DOM CALMET (Augustin) - Dictionnaire historique critique, chronologique, géographique et littéral de la bible. Genève, Chez Marc-Michel Bouquet, 1730; in-4, frontispiece, 34-CCCLXXVIII-471 + XX-908 + 844 + 552 pp. + table de CCCLX pages, contemporary full calf bindings, 5-rib spines, red morocco title-pieces, edges painted red, some spotting, headpieces to be restored. All 4 volumes. Antoine Calmet, Dom Augustin in religion, was born on February 26, 1672 in Ménil-la-Horgne near Commercy, Lorraine, into a modest family (his father was a blacksmith). A keen student from an early age, he was an 18th-century exegete and scholar from Lorraine, known as Dom Calmet, a Benedictine of the Congregation of Saint-Vanne & Saint-Hydulphe. In 1728, Dom Calmet was appointed abbot of Senones, the capital of the principality of Salm. It was in the great Vosges abbey that he worked & lived the latter part of his life, maintaining a correspondence with numerous scholars. He died there on October 25, 1757. Dom Calmet left an immense body of work. His best-known work is his Histoire de Lorraine, the second edition of which was written in Senones. It was also in Senones that he wrote a now-forgotten work, a 17-volume Histoire universelle, on which Voltaire collaborated for a few days in 1753; a Bible in Latin and French, with a Commentaire littéral & critique sur tous les livres de l'Ancien & Nouveau Testament (Paris (1707-1716; 26 vol. in-4°). The Commentaire, a major work by Abbé de Senones, who constantly returned to make corrections, or check translations, was reproduced separately under the title Trésor d'antiquités sacrées & profanes, from 1722, in 9 volumes. Consultant : Mr. Philippe HENRY