(AUCTION CATALOGUE: BIGOT).

Bibliotheca Bigotiana. Seu Catalogus Librorum, quos (dum viverent) summâ curâ & industriâ, ingentíque sumptu congessêre...Joannes, Nicolaus, & Lud. Emericus Bigotii...Quorum plurimi MSS. Antiqui bonae notae tàm Graeci quàm Latini

Horum fiet Auctio die I. mensis Julii 1706, & seqq.… 4 p.l., 72 pp.; 1 p.l., 73-220 pp.; 1 p.l., 248, 59 pp.; [1] p., 31 pp.; [1], 31 pp. Five parts in one vol. 8vo, cont. speckled sheep (joints very carefully repaired), spine richly gilt, red morocco lettering piece on spine. Paris: J. Boudot, C. Osmont, & G. Martin, 1706. A great rarity; “the first sale certainly by auction [of books in Paris] is that of the Bibliotheca Bigotiana on 1 July 1706: ‘horum fiet Auctio’, says the title-page. It included the library of Jean Jacques de Mesmes, for whom Naudé had written his Advis pour dresser une Bibliothèque eighty years before, mixed with the books of Emeric Bigot. This was the first sale catalogue compiled by Gabriel Martin. Paris started late, but within the next twenty-five years it had become the leading international center for book auctions.”–Pollard & Ehrman, pp. 237-38. Émery Bigot (1626-89), French man of letters and literary scholar, knew all the leading French poets and writers of his time. He inherited the large family library which had been formed by his father Jean, councillor to the court of Normandy. Jean had spent enormous amounts of money on the library which contained 6000 books and more than 500 MSS. upon his death. Émery continued to greatly enlarge the library during his many travels in England, Holland, Germany, and Italy. The sale catalogue contains 16,486 lots, including many individual lots with numerous items. This is a very rare catalogue with only one copy listed in N.U.C. Part V lists the MSS. which were purchased separately by the King and can be found today at the Bibliothèque Nationale. Fine copy. Stamp on title of A. Boulange. ❧ Bléchet, p. 69. Histoire des bibliothèques françaises. Les bibliothèques sous l’Ancien Régime 1530-1789 (ed. Claude Jolly), p. 462. Grolier Club, Printed Catalogues of French Book Auctions...1643-1830, 12. N.B.G., Vol. 6, col. 60–“le catalogue forme un livre curieux.” Peignot, p. 81. Not in Blogie and Ehrman did not own a copy.

• USD 7,500.00 > other currencies
• ordernr.: HillBibl-1920

• bookseller: Jonathan A. Hill, Bookseller, Inc. (USA)