Plan Des Œvvres Melées, D’Anne de Rvlman, Conseiller du Roy, es Assesseur Criminel en la Grand Preuosté du Languedoc.
Nîmes, P. Gilles 1630.
4to (204 x 150 mm.). 4, 4, 13p.
Modern patterned boards.
ONLY EDITION OF THIS PROSPECTUS FOR A MASSIVE ILLUSTRATED HISTORY OF LANGUEDOC from ancient times to 1629. Each volume is announced with its own mock title-page, the wording declaring the volume’s contents and the name of the dedicatee, already having accepted the honor. Louis XIII commissioned the first volume, on the events of the Wars of Religion (1562-1629). The second volume, on Roman coins and medals recovered from the precincts of Nîmes, was sponsored by his brother, Gaston d’Orléans. The third volume, on the city and region’s architecture, receives two pages, with Richelieu as the dedicatee. The remaining volumes were to offer Rulman’s correspondence (IV), a history of Nîmes to the year 1000 (V), local Roman inscriptions and epitaphs (VI), proposals to end religious strife (VII), a history of Nîmes from 1000 to the present (VIII), Rulman’s public speeches (IX), a philological study and dictionary of Occitan (also two pages; X) and lastly a collection of proverbs in his native dialect (XI).
In early 1630, when desperately ill, the author asked his sixteen-year-old son, Antoine, to prepare the Plan, which opens with his apology for the design faults and errors in spelling and punctuation. By mid-June Anne had recovered sufficiently to show Papal Nuncio Nicolò Guidi di Bagno the full manuscript, including the folio volume of architectural drawings, and take him on an extended tour of Nîmes’ marvels, thereby securing his patronage for Volume VI. Rulman published an account of his day with Guidi di Bagno, including his intended collaboration with local clock maker, painter and engraver Jacques Bernard and architect Guillaume Remon on the finished illustrations.
Of the present prospectus, I have located three other examples (Mannheim UB complete; BnF lacking last leaf; Nîmes Bibliothèque Carré d’Art lacking first two leaves). Only two other books from this press are known, both of 1630. This is the earliest printed prospectus I have ever seen. In good condition (slightly browned and foxed).
¶Lelong, Bibliothèque historique de la France (1768-78) 37711 (ten vols. only — after a copy lacking the last leaf); Haag, La France protestante X: 70-2 (?after Lelong, ten vols.); Brunet IV: 1459 (?after Lelong, ten vols.); see Répertoire bibliographique des livres imprimés en France au XVIIe siècle IX: 212 55.
Price: $4,600.00