FOSSÉ (Charles-Louis-François de). - Lot 52

FOSSÉ (Charles-Louis-François de). Idées d'un militaire dans la disposition des troupes confiées aux jeunes officiers dans la défense et l'attaque des petits postes. Paris, De l'Imprimerie de France, Ambroise Firmin Didot, Alexandre Jombert jeune, 1783. 2 parts in one volume in-4, blue paper boards, untrimmed (period binding). First edition of this treatise on military strategy. Remarkable illustration engraved in color "en manière de pastel" by Louis-Marin Bonnet (1736-1793), an artist who defined himself here - wrongly - as the "first engraver in this genre": a vignette with the dedicatee's coat of arms and 11 plates of plans engraved after the author's drawings. A chapter of the work deals with the use of colors for the washes of the plans. Copy in contemporary hardback. Small worm gallery in the upper margin of six leaves. Some light spotting.