Catalogvs Librorvm Omnivm Facvltatvm. Qvi Venales reperiuntur in Officina & Societate Philippi Borde, Lavrentii Arnavd Et Clavdii Rigavd, Bibliopolarum Lugdunensium vsque ad hunc annum 1656.
Lyon, for Ph. Borde, Laur. Arnaud and Cl. II Rigaud 1656.
12mo (150 x 83 mm.). 513 [r. 515]p. Large woodcut title ornament.
Contemporary card boards (small hole in the front panel), flat spine.
A REMARKABLE STOCK CATALOG OF SOME TEN THOUSAND SIXTEENTH- AND SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY TITLES REPRESENTING THE COMBINED INVENTORIES OF EIGHT DOMINANT LYONESE PUBLISHERS AND BOOKSELLERS ACTIVE FROM 1555 TO 1656.
Beginning in the 1620s, the book trade in the France’s second city experienced dramatic consolidation through inheritance and liquidation. Philippe Borde, Laurent Arnaud and Claude II Rigaud stood the principal beneficiaries. Between 1650 and 1655 they partnered to purchase the stocks of the Lyonese Giunta, of Horace Cardon, of Horace Boissat, of the Rouillé family and of Claude Prost.
The partners had to sell, and this catalog, clearly prepared in haste, is the result. It swarms with minor errors like reversed and upside-down sorts, repeated pagination, errors in dates and orthography and chase marks, likely arising from the rush to have it ready in time for the Lyon trade fair.
The material is grouped into thirteen categories. The nine subject divisions list only Latin texts in the fields of theology (Scripture, councils, scholastics, morals, controversies, asceticism, spirituality, preaching manuals), law, medicine, philosophy, history, politics and civics, sciences (astronomy, mathematics, architecture, atlases, cabbala), the humanities (grammar, rhetoric, ancient classics) and liturgy. Four sections gather material by language — Greek, Hebrew and Arabic together, Italian, Spanish and French — regardless of subject. In each class entries are arranged alphabetically by author, and each work is identified by its author, title, format, printing place, date and number of volumes (if a set). Imprints span Naples to London and Madrid to Hamburg.
The present example has been marked up in manuscript. Two dozen entries have been canceled in whole or in part across eight different categories, motivated in every case but two by religion. Machiavelli's dangerous political ideas and G.B. Marino’s personal immorality earned censure. Hundreds of entries have been ticked in the left margins, sometimes four or five to a page. I have located one example in the U.S. (Grolier Club). In good condition (one quire browned, narrow pale stain to the second half of the volume).
¶Pollard & Ehrman, Distribution of Books by Catalogue 117, 120, 301, 355 (Arnaud), 361 (Borde) & 511 (Rigaud); Mirto, Stampatori, editori, librai nella seconda metà del Seicento I: 70; Mellot & Queval, Répertoire d’imprimeurs/libraires (vers 1500-vers 1810) (2004) nos. 107 (Arnaud), 634 (Borde) & 474 (Rigaud); Répertoire bibliographique des livres imprimés en France au XVIIe siecle: Lyon ed. Merland I: 142-143-84 (Arnaud), II: 149-66 (Borde) & VI: 202-4 (Rigaud).
Price: $8,500.00