OEUVRES COMPLETES DE J. RACINE avec les notes de tous les commentateurs.
Edition publiee par L. Aime-Martin. Six volumes, totalling over 3,000 pages, engraved frontispiece and 13 plates (most with tissue guard); post 8vo; bound by Simier in navy straight-grain morocco, spines lettered in gilt and decorated in gilt & blind between five raised bands, Volume I stamp-signed at foot 'Simier R du Roi' [Binder to the King], the boards, with decorative gilt and blind borders, arms of Louis XVIII in gilt at centre, gilt edges; a.e.g.; ribbon markers; marbled endpapers, dentelles decorated in gilt; a couple of small edge chips, minor production (trimming) fault to bottom fore-corner pp. 119/120 Volume II and top fore-corner pp. 515/6 Volume VI, a few leaves faintly creased, scattered light foxing; Lefevre, Paris, 1820. First edition thus. *The works of one of the greatest French literary figures of his age, edited by Louis Aime-Martin, printed by the Royal printer, P. Didot, and in a handsome contemporary binding by the Royal binder. The frontispiece is by Prud'hon, with other plates by Desenne, Gerard, Girodet, a.o. Louis-Stanislaus-Xavier, Count of Provence and later King Louis XVIII (1755-1824) was the king of France by title from 1795 and in fact from 1814 to 1824, except for the 'Hundred Days' after Napoleon returned to power following his escape from Elba. Louis XVIII owned two large book collections: one at the Chateau de Brunoy (in which all books were stamped as such on a banner beneath his coat of arms), and the other at Versailles. He compiled a catalogue of these collections, but this set does not bear the Royal Library's inventory number label, so was probably bound for presentation. Rene Simier (1772-1843) was one of the most celebrated French bookbinders of the period. He was commissioned by Napoleon to engrave the official arms of the Empire, and his son Alphonse was also given the title Relieur du Roy (Binder to the King). Item #184555
Price: $12,000.00