353 - BIGNON (Jean-Paul)

BIGNON (Jean-Paul) Les Avantures d'Abdalla fils d'Hanif, envoyé par le sultan des Indes à la découverte de l'Isle de Borico, où est la Fontaine merveilleuse dont l'eau fait rajeunir. Translated into French from the Arabic Manuscript found in Batavia by M. de Sandisson. Paris, Damonneville, 1745. 2 volumes in 1 in-12 (17 x 10 cm), half red basane, richly decorated ribbed spine, red edges (later imitation binding). Third edition. Illustrated with intaglio figures: frontispieces, vignettes, headbands, lettering, friezes, 9 out-of-text illustrations. Nerves and covers worn, 3 cm tear to frontispiece (not missing). Several tears and light spotting. Vol. I. 24-167-[1bl.]-[2] pp. with frontispiece and 7 figures. Vol. II. [1] f. title, pp. [5]-219, [3] pp. front. and 2 figures. The Adventures of Abdalla son of Hanif tells the fabulous story of this hero's quest for a certain "marvelous fountain whose water makes one young again". The influence of the Thousand and One Nights and d'Herbelot's Bibliothèque orientale is unmistakable. The author, Abbé Bignon, orientalist, friend of Antoine Galland and director of the king's library, confessed to reading the manuscripts of the Thousand and One Nights submitted to him "in his carriage, with a candle" on his way back from Versailles in the evening, and to finding great pleasure in them.