THE FRENCH PAINTED BY THEMSELVES. Nineteenth-century moral e - Lot 31

THE FRENCH PAINTED BY THEMSELVES. Nineteenth-century moral encyclopedia. Paris, Curmer, 1840-1841. 9 volumes. - THE ENGLISH PAINTED BY THEMSELVES. Ibid, id. 1840-1841. 2 volumes - Together 11 volumes large in-8, publisher's cream boards. Brivois, 5, 157 / Vicaire, I-64 / III, 794 /// i. (2f.)-XVI-380-(4f.)-front. and 47 pl. / ii. (3f.)-XVIII-376-(4f.)-front. and 48 pl. / iii. (3f.)-XL-352-(4f.)-front. and 48 pl. / iV. (3f.)-392- (5f.)-front. and 49 pl. / V. (3f.)-CVII-376-(5f.)-front. and 63 pl. // i. (3f.)-392-(4f.)-front. and 49 pl. / ii. (3f.)-VIII-396- (4f.)-front. and 50 pl. / iii. (3f.)-VIII-460-(5f.)-57-(1f.)-front. and 53 pl. A map / Prism. (2f.)-480. // i. (3f.)-III-400- front. and 50 pl./ ii. (2f.)-379-front. and 48 pl. Les Français peints par eux-mêmes is one of Curmer's most important published works. It comprises 5 volumes for Paris, 3 for the Province and one volume for the Prisme. The latter was offered to purchasers of the first eight volumes. It contains many unpublished texts by Balzac, Gautier, Janin, Karr, Nerval, Sand, Stendhal... and is illustrated with 415 plates, around 1,500 vignettes in the text by artists of the period: Bellangé, Daubigny, Daumier, Gavarni, Grandville, Johannot... and a double-page color map of France. Copy in the publisher's rare cartonnage. Includes several first printing remarks. Volume III of the Province series has the plates colored. The copy is complete with some 150 issue covers in a publisher's folder. With this series, we present Les Anglais peints par eux-mêmes, a 2-volume work based on the same scheme, illustrated with 100 plates out of text. Some boards soiled, a little stained with defects of use, restoration to one volume, one inner hinge cracked, foxing. The plates in the first volume of the English are heavily browned.