Joseph Vaissete (French, 1685-1756) & Claude de... Lot 291

Joseph Vaissete (French, 1685-1756) & Claude de Vic (French, 1670-1734) General history of Languedoc avec des notes et les pièces justificatives : composée sur les auteurs et les titres originaux, et enrichie de divers monumens. Par deux Religieux Benedictins de la Congregation de S. Maur. Paris, Jacques Vincent. 1730-1745. Five volumes in folio. Full tan calf. Triple framed with straight fillets. Large coat of arms of Madame de Pompadour on covers. Six-ribbed spine, decorated with "thistle" irons in the centre-ribs. Red morocco title-piece, brown morocco end-piece. A fine copy of this fundamental work on the history of Languedoc, the last volume of which ends with the death of Louis XIII. It features four folding maps in contemporary colors and 35 black plates, most of them folding. Volume I bears the Padeloup label at the bottom of the title and, on the flyleaf, the bookplate of Abel François Poisson de Vandières (1727-1781), Marquis de Marigny, brother of Madame de Pompadour, who inherited the Marquise's Château de Ménars in 1764. Provenance: after-death sale of the Bibliothèque de Madame de Pompadour, 1765, no. 3040, described as follows: "5 vol. in-fol, fig. v.f.". (5 volumes in-folio, figures, calf). France, 1730-1745. A 5-volume series on the history of Languedoc compiled by two Benedictine monks. From the book collection of Madame de Pompadour, official mistress of French King Louis XV. Jeanne-Antoinette Poisson, Marquise de Pompadour and Duchesse de Ménars (1721-1764), was a bibliophile. She showed a keen interest in books from an early age, and was scarcely more than twenty when she began to build up a library that she never ceased to enrich, "buying regularly from booksellers" (E. Lever) and at the public sales that proliferated in the mid-18th century. In 1745 - she was 24 at the time - Voltaire wrote: "She has read more at her age than any old lady in the country where she will reign" (Letter from Voltaire to President Hénault, dated 1745, quoted by Evelyne Lever, "Madame de Pompadour", p. 58). The "Catalogue des livres de la bibliothèque de feue Madame la Marquise de Pompadour, Dame du Palais de la Reine" (Hérissant, 1765) contains no fewer than 3,525 numbers, not counting musical scores and prints. In this rich library, books on history formed an important part; reading these works completed the Marquise's education and enabled her, at Court or in front of ministers, to speak confidently about politics.