La Fama Gelosa Della Fortuna.
“Gex” [?Geneva or Lyon], at the author’s expense 1680.
4to (216 x 161 mm.). Etched frontis., [xiv], 167p. Frontis. bust portrait of Louis XIV used twice — in an intaglio frame with three emblems (frontis.) and alone in the text, etched bust portrait of Vittorio Amadeo II duc di Savoia (age 14) with his arms and an emblem, all the etchings by J.-J. Thurneysen, woodcut text emblem of Fortuna.
Contemporary vellum over flexible paper boards (bowed, ink spots on the rear cover, spine defective), early manuscript spine title.
First Edition. The notorious Calvinist satirist and historian composed this slavish panegyric to Louis XIV to garner a place at the French court. The petitioner had just been expelled from Geneva. Leti lays it on thick, i.a., lauding Louis as the common father of all Europe. It worked — if Leti would return to the Catholic faith. Instead he sailed for England.
This (legitimate) plea for patronage, like many of his incendiary publications, bears a false imprint, as no books were printed at Gex before the 18th century. He signed the preface at Lyon. I locate two copies in the U.S. One quire browned, a few minor stains.
¶Aym, “Gregorio Leti, du panégyrique au pamphlet” in Littérature de contestation: Pamphlets et polémiques du règne de Louis XIV aux Lumières edd. Tatin-Gourier & Bonnet 73-88; Krivatsy, Bibliography of the Works of Gregorio Leti 55; Barcia, Bibliografia delle opere di Gregorio Leti nos. 20 “Lyon” & 177; Répertoire bibliographique des livres imprimés en France au XVIIe siècle VIII: 61,5 (Geneva); Bougeois & André, Les Sources de l’histoire de France XVIIe siècle 8724.
Price: $3,800.00