3 volumes, 4to., (10 x 7 5/8 inches) vignettes, 28 engraved maps and plans (including 25 full-sheet or folding), 4 historiated engraved headpieces, numerous decorative woodcut and typographic initials and head- and tailpieces. Without the 44 engraved botanical plates depicting 96 plants. Contemporary French mottled calf, spines gilt in six compartments with red morocco lettering-pieces, marbled endpapers, red edges, professionnaly rebacked with the original spine.
“The appearance in August 1744 of the long delayed Histoire et description générale de la Nouvelle France . . . , dedicated to Louis-Jean-Marie de Bourbon, Duc de Penthièvre, son of the Comte de Toulouse, was the high point of Charlevoix’s career as a historian. His history of New France, although it frequently drew on earlier works such as the Description géographique et historique des Costes de l’Amérique septentrionale . . . (1672) of Nicolas Denys* or the Jesuit Relations, was an original creation. Having visited most of the sites, and having developed his own theory of historiography, Charlevoix had consulted all available documents and had produced, after more than 20 years of research and reflection, the first general history of the French settlements in North America, together with the first annotated bibliography of Canadiana.
The quarto (three-volume) and duodecimo (six-volume) editions of the Histoire et description générale de la Nouvelle France appeared simultaneously, each in five issues with the imprints of five different Parisian printers. Both editions are prized by collectors as handsome examples of 18th-century typography and engraving, with their two-colour title pages, their folding maps and plans by Bellin, and their 22 (4o) or 44 (12mo) folding plates”. DBC. Lande 125; Staton & Tremaine 4697; Howes C307; Sabin 12135.
Offered by Librairie Michel Morisset
$7000
To purchase, contact mm@librairiemichelmorisset.com
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