PRIEUR (Claude). Dialogue de la lycanthropie ou transformati - Lot 161

PRIEUR (Claude). Dialogue de la lycanthropie ou transformation d'hommes en loups, vulgairement dits Loups-garous, & si telle se peut faire. Louvain, Jehan Maes & Philippe Zangre, 1596. In-8, ivory vellum, edges speckled with red (contemporary binding). Unique edition of this opuscule on werewolves, whose bibliographers all emphasize its "insignificant rarity". (Caillet, n°8975; Dorbon, n°3784; Guaïta, n°2014; Yve-Plessis, n°974.) The author, a native of Laval, was a Friar Minor of the Observance order. His work, one of the few texts entirely devoted to lycanthropy, takes the form of a dialogue between three interlocutors debating this alleged "transmutation": the most common, & experimented in this country is in the form of wolves; for they are wolves for a time, when they want, & return to men when they want. [...] [They] have devoured, and still usually devour, not only the beastly, but also men, and especially small children. After referring to a number of testimonies of this kind, they conclude that it's a fable based on pagan superstitions.