DES ROCHES (Madeleine & Catherine).

La Puce de Madame Des-Roches. Qui est un recueil de divers Poëmes Grecs, Latins & François, composz par plusieurs doctes personnages aux Grans Jours tenus à Poitiers l'An 1579. Paris, Pour Abel L'Angelier, 1582. In-4, wine-leather morocco, triple gilt fillet, ornate spine, interior lace, gilt edges (Trautz-Bauzonnet). First edition of this famous collective collection of the bantering and learned poems of the "chante-puce" poets. One of only a few copies with the date 1582, characteristic of the first issue. The story of Madame des Roches' puce is well known: in 1579, several distinguished persons, magistrates and gentlemen, who were at the Grands Jours (extraordinary sessions of justice) in Poitiers, charmed their leisure hours by cultivating poetry: after some time, Pasquier, casting an eye on Catherine Fradonnet (or more exactly on her bodice), spotted "une Pulce qui s'estoit parquee au beau milieu de son sein". Galant, the magistrate declared that the insolent insect, for having had the privilege of trotting over the anatomy of such a beautiful and learned person, deserved "to be enshrined in our papers". The game was on. [...] In the autumn of 1582, a gentleman from Poitou named Jacques de Sourdrai ordered the one hundred and fifteen collected pieces and entrusted them to the official publisher of the Dames des Roches, Abel L'Angelier (N. Ducimetière). The collection contains various sonnets, epigrams, odes, etc., in French, Greek and Latin, by Claude Binet, Jean Binet, Jacques Courtin de Cissé, Catherine des Roches, Achille de Harlay, Jacques Mangot, Pierre Pithou, Nicolas Rapin and Joseph Scaliger. The poem by Étienne Pasquier, the instigator of this curious literary joust, proved most delightful and set the tone for the other fine minds present that day: [...] of course, the incident was a pretext for erotic reveries and declarations of love. One goes so far as to compare the animal to Cupid. [...] This evokes the charms that the young girl keeps hidden from the gentlemen and that only the flea can visit. [...] Imagination and desire are expressed both freely and with preciosity. (Dictionary of Erotic Works, pp. 422-423). A large-margined copy, well bound by Trautz-Bauzonnet. It is cited by Balsamo & Simonin, with fine provenances: Maximilien de Clinchamp (1860, no. 250), Armand Cicongne (1861, no. 890, library purchased en bloc by the Duc d'Aumale, whose duplicates he resold), Henri Bordes (1911, no. 32) and Albert-Louis Natural (1987, no. 48). Spine faded, spine split over a few centimeters. J. P. Barbier-Mueller, IV-5, n°56. - Balsamo & Simonin, n°76. - Cat. De Backer, I, 1926, n°372. - N. Ducimetière, Mignonne..., p. 266. - Tchemerzine, II, p. 909. - Diane Barbier-Mueller, Inventaire..., n°213.