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Details
Bibliothèque Portative de Voyageur. Paris: chez Fournier, 1802. 26 volumes only, 90 x 64mm. Engraved portrait frontispieces. Contemporary speckled calf gilt, flat spines gilt with black morocco lettering-pieces (rubbed, some damage to a few lettering-pieces, a few minor repairs), red silk markers, contained in contemporary calf hinged book box gilt with red morocco lettering-piece (rather worn, hinge re-inforced). Bondy p.83-4 (calling for 49 vols.); cf. Spielmann 49 (one volume only). Contains the works of Corneille, La Fontaine, Racine, Piron and others. Provenance: Edward Bury (amorial bookplates).
"The earliest of travelling libraries is the 'Bibliothèque Portative du Voyageur' [a full list of the works included in the 'library' follows] ... This remarkable library in miniature thus includes many of the most prodigious and important works in the French language ... It is frequently assumed that it was this travelling library which Napoleon Bonaparte carried with him during his campaigns. Spielmann No. 49 lists only the Montesquieu and adds 'The miniature format serves here a definite and acknowledged purpose'. Complete sets are of the utmost rarity and I have only seen one nearly complete set ..." (Bondy). (26)
"The earliest of travelling libraries is the 'Bibliothèque Portative du Voyageur' [a full list of the works included in the 'library' follows] ... This remarkable library in miniature thus includes many of the most prodigious and important works in the French language ... It is frequently assumed that it was this travelling library which Napoleon Bonaparte carried with him during his campaigns. Spielmann No. 49 lists only the Montesquieu and adds 'The miniature format serves here a definite and acknowledged purpose'. Complete sets are of the utmost rarity and I have only seen one nearly complete set ..." (Bondy). (26)
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