ATHÉNÉE. - Lot 10

ATHÉNÉE. Banquet des savans. Paris, Lamy, De l'Imprimerie de Monsieur, 1789-1791. 5 volumes in-4, basane racinée, triple cold-stamped fillet, ornate smooth spine, red title-pieces and green tomaison, mottled edges (period binding). First edition of the first serious French translation of the Deipnosophistes by the Greek grammarian and rhetorician Athenaeus (3rd century), edited by Lefebvre de Villebrune. A veritable encyclopedia of ancient gastronomy, this Banquet des savants provides first-rate information on the table manners of the Ancients: foods, fruits, shellfish, menus, tableware, wines, famous cooks and gourmands, courtesans and libations, etc. This mine of erudition contains extracts from 800 plays, quotations from 1,500 lost works and the names of 700 authors, most of whom would have remained unknown without Athenaeus' work. The first edition, in Greek, was published by Aldus in 1514. According to Oberlé, the 17th-century French translation by Abbé Marolles is worthless. (Vicaire, col. 51; Oberlé, n°6.) A desirable copy, in an elegant contemporary basane racine binding. Several underlining and pencil notes. The title leaf of volume III is poorly bound between pp. 222-223.