Paris, chez Vente et Patas, 1775.
4to [251 x 190 mm] of xii pp. including the engraved title and the frontispiece, pp. 1 to 92, (2) ll., pp. 95 to 147, (17) ll., 91 pp., (1) p., 9 paintings on double-page, 39 full-page costumes plates, 1 large folding map, 1 plate of coat of arms on double-page. Bound in green morocco, triple gilt fillet on the covers with fleur-de-lis on the corners, large gilt border, coat of arms on the center, spine ribbed and decorated with the crowned royal cipher and fleur-de-lis, red morocco lettering piece, inner gilt border, Augsburg paper doublures and endleaves, gilt edges. Contemporary binding.
First edition and first issue of Louis XVI’s Coronation. Cohen, 785.
The standard issue was made in 8vo size, but there are, such as this one, “copies in 4to size on large Dutch paper”.
“In these copies, the prints are highly superior to those in the 8vo one and the figures are framed”. (Cohen)
The abundant illustration is composed of a frontispiece, of a large map of Reims (470 x 335 mm) with, in a medallion, the portraits of Clovis and Louis XVI, of Clovis’s baptism and the Coronation of King Louis XVI, of 9 superb paintings on double-page in emblazoned frames (250 x 193 mm), picturing the different stages of the ceremony: -Levee of the King, -The King going to Church, -The arrival of the Holy Ampulla, -The King bowed down before the Altar, -The Ceremony of the unctions, -The Coronation of the King, -The King lead to the Throne, -The ceremony of the offering, -The Royal Feast; of a plate of coat of arms, of 39 very fine engravings picturing the “Various clothes for the Coronation of Louis XVI” (195 x 120 mm), and of 14 vignettes at the top (122 x 85 mm). The figures have been engraved by Patas, after those that were added to the description of the Coronation of Louis XV.
The first part of the work is dedicated to a chronological presentation of the accession to the throne of the kings of France from Clovis to Louis XVI followed by “Researches about some events in the History of France from 482 to 1774”.
Precious copy bound in contemporary dentelle green morocco with doublures and endleaves made of this superb Augsburg gilt paper, with the arms of King Louis XVI and his gilt cipher repeated on the spine, from the W. Watter Bart. Déc. 1816 library.
The dentelle in rocaille style is contemporary and comes from a provincial workshop with this difference of style of a few years remaining then between Paris and the provincial France. This kind of dentelle can be found on some copies of the Louis XVI period bound in Paris and enriched at their arrival in the libraries of some great erudite far from the capital.
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