THE PROPERTY OF A LADY
LA FONTAINE, Jean de (1621-1695). Fables choisis, mises en vers. Paris: Chez Desaint & Saillant, & Durand, de l'Imprimerie de C.A. Jombert, 1755-1759.
Details
LA FONTAINE, Jean de (1621-1695). Fables choisis, mises en vers. Paris: Chez Desaint & Saillant, & Durand, de l'Imprimerie de C.A. Jombert, 1755-1759.
4 volumes, 2o (322 x 280mm). Half-titles. Engraved frontispiece and 266 (of 275) plates only after Jean Baptiste Oudry engraved by Cochin, Chedel, Prevost and others, numerous wood-cut decorations. (Lacking plates to fable numbers 67, 70, 106, 133, 155, 199, 206 and one unidentified second plate, some spotting, browning and light old dampstaining.) Contemporary French mottled calf gilt, covers with triple fillet border with fleuron cornerpieces, spines in seven ccompartments with raised bands, blue morocco labels in the second and third, the other compartments with repeat decoration in gilt with various small tools surrounding a large centrally-placed flowerhead tool, gilt turn-ins, comb-marbled endpapers, gilt edges (surface damage to leather, extremities rubbed, joints dry and cracked, spines chipped at head and foot). Provenance: unidentified 19th-century armorial bookplate; A. & R. le conte Boudeville (bookplate).
FIRST EDITION of "one of the most ambitious and successful of all illustrated books" (Ray). Plate 271 is here in its second state with the banner including the lettering. The 276 original sketches from which the plates for the present work were produced were drawn by Oudry, more or less for his own amusement, between 1729 and 1734. Once the decision to engrave the images had been taken, Oudry's sketches were re-drawn by Cochin who then oversaw the production of the plates from his drawings. The work eventually appeared between 1755 (the year Oudry died) and 1759. Cohen-de Ricci 548-550; Ray French 5; sold not subject to return. (4)
4 volumes, 2o (322 x 280mm). Half-titles. Engraved frontispiece and 266 (of 275) plates only after Jean Baptiste Oudry engraved by Cochin, Chedel, Prevost and others, numerous wood-cut decorations. (Lacking plates to fable numbers 67, 70, 106, 133, 155, 199, 206 and one unidentified second plate, some spotting, browning and light old dampstaining.) Contemporary French mottled calf gilt, covers with triple fillet border with fleuron cornerpieces, spines in seven ccompartments with raised bands, blue morocco labels in the second and third, the other compartments with repeat decoration in gilt with various small tools surrounding a large centrally-placed flowerhead tool, gilt turn-ins, comb-marbled endpapers, gilt edges (surface damage to leather, extremities rubbed, joints dry and cracked, spines chipped at head and foot). Provenance: unidentified 19th-century armorial bookplate; A. & R. le conte Boudeville (bookplate).
FIRST EDITION of "one of the most ambitious and successful of all illustrated books" (Ray). Plate 271 is here in its second state with the banner including the lettering. The 276 original sketches from which the plates for the present work were produced were drawn by Oudry, more or less for his own amusement, between 1729 and 1734. Once the decision to engrave the images had been taken, Oudry's sketches were re-drawn by Cochin who then oversaw the production of the plates from his drawings. The work eventually appeared between 1755 (the year Oudry died) and 1759. Cohen-de Ricci 548-550; Ray French 5; sold not subject to return. (4)