[Rarebooks] fa: VOLTAIRE - THE AGE OF LEWIS XIV 1752 - Trinity College Armorial Bindings

[Ardwight Chamberlain]

Listed now, auction ending Sunday, March 5. More details and images can be found at the URL below or by searching for the seller name arch_in_la. 

http://tinyurl.com/z3hq52g

Thanks,
Ardwight Chamberlain
Ann Arbor, MI, USA


Francois-Marie Arouet de Voltaire: The Age of Lewis XIV. Translated from the French of M. de Voltaire. Dublin: Printed by George Faulkner, in Essex-Street, MDCCLII [1752]. Two volumes, 12mo (17 cm), in full period calf with the arms of Trinity College, Dublin, tooled in gilt on front and rear covers, gilt-lettered morocco spine labels; viii, 356 pp.; [2], 258, 68, [20] pp.; engraved portrait frontispiece, woodcut initials and decorations. ESTC T137655.

The first Dublin edition, printed the same year as the first London edition and a year after the first French edition, of Voltaire's classic portrait of the age of Louis XIV. The second volume contains two separately paginated parts, the second part with the drop-title "Children of Louis XIV." This copy, fittingly, is in armorial prize bindings of Trinity College, Dublin, and the front paste-downs bear elaborate engraved bookplates proclaiming that the volumes were awarded to a Benjamin Chapman in 1764. Bindings with rubbing, staining and general light wear; binding of vol. II with some chipping to the leather around the embossed arms, short tear at the foot of the front joint; contents lightly toned with a few scattered small spots and touches of soiling, else quite clean and crisp, firmly bound. Rather uncommon: ESTC locates only 4 copies of this edition in the U.S.