131 - - [MIRABEAU (Gabriel-Honoré Riquetti de)]. Errotika Biblion.

- [MIRABEAU (Gabriel-Honoré Riquetti de)]. Errotika Biblion. Rome, Vatican Press [Neuchâtel?, Fauche, Favre, and Vitel?], 1783, small 8vo, IV pp.—192 pages. Bound in bronze half-basane, smooth spine, blind-stamped fillets. (19th-century binding). - Ex-libris of J. Pelletier. Weak hinges, a few small foxing spots or light stains. First edition, reportedly published at shared expense by three printers in Neuchâtel to whom Mirabeau is said to have sold his manuscript. It is certain, however, that he composed this work while imprisoned in the Vincennes dungeon (at the same time as Sade). Pia I, 413 cites a letter from the philosopher addressed to his mistress Sophie de Ruffey: “I was planning to send you today, my dear little kitten, a new and very peculiar manuscript written by your tireless friend, but the copy I intend for Mr. B’s bookseller is not yet finished… These are quite amusing subjects, treated with a seriousness that is no less grotesque, yet very decent. Would you believe that one could conduct research in the Bible and antiquity on onanism, tribadism, etc.—in short, on the most scandalous subjects ever addressed by the casuists—and make all of this readable even to the most prudish reader, while sprinkling it with rather philosophical ideas?” Eleven chapters, whose titles are boldly derived from Greek or Hebrew, deal with bizarre sexual practices, oddities, and perversions, with examples drawn from the Bible, the Church Fathers, or Jesuit theologians; while others come from Greco-Roman antiquity, or are even drawn from current events and accounts from Africa or Asia. Each chapter is preceded by a half-title included in the pagination. The claim that this edition was printed in a run of 14 copies is false. - (Dictionary of Erotic Works, p. 165; Drujon, p. 149, for the history of condemnations and 19th-century editions; Darnton, *The Corpus of Clandestine Literature in France*, p. 204).