Les Œuvres de Monsieur Cyrano de Bergerac
First illustrated 18th-century edition of the Works of Cyrano de Bergerac, bound at the time in ivory vellum mosaicked with the intertwined and crowned cipher attributed to Father Allart Le Roy.
2 volumes in-12, ivory vellum, triple gilt fillet framing the covers, interlaced and crowned monogram attributed to Père Allard Le Roy, raised bands, with red morocco onlay decorated with the crowned monogram attributed to Père Allard Le Roy, decorated edges, inner gilt roll, gilt edges. Armorial and mosaic binding of the period.
155 x 90 mm.
Cyrano de Bergerac, known as Savinien de Cyrano. The Works of Monsieur Cyrano de Bergerac. New edition adorned with engravings.
Amsterdam, 1709.
First illustrated 18th-century edition of Cyrano de Bergerac’s Works.
The first volume is adorned with an engraved title page, a portrait, and two plates before captioning for Le Pédant between pages 214 and 215 and The Death of Agrippina on p. 349. The second volume is adorned with an engraved title page and two plates for Histoire comique on pages 1 and 125.
“Cyrano de Bergerac (1619–1655) came to Paris, frequented the most libertine circles, and was a disciple of Gassendi and the young Molière. His dissipated life soon depleted his modest inheritance, so for a time he lived with M. d’Assoucy, giving up absolute independence; only in 1647 did he inherit his small paternal estate. It was at this time that he wrote the ‘Satirical Letters’ against Scarron, Monfleury, d’Assoucy, and conceived a great work, ‘The Other World’, a kind of new utopia (he was familiar with Campanella’s work) in which, with bizarre imagination, he expounded his bold theories of physics, astronomy, and philosophy.”
“Eager for intellectual freedom and hostile to any authority, especially that of Aristotle, he asserts the Earth’s movement, the eternity and infinity of the Universe, the intelligence of animals, the power of imagination, and the atomic constitution of matter; he criticizes the proofs of the immortality of the soul and Providence, opposes Creation and miracles, arrives at a sort of naturalistic pantheism, and, along the way... gives the concept of the hot-air balloon, the parachute, and the gramophone.” (René Pintard).
Precious volumes in an elegant contemporary ivory vellum binding, lavishly decorated with an interlaced and crowned cipher attributed to Father Allard le Roy.
Olivier describes a copy of Boileau’s Works printed in 1677 with this cipher, noting: “These stamps have always been thought to belong to Father Allard Le Roy, author of the ‘Compendium vitæ B. Francisci de Borgia,’ published in 1624, but we have been unable to confirm this attribution, which seems doubtful to us.
Stamps struck at the center and corners of: ‘Œuvres diverses du Sr D*** (Boileau)’, Amsterdam, Wolfang, 1677. (Librairie Rahir, Jan. 1920 catalog, no. 81) and: ‘Œuvres diverses de M. Roy’, Paris, Robustel, Pissot, Huart, Chaubert, 1727.”
From the library of Monsieur de Rentierre with ex-libris.
