60 - LA FONTAINE (Jean de). Selected Fables, set to verse. Antwerp: Henry van Dunewalt, 1688 (first four volumes);

LA FONTAINE (Jean de). Selected Fables, set to verse. Antwerp: Henry van Dunewalt, 1688 (first four volumes); The Hague: Henry van Bulderen, 1694 (fifth volume). Set of five small 8vo volumes (152 x 135 mm), 18th-century binding in long-grained red morocco, wide and delicate floral garland framing the covers, ornate ribbed spine, interior roulette, gilt edges, slipcases, and cases (MacDonald, New York). A very attractive Dutch imitation of the precious complete original collective edition of the Fables published in Paris by Claude Barbin and Denys Thierry between 1678 and 1694. It is illustrated with a frontispiece by Romain de Hooghe dated 1687, a vignette at the beginning of Book I, and 235 half-page illustrations modeled after those drawn by Chauveau for the Parisian edition and engraved on copper by Henri Cause, who signed most of them in full, and some with his initials. “In 1688, Dutch publishers released a complete edition of La Fontaine’s Fables, featuring exact copies of all of F. Chauveau’s illustrations; they are set within larger frames, with lines and hatching in Chauveau’s style. These copies are signed H. Cause; they are arranged as in Chauveau’s book, in the middle of the page, at the beginning of each fable, and many are reversed …” (A. Desprès). As always, the first four volumes here come from the Antwerp edition by Van Dunewalt, 1688, and the fifth from the reprint published the same year in The Hague by Henry van Bulderen—a reprint whose fifth volume is dated 1694. Describing the four volumes of the Antwerp edition, the Count of Rochambeau notes: “This edition must have had a fifth part like that of van Bulderen; we have not come across it.” A superb copy, nicely divided into five volumes, fully and very carefully rebound in exquisite late 18th-century morocco leather bindings decorated on the covers with delicate floral lace. From the library of Mortimer L. Schiff, London, Sotheby’s, 1938, lot 946, to whom we undoubtedly owe the excellent protective slipcases. Rochambeau (Count of). Bibliography of the Works of La Fontaine, Paris, 1911, nos. S 19 and 20; Desprès (A.). The Illustrated Editions of La Fontaine’s Fables, Paris, 1892, pp. 26–27; Brunet, III, 752.