APPIEN. - Lot 3

APPIEN. Des Guerres des Romains, livres xj... Plus, y sont adioustez deux livres, nouvellement traduicts de Grecs en Françoys, par le Seigneur d'Avenelles. Paris : Benoist Prevost, 1560. 2 parts in one volume, in-8, marbled basane, spine ribbed and decorated, red edges (18th century binding). Rare new edition of the first French translation of Appian's "Wars of the Romans", compiled by Claude de Seyssel from a Latin translation by his collaborator Jean Lascaris. The first edition appeared in Lyon in 1544. It contains for the first time the 2 texts entitled "Des Histoires Romaines, l'Ibérique, ou Espagnole: & l'Annibale, ou des exploicts d'Annibal Carthageois en Italie" translated from Greek by Philippe Des Avenelles, printed separately with their own title page and pagination. Copy in an 18th-century binding made for a certain Duvair, whose name has been inscribed in gilded letters on the tail of the spine. The title and endpapers also bear several old handwritten bookplates, some of them crossed out. They include the names of Louis Ferrand, Gabriel Billard, J. P. L. Dumoustier, etc. Used rubbing to binding, corners slightly dulled. Soiling to a few leaves, discreet wormholes, some wetness. Book bb, containing part of the table of chapters, has been mistakenly bound between books a and b of the second part.