[MANUSCRIT]. [RACINE (Louis)] Inventory after the death of M. Louis Racine In French, manuscript on paper. France, Paris, February 11, 1763. In-folio, 168 ff, end missing, cursive handwriting in brown ink, notary's handwriting, paper stamped "Généralité de Paris". Unbound manuscript. A few stains, small hole in first leaf. Dimensions: 332x220mm Louis Racine (1692-1763) was the son of playwright Jean Racine, his second son and seventh and last child. Louis Racine lost his father at the age of six, and in 1728 married Marie Presle de L'Écluse, daughter of a member of the Lyon Mint Court. He lost his eldest son in Cadiz in 1755, a victim of the flood caused by the Lisbon earthquake. This was a terrible blow for him, and he stopped writing, limiting himself to translating Milton's Paradise Lost, and immersed himself in devotion. Author of poems such as La Grâce (1720), a Jansenist-inspired text, and La Religion (1742), Louis Racine was admitted to the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres in 1719. All his life, he lived in the memory of his "grandfather". He published Mémoires sur la vie de Jean Racine (1747). Louis Racine had a scholarly brother, Jean-Baptiste Racine (1678-1747): Jean-Baptiste Racine's extensive library passed into the hands of his younger brother Louis: "It was obviously extremely valuable because it included the great poet's manuscripts, documents concerning him, books that had belonged to him and that he had often annotated in the most learned manner" (Jovy, 1932, p. 558). Following the death of his son in 1755, Louis Racine organized a sale of his library, which included works that had belonged to one or more of the three Racines (Jean, Jean-Baptiste and Louis). Some of these books were purchased by Le Franc de Pompignan (1709-1784), a friend of Louis Racine, who donated them to the city of Toulouse: "Le Franc de Pompignan collected some of his friend's books, and later disposed of them in favor of the Toulouse library, which was almost his homeland" (La Roque, Poésies de Louis Racine, Paris, 1892, p. 53). This after-death inventory is interesting because, in addition to the furniture, paintings and other possessions of the deceased at his home on rue Sainte-Anne in Paris, it lists the books that belonged to him, those that were not sold in 1755: "S'ensuivent les livres composant la bibliothèque dudit sieur Racine prisée et estimée...de l'avis du Sieur François Gabriel Marigot père, libraire à Paris, demourant quaye des Augustins, paroisse Saint André des Arcs, expert et nommé par toutes les parties...". This is followed by prints, archives and various deeds or contracts. Among the books, for example: "Onze volumes dont œuvre de Racine Père...". See: Abbé Adrien de La Roque,Vie de Louis Racine, suivie d'une notice sur les autres enfants de Jean Racine, par l'un de ses arrière-petits-fils, Paris, Firmin Didot frères, 1852. - Jovy, Ernest. "La bibliothèque des Racine, Jean, Jean-Baptiste et Louis Racine", in Bulletin du bibliophile et du bibliothécaire, 1932, nouvelle série (onzième année), pp. 556-564. - Sale]. [Racine, Louis (Collection)]. Catalog des livres de feu Monsieur R*** dont la vente sera indiquée par affiches, Paris, G. Martin, August 7, 1755.