BRETONNAYAU (René).

Lot 28
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BRETONNAYAU (René).
Ɵ La Génération de l'homme, et le temple de l'âme : avec Autres œuvres Poëtiques extraittes de l'Esculape. Paris, Pour Abel L'Angelier, 1583. In-4, red morocco, double framed with two gilt filets, gilt fleurons and volutes in the corners, ornate spine, inner lace, gilt edges on marble (Petit-Simier). First edition of this collection of scientific poems. The author, a doctor from Anjou and son-in-law of the Touraine apothecary Thomas Lespleigney, invites us here to an anatomical journey. After having discussed generation, conception of man and sterility, he deals with the temple of the soul, the manufacture of the eye, the heart, the liver, or still decoration or embellishment of the face, teeth & hands. Colic and hemorrhoids, less exciting subjects, are also addressed. The work of Bretonnayau rehabilitates the enjoying body and the festive writing in the repressive climate of the post-tridentine morality [...]. The subversive potentiality of the work is made readable in the very structure of the collection, which opens on the removed description of the organs of the generation and the coitus, and which ends on a poem entitled "The Monkey" where the separation between the man and the animal is tested dangerously (Dominique Brancher, "Medical Eros. Le périple anatomique de René Bretonnayau (1583)" in Renaissance et Réforme, 2015). Title placed in a woodcut frame formed of four different blocks, from the material of Lucas Breyer (Renouard, n°558). Antique manuscript bookplate on the title. A few yellowed leaves, otherwise a fine copy very well bound: it is quoted by Balsamo & Simonin. J. P. Barbier-Mueller, IV-1, n°54. - Balsamo & Simonin, n°80. - Lachèvre, Recueils de poésies libres et satiriques, pp. 127-129. - Diane Barbier-Mueller, Inventaire..., n°103
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