€ 6.000

ARIOSTO, Ludovico. Orlando furioso di Ludovico Ariosto. Nuova Edizione Corretta e ricorretta.

Paris, Giovanni Claudio Molini., 1788.

Quarto (245 x 175 mm.); large paper copy; volume 1: engraved portrait frontispiece, engraved title-page, 48 plates; vol.2: engraved portrait frontispiece, engraved title-page, 45 plates; vol.3: engraved title-page, 49 plates; vol.4: engraved title-page, 46 plates; vol.5: engraved title-page, woodcut tail-pieces; 188 plates in total, plus 5 title-pages and two portrait frontespieces. A very fine copy in contemporary French straight-grained red morocco by Bozerian Jeune (signed at foot of spine in volume 1), gilt edges. Provenance: Daniel Hodgson Kirkman, (1814 –1879) was an East India merchant and banker, became Deputy Governor and Governor of the Bank of England (1863–1865) and a Member of Parliament in the United Kingdom; and Gerard de Berny. (1880 –1957) was a French politician of the French Third Republic.

One of the 49 copies printed sur papier d'Hollande, our copy is apparently unique having more plates, 188, than any other known copy.The plates here included are the 46 engravings done by Cochin for the French translation "Roland Furieux" (Paris, 1775-83) all in two states and two in three states. In addition to these engravings, the present copy contains 13 engravings after Eisen five of which in two states; 26 after Moreau 13 of which in two states, six engravings after Monnet all in two states, 29 after Cipriani 15 of which in two states, and two after Greuse. Brunet noted that some of the Large Paper Copies of the 1788 edition, among them Renouard's, had the 46 plates from the Baskerville edition and the 46 from 1775 edition, in a single state, added. Cohen-de Ricci reported that the Bibliothèque Nationale's copy of our edition has the final and eau-forte versions of the Cochin engravings from the 1775 edition inserted. This edition was printed in Orléans by Rouzeau-Montaut and contains additional illustrations not included in the Baskerville edition (which contained only 46 plates), some of which are in two or three states (mostly before and after letters). Agnelli-Ravegnani, 210: “Elegante e pregiata edizione in-12, della quale esistono 49 esemplari in-4 sopra carta d'Olanda, ma, a parere del Graesse, poco ricercati a meno che non vi siano aggiunte le illustrazioni avanti lettera incise all'acquaforte da Cochin, Bartolazzi, Helman, Pouce, de Ghendt ecc.”

Graesse, I p.199; Brunet, I p.438.