LA FONTAINE (Jean de). - Lot 14

LA FONTAINE (Jean de). Contes et nouvelles en vers. Amsterdam: Henry Desbordes, 1685. -2 volumes in-12, 154 x 97: frontispiece, (8 ff.), 236 pp. ; frontispiece, (4 ff.), 216 pp. Red morocco, triple gilt fillet framing the boards, ornate ribbed spine, interior gilt roulette, dominoté paper lining and endpapers, gilt edges (18th or 19th century binding). Rochambeau, p. 511, no. 28. - José de Los Llanos, Les illustrateurs des Contes de La Fontaine au XVIIIe siècle, in: Jean de La Fontaine, BNF, 1995, p. 74. First illustrated edition of the Contes de La Fontaine, published during the author's lifetime. It includes all of La Fontaine's tales, with the exception of the six he published the same year in Ouvrages de prose et de Poésie in collaboration with Maucroix, and the tale of Quiproquo, which was not published until after the author's death. The edition is illustrated with a frontispiece and 58 etched figures by the famous Dutch painter, sculptor and engraver Romeyn de Hooghe (1645-1708). This is the only contemporary illustration of the text, and ONE OF THE ARTIST'S MASTERPIECES. The frontispiece depicts Venus, pen in hand, leaning against a lyre which itself rests on a pedestal bearing the book's title and the publisher's name. Standing next to her, Love empties his quiver of arrows. The 58 vignettes are arranged halfway down the page, one for each tale. According to José de Los Llanos, these vignettes "are at the origin of what was to become, if not a tradition, at least an almost obligatory stylistic exercise for several generations of artists. They bear witness to certain inventions that deserve to be recognized, such as the idea of staging the Tales as plays in which the actors confront each other with the props and gestures of the comic repertoire, in the closed space of a set". This is the first of 3 known issues. It can be identified by page 211 of the first volume, which includes 11 lines of text, and by the engraving of Le Villageois qui cherche son veau (Volume 2, page 49), which is intact. A copy in 18th-century or 19th-century morocco imitating an 18th-century binding, fully set at the time of binding, enriched by a second copy of the frontispiece placed at the head of the second volume, as well as two copies of the portrait of La Fontaine engraved by Pinssio after Rigaud for the edition of the author's Œuvres choisies published by Michel-Antoine David in 1744. It comes from the library of German banker Jean Furstenberg (1890-1982), best known as a bibliophile, who assembled one of the most important private collections of precious books and bindings. Spines slightly faded, hinges cracked, the hinge on the first cover of the first volume partly cracked, small tears to the headpieces. Very good condition inside, the engravings being in a remarkable edition and none cut by the binder. Provenance: Jean Furstenberg, with bookplate. - Otto Schäfer (Sotheby's sale, December 7, 1995, no. 327).