LORRIS, Guillaume de, and Jean de MEUNG. Le rommant de la rose. Nouuellement imprime a paris . Paris: Michel Le Noir, 26 January 1515. Chancery 4 o (196 x 135 mm). Collation: a-x 8 . 4 . 4 z 4 4 A-C 8 . 4 . 4 D 8 E 4 (a1r title, a1v full-page woodcut of scholar, a2r text, E3v colophon, E4r full-page scholar woodcut, E4v printer's device). 156 leaves, unfoliated. Double column. Btarde type. 24 woodcuts printed from 17 blocks, including title cut in two compartments, repeated on colophon page, nearly full-page cut of a scholar at his lectern on title verso and last leaf recto, and 14 small text woodcuts (repeated to 20, one cut with floriated woodcut strip border). Small cribl initials, one larger woodcut initial (the woodblock cut down), Le Noir's large woodcut black shield device (Renouard 621). (Fols. a1.8 and E1 rehinged, small repair to lower forecorner of a1, lower margins of D4.5 trimmed, occasional minor marginal worming, some soiling or discoloration.) Modern blind-stamped calf (rubbed). Provenance : 19th-century shelfmark "B977" on title; London 1894 note of purchase in pencil on final leaf. Second of three Le Noir editions in quarto format. The first, published in 1509, was the first dated edition of the Lorris-Meung romance. It was reprinted twice, each time with more illustrations, in the present edition and again in 1519 (his heir Philippe published a further edition in 1526). Only the title woodcut, a single block with two scenes, showing the narrator/dreamer sleeping in bed and Dame oiseuse , was specially designed by Le Noir for the 1509 edition. The remaining woodblocks were assembled from his general stock, including a group of 7 small blocks that were apparently cut for an unknown Le Noir edition of the scabrous Livre de Matholus (cf. Bourdillon pp. 92-96). (That of Mars and Venus in bed, on t3v, was abandoned in the 1519 edition, no doubt because of its "impropriety" [Bourdillon, p. 31].) This series of economically printed and miscellaneously illustrated small-format editions testifies to the lasting popularity of the Roman well into the 16th century. The Le Noir editions are among the last editions of the traditional text, based, with minor variants, on the large corpus of 15th-century manuscripts: an "audaciously" modernized version (Tchemerzine), whose usual attribution to Clment Marot has lately been questioned, was published in 1526 and was followed for all but one of the subsequent 16th-century editions, of which the last appeared in 1538. A particularly rare example of early French popular printing: Moreau located no institutional copies, and lists only the copies (or copy?) that surfaced in the Bancal and Lebigre sales in 1882 and 1889. This edition was unknown to Brunet, who listed Le Noir's 1509 and 1519 editions only. No American institutional copies of any of the Le Noir editions appear to be recorded. F.W. Bourdillon, The Early Editions of the Roman de la Rose (London 1906), edition K ("extremely rare"), pp. 30-31, 50-51, 88, 92-96; Moreau II, 1101; Tchemerzine IV, 225b.
LORRIS, Guillaume de, and Jean de MEUNG. Le rommant de la rose. Nouuellement imprime a paris . Paris: Michel Le Noir, 26 January 1515. Chancery 4 o (196 x 135 mm). Collation: a-x 8 . 4 . 4 z 4 4 A-C 8 . 4 . 4 D 8 E 4 (a1r title, a1v full-page woodcut of scholar, a2r text, E3v colophon, E4r full-page scholar woodcut, E4v printer's device). 156 leaves, unfoliated. Double column. Btarde type. 24 woodcuts printed from 17 blocks, including title cut in two compartments, repeated on colophon page, nearly full-page cut of a scholar at his lectern on title verso and last leaf recto, and 14 small text woodcuts (repeated to 20, one cut with floriated woodcut strip border). Small cribl initials, one larger woodcut initial (the woodblock cut down), Le Noir's large woodcut black shield device (Renouard 621). (Fols. a1.8 and E1 rehinged, small repair to lower forecorner of a1, lower margins of D4.5 trimmed, occasional minor marginal worming, some soiling or discoloration.) Modern blind-stamped calf (rubbed). Provenance : 19th-century shelfmark "B977" on title; London 1894 note of purchase in pencil on final leaf. Second of three Le Noir editions in quarto format. The first, published in 1509, was the first dated edition of the Lorris-Meung romance. It was reprinted twice, each time with more illustrations, in the present edition and again in 1519 (his heir Philippe published a further edition in 1526). Only the title woodcut, a single block with two scenes, showing the narrator/dreamer sleeping in bed and Dame oiseuse , was specially designed by Le Noir for the 1509 edition. The remaining woodblocks were assembled from his general stock, including a group of 7 small blocks that were apparently cut for an unknown Le Noir edition of the scabrous Livre de Matholus (cf. Bourdillon pp. 92-96). (That of Mars and Venus in bed, on t3v, was abandoned in the 1519 edition, no doubt because of its "impropriety" [Bourdillon, p. 31].) This series of economically printed and miscellaneously illustrated small-format editions testifies to the lasting popularity of the Roman well into the 16th century. The Le Noir editions are among the last editions of the traditional text, based, with minor variants, on the large corpus of 15th-century manuscripts: an "audaciously" modernized version (Tchemerzine), whose usual attribution to Clment Marot has lately been questioned, was published in 1526 and was followed for all but one of the subsequent 16th-century editions, of which the last appeared in 1538. A particularly rare example of early French popular printing: Moreau located no institutional copies, and lists only the copies (or copy?) that surfaced in the Bancal and Lebigre sales in 1882 and 1889. This edition was unknown to Brunet, who listed Le Noir's 1509 and 1519 editions only. No American institutional copies of any of the Le Noir editions appear to be recorded. F.W. Bourdillon, The Early Editions of the Roman de la Rose (London 1906), edition K ("extremely rare"), pp. 30-31, 50-51, 88, 92-96; Moreau II, 1101; Tchemerzine IV, 225b.
.jpg "Source: Christie's")
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