French Book-plates

French Book-plates

T is nearly a quarter of a century since Mons. Maurice Tourneux first drew attention to the subject of French book-plates in an article which appeared in LAmateur dAutographes for April, 1872. This was descriptive of the famous collection of Mons. Aglas Bouvenne, who is himself the designer of some of the most interesting and artistic of modern French book-plates. Next followed the well-known work of Mons. A. Poulet-Malassis, Les Ex-Libris Franais, the preface to which is dated January 20th, 1874; a second edition was issued in the following year by P. Rouquette, Paris, 1875. Then, after a long interval, appeared Les Ex-Libris et les Marques de Possession du Livre, by Henri Bouchot. Paris: Edouard Rouveyre, 1891. Beyond these, and a few pamphlets descriptive of local collections, such as the Petite Revue dEx-Libris Alsaciens, by Auguste Stoeber, 1881, and some articles by Octave Uzanne in Le Livre Moderne, comparatively little had been written on the topic until the appearance of the first edition of this work. Indeed, in his last article in Le Livre Moderne (No. 24, December, 1891), M. Octave Uzanne deplored the want of interest shown by the French authors in this important branch of bibliographical art. From amongst the hundreds of thousands of book-plates known to exist in public and private collections, there would, he said, be no difficulty in selecting sufficient representative examples to form a magnificent Dictionnaire Illustr des Ex-Libris. The task must, however, remain unperformed until an author is found possessing not only sufficient taste, skill, and leisure to undertake it, but also ample means to carry it out, for such a work would undoubtedly be costly, and not many publishers would be willing to undertake the risk of producing it. ......Buy Now (To Read More)

Product details

Ebook Number: 41620
Author: Hamilton, Walter
Release Date: Dec 14, 2012
Format: eBook
Language: English