Guéroult, Le premier livre des emblemes, Lyon, 1550, red morocco by Bauzonnet-Trautz, Bertin-Firmin Didot copy

Guéroult, Guillaume. Le Premier livre des Emblemes, composé par Guillaume Guéroult. Lyon: Balthazar Arnoullet, 1550

First edition of Guéroult's emblem book, among an eclectic oeuvre comprising historical, geographical, religious and botanical works. Guéroult retells Aesop's fable of the Fox, the Cockerel and the Dog (Aesop’s Fables, 2.15) as his second emblem, 'A troumpeur trompeur et demy'. In turn, Guéroult's work is known to have influenced Jean de La Fontaine; in particular his fifteenth emblem, 'Les riches sont supportes & les povres oppresses' had direct influences on Les Animaux malades de la peste.

The woodcuts used to be attributed to Bernard Salomon, but that has now been disputed.

8vo (160 x 102 mm). Italic type, 25 lines plus headline. collation: A-D⁸ E⁴: 36 leaves. Title-page with woodcut device, woodcut initials, 28 woodcut emblems (three repetitions), washed inscriptions and annotations throughout. (Washed.)

binding: Red morocco by Bauzonnet-Trautz (165 x 106 mm), spine gilt in compartments, marbled endpapers, gilt edges, a few deckle edges.

provenance: Armand Bertin (1801-1854), bookplate — Alexandre-Henry de Chaponay (1811-1878), sale, Paris, 26-31 January 1863, lot 743 ("mar. r., fil., tr. dor. (Bauzonnet-Trautz). Joli exemplaire de M. A. Bertin, grande de marges et rempli de témoins") — Ambroise Firmin-Didot (1790-1876), bookplate, sale, Paris, 26-31 May 1879, lot 432 — Samuel Ashton Thompson Yates (1842-1903), bookplate dated 1894 — Allan Heywood Bright (1862-1941), sale, Christie's, 16 July 2014, part of lot 105. acquisition: Purchased at the preceding sale. references: Landwehr, Romanic Emblem Books 357; Mortimer, Harvard French 262