Coypel

1746 · réf. 166941 — 1746. CERVANTES. Les Principals Aventures de Don Quichote. Complete suite of 31 plates 1 headpiece and 1 vignette by Coypel Picart et al. some mounted on strong paper. Folio 368 x 252 mm bound in nineteenth-century French red half morocco over embossed paper boards embossed white endpapers. The Hague: De Hondt 1746. A rare suite in first issue of the Coypel-Picart engravings produced to illustrate Cervantes text of 1746. The original paintings by Charles Coypel 1694-1752 illustrating Don Quixote now hanging at Compiègne-French Royal residence of Louis XV are considered his greatest works; the paintings were first reproduced in a large-folio suite of 25 prints issued in Paris in 1723. The above volume belongs to the reduced format edition issued in 1746 by De Hondt French and Dutch texts were available. This project was begun by Picart who died in 1733 necessitating the participation of Schley. Twenty five plates were executed after Coypel's designs; the others were after Boucher Cochin Le Bas and Tremolière. "It is not too much to say that the pictorial tradition associated with Cervantes' masterpiece owes as much to Coypel as to any other artist" Ray p. 13. PROVENANCE: Lenormand du Coudray 1712-1789 famed Orléans print-collector to whom Lugt nos. 1704-1706 devotes more than a column. Lugt's assertion that Lenormand du Coudray affixed his signature to the verso of nearly every print he owned holds true in the present volume: each plate is elaborately inscribed with his monogram and date of acquisition "2 Feb. 1756" i.e. only ten years after they were published. It makes sense that Lenormand du Coudray would purchase the suite without text as he was interested in graphic art and further they are consecutively numbered by him in contemporary MS. Ashbee Iconography of Don Quixote no. 43. Ray French no. 4 error in collation: the "frontispiece" is a ghost. hardcover books