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12mo (105 x 180 mmm). [12], 754, [2] pp. Text in French and Latin. BOUND BY P. MESLANT in early 19th-century full red long-grain morocco, smooth spine divided into six compartments, title lettered direct in the second, others richly gilt radiating triangles, in the centers of which appear to be tiny tetragrammaton (?), covers finely gilt with interlocking rolls, turn-ins gilt, blue paper pastedowns and endpapers (abrasion in gutter of front hinge which is not cracked), all edges gilt (scattered foxing, some wear to binding extremities). An attractive and well bound copy. PUBLISHED BY ANTOINETTE CAILLEAU UNDER THE NAME OF "VEUVE DUCHESNE," A BEAUTIFULLY BOUND PRAYER BOOK THAT ATTESTS TO THE HIGH REGARD IN WHICH HER PUBLICATIONS WERE HELD BY THE BOOK-BUYING PUBLIC. THE PUBLISHER: Antoinette Cailleau was born into the trade, being the daughter of the Parisian bookseller Andre Cailleau and Antoinette Huguier. She married Nicolas-Bonaventure Duchesne, initially a merchant from Normandy, in 1747. He was admitted into the guild and took over her father's shop. Duchesne became successful with a bold publishing strategy, to the extent that he was entrusted by such famous authors as Voltaire and Rousseau to publish their books. When her husband died in 1765, Antoinette inherited a business valued at more than 260,000 livres -- an enormous sum in those days. She proved to be an exceptional businesswoman, and under her leadership the Duchesne firm became even more profitable, printing and selling books "in all genres" (Arbour) including theater, fiction, science, history, poetry, scientific and technical books, theology, etc. After 1787 (the year in which our volume was published) she was joined by her son Jean-Nicolas. She retired in 1791 and died in 1793, leaving an estate which includined another house on the rue Saint-Jacques and a country house. He success can also be measured in her arrangments of the marriages of her two daughters to men of good standing. Despite inflation, her estate was valued at 177,000 livres. Her friend and colleague Voltaire called her "the exact and shrewd widow Duchesne." THE BINDER: Fine bindings signed "P. Meslant," "N. Meslant" and "R[ene] O[thon] Meslant are known, yet Flety (p. 128) makes no distinction between any of them. Judging from the quality of the tooling and decoration, we are inclined to believe that these binders were active in the same workshop which was established in Paris in 1797 and became known for bindings "le plus soignees et decorees," most notably for Louis-Philippe and many members of the family d'Orleans. Our binder (P. Meslant) is the best known of the three and is known to have been patronized by Napoleon and Marie-Louise (see: Vente Wittock V, no. 52). The Meslant shop itself was active until at least 1840. THE TEXT: Breviary of Paris and of Rome, containing all Offices of the day, the Processions and Masses, the Antiphons and the Responses of the whole year, and the Office of the Dead. Interestingly, the Approbation mentions that this text was "reprinted" by "our friend" the printer-bookseller Nicolas-Francois Valleyre jeune, apparently from Valleyre's 1773 (?) edition but does not name the widow Duchesne. It is possible that she simply acquired the unsold sheets and had a new title-page printed, naming her as publisher. Arbour, Dictionnaire des femmes libraires en France 1470-1870, p. 203.
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