Pierre de RONSARD. Les Quatre premiers livres des Odes... Ensemble son Bocage... - Pierre de RONSARD. L'Hymne de France. Paris, Michel Vascosan, 1549. 2 works in one volume in-8, brown basane, gilt arms in the center of the boards, spine with 5 ornate nerves ( Late 17th century binding). Barbier, MBP, II-2, 3, 4, 5 // De Backer, 389 bis // Olivier, 2350 // Rothschild, 669-671 // Tchemerzine-Scheler, V-415/416. I. (10 f.)-170 f.-(2 f.) / A8, *2, a-x8, y4 ( with y3 signed z3) // II (8 f.) / A8 / 98 x 159 mm. First editions of these two very rare works, which are among Ronsard's earliest published works. There is a debate between several bibliographers about different editions of the Four first books of the Odes. Barbier-Mueller's summary of the debate is very skilfully commented in Ma bibliothèque poétique (II-n° 5). Without going into the details of this polemic, we shall follow his opinion that there are several states of this edition, and indicate the composition of our copy. This one: - contains the Suravertissement followed by the Privilege; - contains misprint on verso of folio 136, Boucage for Bocage; - contains error on folio 155, erroneously numbered 557; - contains the two errata leaves at the end of the volume. L'Hymne de France is sometimes considered Ronsard's first publication (cf. Picot in the Rothschild catalog), sometimes his second after L'Épithalame d'Antoine de Bourbon (cf. Tchemerzine). . Sometimes, as here, we find the Quatre premiers livres... and L'Hymne bound together; the reason for this is that the Quatres premiers livres contain in fine, as we said, two errata leaves which are often missing and which are present here. Curiously, these two errata pages concern both books, even though they were published by two different publishers. This peculiarity has led some bibliographers, such as Seymour de Ricci, to believe that the first collection and the booklet must have been sold together, and that a copy of the Quatre premiers livres... not containing L'Hymne would be incomplete. We agree with Barbier-Mueller's thesis that, due to a typographical correction to the word Hymne to Hinne and because of an error in the name Ronsard spelled with a T, considered these two publications to be two separate editions. A copy bearing the arms of François Chartraire de Montigny, a member of the Burgundy Parliament in 1692, who died in 1728, leaving behind a substantial library. The copy contains a few old handwritten annotations and a few underlined passages. Binding a little rubbed, title page rebacked. Title of Odes stained and restored, a few brown spots, probably due to faded ink. Provenance: J.B. Clergéon (? handwritten bookplate dated 1633), François Chartraire de Montigny (arms) and Mme Gueneau de Mussy (bookplate).