Contes orientaux
The Oriental Tales by Caylus adorned with 8 beautiful engravings.
A very fine copy of this rare first edition preserved in its contemporary binding with the monogram of the Duke of Valentinois.
Marbled calf, spines with raised bands decorated with gilt fillets and motifs, crowned cipher at the foot, red morocco title and volume labels, gilt fillet on edges, red edges.Contemporary binding.
168 x 96 mm.
Caylus, Anne Claude Philippe, Count of. Oriental Tales drawn from the manuscripts of the library of the King of France, decorated with engraved illustrations.
The Hague, 1743.
Rare first edition and first printing of the 8 engravings of Caylus’s Oriental Tales.
Barbier, I, 748; Cohen, 99; Library of Baron Jérôme Pichon, 1057; Edouard Rahir Library, IV, 1000.
“Fairy tales and wonderful stories occupy an important place in Caylus’s literary work, undoubtedly the foremost” (Jean-Paul Sermain).
“In the last years of the reign of Louis XIV, the enthusiasm for tales continued in the popularity of oriental stories: from 1704, Galland published his ‘translation’ of the Thousand and One Nights. The taste for Arab or Persian tales reflects the public’s growing interest in exoticism. In this period of a crisis of values, interest in the customs of foreign countries fostered a re-examination of political and religious institutions, and it was on this confrontation between the foreign gaze and French behavior that Montesquieu would build his Persian Letters” (F. Hahn).
“Count de Caylus (1692-1765) was able to devote himself fully to his marked taste for the arts, to satisfy and increase it through various journeys undertaken for his instruction. Thus, after visiting Italy, whose masterpieces he admired with great enthusiasm, he left for the Levant, with the French ambassador to the Ottoman Porte. Spending a few days in Smyrna, he took advantage of this stay to explore the ruins of Ephesus and those of Colophon, then known to so few Europeans.”
Very beautiful copy bound at the time for the Duke of Valentinois, one of the great collectors of the 18th century, who added a piquant note identifying the dedicatee of these tales: “The Countess de Mailli, deposed sultana” (one of the three Mailly sisters who were successively mistresses of Louis XV—Louise Julie was favored by the king from 1733 to 1739, then again in 1742, just before the publication of the Tales).
Jacques-François Léonor de Goyon-Matignon (1689-1751) was appointed colonel of infantry and, in 1713, obtained the position of lieutenant general of Normandy. On the occasion of his marriage, Louis XIV granted him, on 24 July 1715, the letters patent of duke and peer of France, with the title of Duke of Valentinois. Becoming Prince of Monaco, he returned to Paris, where, in his magnificent mansion, he indulged his passion for literature and the arts, receiving artists and writers, including Voltaire (O. Hermal, pl. 1820).
