Eric Chaim Kline, Bookseller - Old and Rare Books

Parallele de l'architecture antique et de la modern (A Parallel between Ancient and Modern Archtecture) [A BEAUTIFULLY PRINTED VOLUME, REMARKABLE FOR ITS DESIGN AND TECHNICAL EXECUTION]

Fréart, Roland, Sieur de Chambray

Paris: Edme Martin, 1650. First edition. Two parts, folio (41.9 by 28.25 cm). 62 leaves. [12], 109, [1, blank], [2, glossary of terms] pp. Added engraved title, with portrait of the author; 40 full-page engraved plates; engraved headpieces, initials. Contemporary calf (some wear at extremities), gilt borders; spine with raised bands, gilt tooled ornaments. Fine, very amply-margined copy.

First edition of this "beautifully printed and designed volume" (Fowler), which systematically presents the opinions of ten early modern architectural writers on the five Greco-Roman orders: Doric, Ionic, Corinthian, Tuscan and Composite. The editor provides substantial commentary, as well. The extraordinary nature of this work is noted by Cicognara: "Prima ed accuratissima edizione di un’opera insigne e preziosa per la sua esecuzione tipografica e calcografica, oltre le cognizioni riunite nel testo" / This is the first and most accurate edition of a work that is remarkable and valuable for its typographical design and craftmanship of engraving, as well as the information assembled in the text." Fréart arranges his work by Greco-Roman order, grouping the commentary of the ten writers into pairs: Andrea Palladio (1508-1580) and Vincenzo Scamozzi (1552-1616); Sebastiano Serlio (1475-1554) and Giacomo Barozzi da Vignola (1507-1573); Daniel Barbaro (1513-1570) and Pietro Cataneo (d. 1569); Leon Battista Alberti (1404-1472) and Gioseffe Viola Zanini (ca. 1599-1631); Jean Bullant (1515-1578) and Philibert de Lorme (1515?-1570).

The privilege of the 1702 edition published at Paris by Pierre Emery, notes that the unsigned plates were engraved by Errard. An English translation of Parallele de l'Architure by John Evelyn appeared at London in 1664, and was reprinted in 1707 with a dedication to Sir Christopher Wren. Freart's French translation of the complete text of Palladio's Quattro Libri (Venice, 1570) appeared in 1650; and of Leonardo's Treatise on Painting in 1651.

The French writer and collector, Roland Fréart, Sieur de Chambray (ca. 1606-1676), was an important early modern theorist of architecture and the arts, who wrote at a time when French architects struggled to apply a new sense of discipline and order to the practice of building. Item #55419

References: Digital Cicognara Library 507; Fowler 127; Millard (French Books) 76.

Full title and imprint: Parallele de l'architecture antique et de la moderne: avec un recueil des dix principaux autheurs qui ont écrit des cinq orders; sçavoir, Palladio et Scamozzi, Serlio et Vignola, D. Barbaro et Cataneo, L.B. Alberti et Viola, Bulland et de Lorme. comparez entre eux. Les trois orderes Grecs, le Dorique, l'Ionique et le Corinthien, font la premiere partie de ce Traitté: et les deux Latins, le Toscan et le Composite, en font la derniere. A Paris, De l'Imprimerie d'Edme Martin, ruë S. Iacques, au Soleil d'or. M.DC.L. Avec privilege du Roy.

Price: $2,750.00