| Item Description: | Includes index.
Michael Laird, bookseller, description: 8vo. Engraved frontispiece by Gravelot engraved by Longueil. xvi, 427, [5] pp. Contemporary French red morocco, triple gilt fillets around sides, smooth spine gilt, olive morocco label, a.e.g., blue silk pastedowns and endpapers. Gorgeous copy in contemporary French red morocco; from the esteemed library of Robert Pirie, with his bookplate. An extremely elegant edition of this famous Neo-Latin poem on agricultural pursuits, complete with an engraved frontispiece by the foremost French book artist of the 18th century: Henri Gravelot. Vanière's reflections on animal husbandry, bee-keeping, poultry, raising rabbits, arboriculture, and the cultivation of parkland are couched in Latin of such grace and style that he became known as the "Virgil of France." Vanière (1664-1739), a Jesuit, first published his poem in 1696; it became hugely successful and was many times reprinted. This edition has an 8-page prefatory elegy by another Jesuit, Isaac-Jean Badon (b. 1719) preceding the text. There are poems about horses and cattle (no. 3), trees (5 & 6), work according to seasons (7 & 8), gardening (9), wine (11), farms and farmyards (12), bees (14), fishing (15), and parks (16). It is a remarkable fact that the work has never been translated fully into English. That such a work was so superbly printed - and in this instance bound - reflects the rise of the cultural phenomenon we call the "gentleman farmer" in France and elsewhere during the 18th century. |
|---|