[MANUSCRIPT]. PRÉVOST, M.
Cours de géométrie pratique professé par M. Prevost et suivi par C.F. Frenet. Comprenant 1o. La géométrie élémentaire avec ses applications au toisé, au cubage, géodésie, etc. 2o. La géométrie descriptive avec ses applications à la perspective, à la coupe des pierres etc.
[Lyon?, ca. 1825?]. Oblong folio (35 x 45 cm). With a flourished calligraphic title-page signed "[Charles] Esclozas scripsit", and 140 leaves with more than 350 figures in black ink and sometimes pencil, red ink or coloured washes (blue, yellow, red, green and grey), illustrating plain and solid geometry, projections, perspective, architecture, bridges, cartography, globes, sundials, etc., and with text and illustrations in black thick-thin borders. Contemporary green half morocco, spine richly gold-tooled. [1], [1 blank], [97], [1 blank] pp. plus 140 illustration ll. partly numbered in 13 series.
€ 25,000
Complete and thoroughly illustrated course of practical plane and solid geometry (including conic and other sections), with applications to projections, perspective, surveying, bridges, architecture and stone masonry, cartography, geodesy and globes, sundials, etc. The title suggests it was a series of lectures by "M. Prevost" (it is not clear whether "M" is an initial or merely means "monsieur"), followed by C.F. Frenet, who apparently wrote up Prévost's lectures and drew the finely executed illustrations. The texts are mostly captions to the figures in the illustrations and are usually keyed to them with numbers. The title-page divides the text into two numbered parts. The first (géométrie élémentaire) has 5 subdivisions (géométrie élémentaire, geodésie graphique, du plan, surface des solides, cubature des corps), and the second (géométrie descriptive) has 8 subdivisions (problemes & plans tangens, sections, poliedres, developpemens, construire une mappe-monde, gnomonique & cadrans, coupe des pierres, perspective). The extent of the course suggests it continued for more than one year. Frenet probably set down Prévost's words and sketched his illustrations during the lectures, but made the present fair copies of both at home afterward. The ninth plate includes the captions of figures 73 to 80 in a trompe l'oeil drawing of a piece of paper as if it were attached with sealing wax and had its corners curling up.
We have not been able to identify Prévost or Frenet, but the calligrapher who executed the title-page was almost certainly Charles Esclozas/Esclosas (ca. 1796-1839), who worked in his native Lyon from 1823 to his death, so the manuscript probably originated in or near Lyon.
A few leaves are bound out of order. The ink of the flourishes at the head of the title-page has eaten through the paper, and in a couple illustration leaves the paper has torn along a border line (in one case with loss of the fore-edge margin). The title-page and last leaf are creased and a few leaves show browning or foxing, but most leaves remain in very good condition. The binding is rubbed and the hinges worn, but the tooling on the spine remains clear. A manuscript course of practical geometry with finely executed illustrations, perhaps prepared for publication but never published.
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