Le Maire / Carl Schuler - Les Traits de l'histoire universelle, sacrée et profane, d'après les plus grands peintres et les - 1760-1820

Set of 2 works from the 18th and 19th centuries, in 3 volumes, in fair condition and that bear witness to the biblical iconography of their era:

- LE MAIRE (engraver). The Traits of universal history, sacred and profane, after the greatest painters and the best writers. The Sacred History. Amsterdam, Fouquet the younger; Paris, Le Maire, Desaint et Saillant, the Étienne brothers, Joullain [and Michel Lambert for vol. II], 1760. 2 vols. small 8vo, entirely engraved: title, dedication and 237 numbered plates, half dark tan morocco, smooth spines with gilded lines, title labels, speckled paper boards (bindings from the period). First edition.

Le Maire, Parisian engraver, pupil of Jacques-Philippe Le Bas (1707-1783), conceived this collection as a history in images “intended mainly for the education of young people.” He also offers “excellent models of composition and design” to young artists. The engraved epistle, placed under the arms of France, is addressed to the young Duke of Burgundy, Louis-Joseph-Xavier of France (1751-1761), eldest son of the Dauphin. It proclaims Bolssuet (1627-1704), author of the Discourse on Universal History.

Each leaf is engraved on the recto only. It pairs a composition after the great masters, signed “Le Maire f.,” with the Latin text of the Vulgate with its reference, then with a French translation engraved in italics. The two volumes cover the Old Testament. The title of volume II presents a notable variant, as its wording changes: “the Author” replaces “Mr. Le Maire,” and the bookseller Michel Lambert “at the Parnassus” is added. The work would be reissued and augmented in 1771 under Le Bas’ direction.

Incomplete copy with 4 plates, bindings slightly rubbed, threadbare stitching causing occasional gathers to loosen and highlights (see specific photo), ink trace on the first plate (see specific photo), other minor defects.

- SCHULER (Carl). The Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testament depicted in Biblical copperplates. Freiburg im Breisgau, in the Herder’scher Kunst- und Buchhandlung, ca. 1820. 1 vol. 8vo, collection of 193 copper-engraved plates with captions, irregular pagination, slightly later purple-brown half-leather binding, smooth gold-decorated spine.

Carl Schuler (1782-1852), engraver active in the first half of the 19th century, directed for the Herder house of Freiburg im Breisgau, a renowned German Catholic bookseller, the execution of this sequence of biblical illustrations intended to accompany domestic reading of Scripture.

The work presents itself as a collection of 193 romantic plates (out of 200, probably), devoid of text. Each engraving occupies a full page, bearing at the top the chapter-verse reference and, beneath the line, a German cursive caption; signature “Schuler fecit argent.”, probably for Argentorati (Strasbourg).

The overall condition is fair: binding slightly rubbed, very widespread foxing on several plates, repairs to a few plates, some tears without loss on others, a small loss on the first plate, some stains and other minor defects.

Both works are offered as-is, as an iconographic biblical source of French Classicism of the 18th century and early 19th-century German Romanticism.