DÜRER Albrecht Les Quatre livres de la proportion des parties & pourtraicts des corps humains. [Relié avec]: Institutionum geometricarum libri quatuor, in quibus, lineas, superficies, & solida corpora, ita tractavit.

Vitry, 248. 

Third French edition of the Vier Bücher von menschlicher Proportion, Dürer’s important contribution to the science of art, anatomy, and the theory of human proportions, bound with the fifth and final Latin edition of Dürer’s first book on the theory of art, the Underweysung der Messung.

Remarkable Provenance

This copy has belonged to the eminent scientist Jean-François Nicéron (1613-1646) bearing his signature on the Latin edition of Dürer. The inscription is dated just three years before the first edition of his principal treatise, La Perspective Curieuse, and the binding shows the arms of the convent to which it belonged. Provenances from important artists, architects and theorists are among the rarest to survive, presumably because their books were used to death; and works whose subject matter directly relates to the owner’s claim to our attention, where the provenance is indisputable, as here, are rare still: it was in this copy that Nicéron read his Dürer, gathering from the Nuremberg artist and theorist the principles and techniques which he would develop in his own work, best known for the development of anamorphosis. As the copy resided in the conventual library of the Minims in Paris, it is not unlikely that it was also utilized by yet another distinguished member of that Order interested in perspective, Marin Mersenne.

Some leaves slightly toned or soiled: binding slightly rubbed or scuffed and with some old restorations, fly leaves renewed. With the engraved portrait of Jean Baptiste Scanarole tipped on front enpaper.

Other provenance : Thomas Vroom (book plate).