). Bâtarde type 11:98, double column, 44 lines and headline, xylographic titles incorporating calligraphic initial L, publisher's metalcut device B at the end of v.2, 4 FULL-PAGE MINIATURES WITHIN ARCHITECTURAL BORDERS, 160 smaller column-width miniatures, two illuminated borders of floral and foliate ornament in vv. 2 and 3 (armorial shield left empty), numerous illuminated initials, gouache and gold paint by artists of the Vérard atelier directed by Jacques de Besançon. The printed chapter-headings that are obscured by miniatures copied in the margins in bastarda manuscript by a scribe in Vérard's shop. (Text and woodcut on x3 in v.1 in pen-and-ink and painted facsimile, two architectural borders and some marginal chapter-headings shaved by the binder's knife, a couple of very minor stains.)
Binding: very fine gold-tooled and mosaïqué dark-blue morocco, decorated to a 16th-century fanfare design with fillets, gouges, leafy sprays, floral tools, hatched ornament, and red, light-blue and citron inlays, French royal arms in central compartment of covers, spines tooled in compartments, red morocco doublures with a semis of fleurs-de-lis, red watered silk and marbled paper fly-leaves, gilt and gauffered edges, bound by LORTIC 1878 (signed, ticket), who showed it at the Exposition Universelle of 1878. Morocco pull-off cases, also by Lortic. Immaculate condition.
Provenance: Ambroise Firmin Didot (1878 Paris sale, lot 696, F 30,500 to Techener); Robert Hoe (1912 New York sale, $4,000); Count Axel von Kalckreuth (bookplate); Fritz Kreisler (1949 New York sale, lot 117, $3,500); Francis Kettaneh (1980 Paris sale, lot 66, FF 620,000 to Berès).
Second edition, reprinted from Vérard's first of ca. 1502-03. COMPLETE VELLUM SETS, ILLUMINATED AND IN FINE CONDITION, OF EITHER EDITION ARE OF EXTREME RARITY. Of the first edition London BL has the Old Royal Library set on vellum; another vellum set is divided between London BL (ex-Demidoff) and Paris BNF. Of the second edition Paris BNF has the D'Urfé-La Vallière-MacCarthy set. Monstrelet continued Froissart's chronicle to the year 1444, and his work was continued down to 1461 by Mathieu d'Escouchi (v.3). Macfarlane 176; Van Praet Vélins du roi V, 121; Brunet, France litt. 145.
The large miniatures are:
v.1 Author presenting his work to a patron (ã1v)
Assassination in Paris of Louis d'Orléans (ã10v)
Siege of a Burgundian town (x3v, miniature by the 19th-century facsimile artist Pilinski imitating an illuminated woodcut)
v.2 Battle of Burgundian and English against French cavalry (A1v)
v.3. Battle of Burgundian and French cavalry (χ1v). (2)
3 volumes bound in 2, super-chancery 2° (317 x 223mm). PRINTED ON VELLUM. Collation: v.1 ã10 (title, prologue, table of contents), a-e8 f10 g-u8 x8 (-5 blank cancelled) y-z & aa-mm8 n6 oo8 (text); v.2 A8 (title, prologue, table of contents), B-U x-z & \\n8 \\g10 (text); v.3 AA6 (title, table of contents),χ1 (recto blank, verso miniature), BB-RR8 (text). V.1: 312 leaves (of 313, x3 facsimile); v.2: 210 leaves; v.3: 135 leaves (χ1 not inserted in paper copies). Bâtarde type 11:98, double column, 44 lines and headline, xylographic titles incorporating calligraphic initial L, publisher's metalcut device B at the end of v.2, 4 FULL-PAGE MINIATURES WITHIN ARCHITECTURAL BORDERS, 160 smaller column-width miniatures, two illuminated borders of floral and foliate ornament in vv. 2 and 3 (armorial shield left empty), numerous illuminated initials, gouache and gold paint by artists of the Vérard atelier directed by Jacques de Besançon. The printed chapter-headings that are obscured by miniatures copied in the margins in bastarda manuscript by a scribe in Vérard's shop. (Text and woodcut on x3 in v.1 in pen-and-ink and painted facsimile, two architectural borders and some marginal chapter-headings shaved by the binder's knife, a couple of very minor stains.)
Binding: very fine gold-tooled and mosaïqué dark-blue morocco, decorated to a 16th-century fanfare design with fillets, gouges, leafy sprays, floral tools, hatched ornament, and red, light-blue and citron inlays, French royal arms in central compartment of covers, spines tooled in compartments, red morocco doublures with a semis of fleurs-de-lis, red watered silk and marbled paper fly-leaves, gilt and gauffered edges, bound by LORTIC 1878 (signed, ticket), who showed it at the Exposition Universelle of 1878. Morocco pull-off cases, also by Lortic. Immaculate condition.
Provenance: Ambroise Firmin Didot (1878 Paris sale, lot 696, F 30,500 to Techener); Robert Hoe (1912 New York sale, $4,000); Count Axel von Kalckreuth (bookplate); Fritz Kreisler (1949 New York sale, lot 117, $3,500); Francis Kettaneh (1980 Paris sale, lot 66, FF 620,000 to Berès).
Second edition, reprinted from Vérard's first of ca. 1502-03. COMPLETE VELLUM SETS, ILLUMINATED AND IN FINE CONDITION, OF EITHER EDITION ARE OF EXTREME RARITY. Of the first edition London BL has the Old Royal Library set on vellum; another vellum set is divided between London BL (ex-Demidoff) and Paris BNF. Of the second edition Paris BNF has the D'Urfé-La Vallière-MacCarthy set. Monstrelet continued Froissart's chronicle to the year 1444, and his work was continued down to 1461 by Mathieu d'Escouchi (v.3). Macfarlane 176; Van Praet Vélins du roi V, 121; Brunet, France litt. 145.
The large miniatures are:
v.1 Author presenting his work to a patron (ã1v)
Assassination in Paris of Louis d'Orléans (ã10v)
Siege of a Burgundian town (x3v, miniature by the 19th-century facsimile artist Pilinski imitating an illuminated woodcut)
v.2 Battle of Burgundian and English against French cavalry (A1v)
v.3. Battle of Burgundian and French cavalry (χ1v). (2)