De rerum natura libri sex.

Paris: for Guillaume Rouillé, Lyon, and his nephew Philippe Gautier Rouillé, Paris,, 1563. The only known large paper copy, with contemporary colour, in a remarkable Parisian binding First Lambin edition, large paper copy, 3 cm larger in both dimensions than copies on regular paper and uniquely, according to Brunet, with contemporary colouring, in a splendid Parisian gold-tooled morocco binding of the period. Brunet writes of "cette première édition estimée du Lucrèce de Lambin" and describes at length this unique copy, on large paper, with contemporary colouring: "Un exemplaire de l'édition de 1563, en Grand Papier (avec les capitales du commencement de chaque livre enluminées), et relié en maroquin olive à compartiments, a été vendu 15 liv. chez M. Dent, qui, selon le Repertorium bibliogr., 246, l'avait payé 40 liv. Jusque-là on ne connaissait point le Grand Papier de cette édition estimée." The French classical scholar and philologist Denys Lambin (1516-1572) was one of the greatest critical editors of his time; his "editorial work expresses a deep sympathy for his subject and the prefaces and notes are a monument of erudition and fine vigorous Latinity" (PMM). The edition was likely initiated by Guillaume Rouillé, the prodigious merchant-publisher of Lyon, and published in short-term partnership with his nephew in Paris, as a means of getting him established there. This is the edition of Lucretius cited in Printing and the Mind of Man, where it is described as "one of the grandest and most moving poems in the Latin language". "Of very few languages can it be said that the first surviving major poem in it is an exposition of a philosophical system of considerable subtlety, but first or last, Lucretius's 'On the Nature of Things' would have been a unique contribution to any literature. In it the atomic theory, the most vivid and tender depictions of nature, and a sense of the beauty and rhythm of words which triumphs over the early unsophisticated form of the Latin Hexameter, all those combine in the most astonishing way to produce one of the grandest and most moving poems in the Latin language." More recently, Lucretius's poem was the subject of The Swerve: How the World Became Modern, a 2011 book by Stephen Greenblatt, which was winner of the 2012 Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction and 2011 National Book Award for Nonfiction. The pattern of gold-tooling on this sumptuous binding was popular in Paris in the 1560s and 70s and several binders used variations on it, such as the binders who worked for Francis II and Charles IX, and for Thomas Mahieu and others. As styles are easy to copy and similar designs were often embellished with tools belonging to totally separate binders, attribution to a specific binder or atelier is impossible in this case. For example, one of the tools is closely similar to a tool used by Wotton's Binder III, but it is not identical and so this binding cannot be attributed to that workshop. Henry Davis Gift II, 14, illustrates a copy of Pausanias, 1551, bound for Thomas Mahieu with similar but again not identical tooling. Nevertheless, the binding exhibits the characteristic craftsmanship of the most accomplished Parisian binders of the period. Provenance: John Dent (1760-1826), his sale, London 1827, lot 694 ("This is one of the most beautiful books in Mr. Dent's Library"); Bibliothèque Henri Béraldi [1849-1931], Paris, 1934, Première partie, no. 20; Maurice Burrus (1882–1959), with his bookplate; Thierry de Maigret Vente aux Enchères, Drouot 27 Nov 2013, lot 86. Quarto (252 x 185 mm). Contemporary olive-green morocco over pasteboard, tooled in gold with fillets, gouges and lines, spine with five gilt-ruled raised bands and six compartments with gilt fleurons and leaf sprays, blue and yellow headbands, board edges with two-line gilt rule and hatched sections, turn-ins unruled, white endpapers, edges gilt and gauffered; title lettering in gold within central oval on upper cover added at a later date. Housed in a custom olive morocco fleece-lined folding case. Title within large woodcut historiated border, woodcut headpieces and initials, all with fine contemporary hand-colouring heightened with gold. Discreet small repair to front joint at head, two spots to title page, else internally fresh and clean, a fine copy. Adams L1659; Printing and the Mind of Man 87.