[MARIE-ANTOINETTE]. - MOREAU (Jacob-Nicolas)]. Library of Madame la Dauphine. N° I. Histoire. À Paris, chez Saillant Nyon ; et chez Moutard, 1770. In-8, 182-(2 of which the second is blank) pp. garnet morocco, smooth spine cloisonné and fleuronné with black title-piece, triple gilt fillet framing the boards with corner fleurons, gilt fleur-de-lis in spandrels and gilt coat-of-arms in the center, filleted edges, gilt inner roulette, gilt edges; tiny incision on one bit (period binding); volume placed in a modern brick cloth slipcase with black title-piece on the spine. FIRST EDITION. Copper-engraved frontispiece by Charles Eisen, depicting Marie-Antoinette surrounded by the three Graces and receiving a book from Clio, Muse of History. PROGRAM TO CREATE A HISTORICAL LIBRARY FOR THE DAUPHINE. Appointed librarian to the Dauphine on May 20, 1770, a few days after her marriage to the future Louis XVI, Jacob-Nicolas Moreau devised a vast plan to build her a library of choice in all subjects. He immediately set to work, beginning with history, his favorite subject, and wrote this programmatic work: in it, he presents in three parts "the object and moral purpose of History; the chain of events that make it up; the sequence of books that instruct us" (p. 13). This third part of the book includes a list of some 160 titles of "the best French books of which a historical library can be composed" (p. 158). However, he was unable to continue his task and publish the volumes planned for the other subjects, because, while nominally retaining his title of librarian, he was soon dismissed, probably through the intrigues of the Dauphine's reader and secretary, Abbé de Vermond and secretary Pierre-Dominique Berthollet dit Campan - the library was in fact entrusted to the care of the latter. LAWYER AND HISTORIAN JACOB-NICOLAS MOREAU (1717-1803), HOSTILE TO THE "PHILOSOPHES", was tutor to the children of Chancellor d'Aguesseau during his law studies, then practiced as a lawyer before joining the Contrôle Général des Finances in 1759 as "avocat des finances". There, he set up the ministry's archives and library, broadening its interests to include French history and ancient literature, and in 1762 founded the Cabinet des Chartes (where original documents and copies made throughout France and abroad were to be collected) - the whole thing became known as the Bibliothèque de législation, histoire et droit public (Library of Legislation, History and Public Law). From 1769 onwards, he was assisted by a Comité des Chartes (Charters Committee), whose members included Mauretans and such luminaries as the Marquis de Paulmy, to oversee the publication of all manner of collections of ancient sources. This institution was merged with the Bibliothèque Royale by decree in 1790, and its holdings now form the "Moreau Collection". Jacob-Nicolas Moreau was also attached to the Dauphin Louis as historical advisor (but the prince, father of Louis XVI, died in 1765), and appointed librarian to the Dauphine (1770, but he was unable to really work due to intrigues), historiographer of France (1774), and first secretary to the Count of Provence, future Louis XVIII. A magnificent copy in morocco with the coat of arms of Louis XVI dauphin These arms are composed of several irons (absent from OHR) and include the cross of Grand Master of the Orders of Saint-Lazare and Mont-Carmel, a dignity with which the future Louis XVI was invested from 1757 to 1773. A copy bearing Marie-Antoinette's coat of arms is currently held at the BnF as RES-Z-4208. Provenance: Champagne house owner and politician Louis ROEDERER (1845-1880). - Léon OLRY-ROEDERER, nephew and heir of the former (Seymour de Ricci, The Roederer library of French books prints and drawings of the eighteenth century, Philadelphia, Rosenbach, 1923, pp. 15 and 20). - Philadelphia bookseller and bibliophile Abraham Simon Wolf ROSENBACH (1876-1952, pencil note on one of the endpapers; by bulk purchase of the former's library). - Jeweler Raphaël ESMERIAN (1903-1976; bookplate vignette; third sale, Paris, Palais Galliera, Georges Blaizot et Claude Guérin experts, June 6, 1973, no. 9, reproduction p. 5). - The bookseller and bibliophile Bernard Hartmut BRESLAUER (Bibliotheca Bibliographica Breslaueriana, New York, Christie's, March 21, 2005, no. 59).