Eric Chaim Kline, Bookseller - Old and Rare Books

Parallèles des édifices anciens et modernes du continent africain... Atlas (Parallels between Ancient and Modern Buildings on the Continent of Africa... Atlas) [WITH SEVEN ORIGINAL SALTED PAPER PRINTS FROM CALOTYPES]

Trémaux, Pierre

Paris: L. Hachette et Cie, [1861]. First edition. Board portfolio. Oblong folio (36 by 55 cm). Tinted lithographic title; letterpress title; table; 15 unnumbered leaves of plate descriptions; 82 plates, numbered 1 - 82: 7 salted paper prints from calotypes, 3 chromolithographs, 43 lithographs (tinted or monochrome; 19 after photographs; duplicate plate 53), 30 steel engravings; 1 folding steel engraved map. Additional content: "Habitation Moresque (11 a 16)" largely repeats, but modifies the preceding text plate to provide a complete description of the images in this category; lithographic proof on tissue laid in with calotype plate no. 65. A lithographic reproduction has been mounted on top of the original calotype on plate no. 28. Plates loose in recent portfolio. Two text leaves heavily darkended; most lithographic and engraved plates very good to nearly fine, with touches of faint to light foxing or marginal smudges, about one-quarter with more notable foxing (generally confined to the margins); map with light, mostly marginal foxing; calotype prints very good to nearly fine, with some minor blemishes, lithographic proof on tissue (with plate 65) nearly fine. Overall, a very good collection.

Atlas comprising the second series of illustrated material which documents seven years of exploration and travel by the French architect Pierre Trémaux (1818-1895). Trained at the École des Beaux Arts, Trémaux was also a laureate of the Société de Géographie. He is best known for this epic travel series collectively titled: Voyages au Soudan oriental, dans l'Afrique septentrionale et dans l'Asie Mineure exécutés de 1847 à 1854 (Travels to Eastern Sudan, Northern Africa and Asia Minor Conducted from 1847 to 1854). In these works Trémaux describes the geology, flora and fauna, architectural monuments, and peoples of the regions. "Trémaux began his journeys around 1847 and was in Cairo by 1848 but probably did not start photographing until 1853 or 1854." Sold in installments, the Voyages was "originially intended as a monumental work with a total of 355 photographs in three series. However, the most complete set existing today includes only twenty-one photographs and fifty-six lithographs" (Perez).

While Trémaux had at first hoped to illustrate his works with calotypes, the fugitive nature of the process and the fact that he did not choose a master printer to produce his salt paper prints yielded specimens that were excessively faded. "Thus, only some issues of the [Voyages series] contain original salt prints from paper negatives. In other cases the photographs have been removed or had lithographs or photolithographs pasted over them" (Jacobson). Over the approximately fifteen years in which Trémaux' publications appeared "the method of reproduction of the illustrations changed from traditional lithography from drawings, to salted paper prints from calotype negatives, to lithographs traced from original photographs to photolithography" (Vaczek & Buckland). The present collection contains seven salt paper prints after calotypes (19.5 - 20.5 by 24.9 - 25.6 cm), mounted on paper, with printed numeration and titles:

Vue d'une cour à Tunis, d l'Hotel d'un Ministre du Bey (pl. 10); Détail d'un arc de triomphe à Tripoli de Barbarie (pl. 58); Vue du nymphée de Zaghouan, formant la prise d'eau des aqueducs de Carthage (pl. 61); Vue de l'aqueduc de Carthage, prise sur les bords d'Ouad-el-Méliana (pl. 63); Vue des grandes citernes de Carthage, prise dans l'axe de la percée longitudinale et montrant sa construction en blocage (pl. 65); Vue de l'amphithéatre d'El-Djem, prise au Sud (pl. 68); Vue intérieure de l'amphithéatre d'El-Djem (pl. 70).

Ample descriptive text accompanies each of the 82 plates. Along with views of buildings and ancient sites, many plates provide fine details of decorative motifs from antiquity, the middle ages, and the recent era. Subjects include the Moorish architecture of Algeria and Tunis; the mosques of Cairo, along with the tombs of the Mameluks and Caliphs; the aqueduct and cisterns of ancient Carthage and Zaghouan; Djedeida; and El-Djem, the ancient Roman city of Thysdrus. Trémaux' descriptions and sketches of Lower Nubia are considered to be especially valuable, as much of this area now is covered by Lake Nubia, the extension into Sudan of Lake Nasser, created when the Aswan High Dam was built in the 1960s. These include the ruins of the ancient city of the Kushitic Kingdom of Meroë in the desert of Naqa (Naga'a); Napata at the fourth cataract of the Nile and the region of Jebel Barkal, the main Kushite cult center of Amun in the Egyptian New Kingdom (16th-11th cent. BCE); and the pyramids of the Nubian kings at Nuri. Very good. Item #54563

References: Brunet V, col. 935; Goldschmidt & Naef, The Truthful Lens 171; J. Hannavy (ed.), Encyclopedia of Nineteenth-Century Photography 2: p. 1408, with notes on dating the 3 series; K. Jacobson, Odalisques & Arabesques: Orientalist Photography 1839-1925 (2007): p. 273; Jammes & Janis, The Art of French Calotype (1983): pp. 250-252; N. Perez, Focus East, Early Photography in the Near East 1839-1885 (1988): pp. 227-8; B. Öztuncay, The Photographers of Constantinople 1 (2003), p. 83, note; L. Vaczek & G. Buckland, Travellers in Ancient Lands, a Portrait of the Middle East, 1839-1919 (1981): pp. 196-7.

Full title and imprint: Parallèles des édifices anciens et modernes du continent africain dessinés et relevés 1847 a 1854 dans l'Algerie, les régences de Tunis et de Tripoli, l'Egypte, la Nubie, les déserts, l'île de Méroé, le Sennar, le fa-Zoglo et dans les contrées inconnues de la Nigritie : Atlas (comprenant des exemples de chaque style choisis parmi les monuments les plus intéressants et les moins connus) avec notices par Pierre Trémeaux architecte laureat de l'Institut, membre de plusieurs sociétés savantes : Ouvrage publié avec encouragément de l'Institut et du Gouvernement Français. Paris: Librairie L. Hachette et Cie, editeurs.

Price: $16,500.00