De Burigny - Histoire Générale de Sicile - 1745

GRANDI CARTE RIPIEGATE – FIRST EDITION – SICILY GREEK, ROMAN, ARAB, NORMAN AND SPANISH
First edition of the monumental Histoire générale de Sicile by Jean Lévesque de Burigny, published in The Hague in 1745 in two elegant volumes. One of the broadest eighteenth-century syntheses devoted to the island’s history, the work traces Sicily’s story from the oldest populations and Phoenician and Greek colonizations to the political events contemporary with the author. Ample space is allotted to classical Sicily, Syracuse, Greek culture, poetry, rhetoric, philosophy, medicine and the arts, before systematically following the dominations of Roman, Byzantine, Arab, Norman, Swabian, Angevin, Aragonese and Spanish rule. The cartographic apparatus is particularly important, consisting of two large engraved maps repeatedly folded: the Carte géographique de l’Isle et Royaume de Sicile, dedicated to modern Sicily, and Sicilia Vetus, which reconstructs the island’s geography in antiquity. The two maps allow an intriguing comparison between classical and eighteenth-century Sicily and represent one of the most desirable collecting elements of the edition. The exemplar’s prestige is completed by its sumptuous preservation in the two uniform contemporary bindings in full marbled calf, with spine supports richly decorated in gold, red morocco inlays and marbled edges.

WHY TO BUY
FIRST EDITION – 1745! One of the great eighteenth-century histories devoted entirely to Sicily.
BIG FOLDED MAPS! SICILIA VETUS and the modern Sicily united in the same copy.
FROM MAGNA GRAECIA TO THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY! Over two thousand years of political, cultural and Mediterranean history.
TWO VOLUMES IN SPLENDID CONTEMPORARY CALF! An elegant pairing for a major collection of Sicily and the Grand Tour.

MARKET VALUE
The first edition of the Histoire générale de Sicile retains solid interest for collectors of Sicily, Italian local history, cartography and the Grand Tour. The factors most affecting valuation are the completeness of the two volumes, the presence of both large folded maps, the freshness of the maps, and the quality of the bindings. For a complete exemplar, with the two maps preserved and in elegant uniform full contemporary calf, a retail value realistically falls in the €1,000-2,000 range, with potential higher offers for particularly fresh copies, wide margins or provenance of significance.

PHYSICAL / CONDITION
Two volumes. Volume I: pp. (4), 14 nn., 512, (4). Volume II: pp. (4), 8 nn., 454, (2), 10 nn., (4). Two large engraved folded maps of Sicily: one dedicated to the island’s contemporary geography and one titled Sicilia Vetus, relating to ancient geography. Frontispieces printed in red and black with an ornamental vignette engraved. Elegant uniform contemporary binding in full marbled calf, with spine panels richly decorated in gold; red morocco inlays with titles and volume numbers impressed in gold. Marbled edges and marbled endleaves with some signs of wear. Maps with sporadic browning, foxing and normal signs of time. The large folded maps may show folds, small tears or minimal marginal defects compatible with use. Elegant and desirable exemplar in its eighteenth-century attire. As with all antique volumes, slight defects or restorations not expressly mentioned may be present.

FULL TITLES & AUTHORS
Jean Lévesque de Burigny (1692-1785).
Histoire générale de Sicile.
A La Haye: chez Isaac Beauregard, et Pierre Gosse Junior et Comp., 1745.
FIRST EDITION.
Two volumes
Volume I: pp. (4), 14 nn., 512, (4).
Volume II: pp. (4), 8 nn., 454, (2), 10 nn., (4).
With two large folded engraved maps: Carte géographique de l’Isle et Royaume de Sicile and Sicilia Vetus.

BIOGRAPHY OF THE AUTHOR
Jean Lévesque de Burigny (1692-1785) was a French historian and scholar, representative of that eighteenth-century culture that sought to reconstruct the past through a systematic examination of classical, medieval and modern sources. He devoted himself with particular intensity to European and Mediterranean history and gained notoriety also through important biographical studies dedicated to figures such as Erasmus, Grotius and Bossuet. His erudite formation emerges fully in the Histoire générale de Sicile, where the island’s history is reconstructed not as a peripheral tale, but as an integral part of the political and cultural history of the Mediterranean. Burigny combines ancient sources, medieval chronicles and modern documentation to follow the continual transformations of a land contested for centuries by the major European and Mediterranean powers. The work thus represents one of the most extensive syntheses on Sicily produced by eighteenth-century French historiography.

RARITY
The Histoire générale de Sicile of 1745 is not an extremely rare bibliographic title, but complete, high-quality exemplars show a desirability markedly higher than incomplete copies or those lacking the cartographic apparatus. The main discriminating element is the two large folded maps, easily subject to detachment, loss or damage over the centuries. The contemporaneous presence of Carte géographique de l’Isle et Royaume de Sicile and Sicilia Vetus allows full appreciation of the author’s historical-geographical project. Also particularly interesting is the preservation of the two volumes in the elegant original uniform bindings in full marbled calf. The combination of first edition, two large maps, two complete volumes and contemporary binding places this exemplar in the qualitatively most desirable tier of first-edition copies.

HISTORICAL IMPORTANCE
Sicily occupies a unique position in Mediterranean history, and Burigny builds his work precisely around this extraordinary cultural stratification. Phoenicians, Greeks, Carthaginians, Romans, Byzantines, Arabs, Normans, Swabs, Angevins, Aragonese and Spaniards repeatedly transformed the island’s political and cultural identity. The narrative gives ample space to Greek Sicily, the Punic Wars, Syracuse and its tyrants, but also addresses the intellectual production of antiquity through sections dedicated to Sicilian poets, orators, philosophers, physicians and artists. The work then proceeds through the Middle Ages and modern era, continually linking the island’s fortunes to the major European power balances. The two maps reinforce this historical conception: Sicilia Vetus depicts the territory of classical sources, while the modern map presents the island as known to the eighteenth-century traveler. The volume thus constitutes a significant source for the history of Sicily, cartography, Enlightenment historiography and Grand Tour culture.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Hoefer, Nouvelle Biographie Générale, entry Jean Lévesque de Burigny.
Barbier, Dictionnaire des ouvrages anonymes et pseudonymes.
Bibliothèque nationale de France, bibliographic repertories dedicated to Jean Lévesque de Burigny.
Repertori bibliografici dedicated to the history of Sicily, eighteenth-century cartography and Grand Tour literature.
Catalogues of major European libraries relating to the first edition of Histoire générale de Sicile of 1745.