Pair of 18th-Century French Books, 1766 & 1774

Two genuinely antique French books in original paper-board bindings with exposed hand-sewn spines, both dating to the third quarter of the 18th century.

The first, Histoire de la Constitution Unigenitus by Pierre-François Lafiteau, Bishop of Sisteron (Avignon, 1766), is a history and defense of the famous papal bull Unigenitus of 1713, the decree that condemned Jansenism and set off one of the great religious and political struggles of 18th-century France. Lafiteau (1685 to 1764) had served as the King's chargé d'affaires at the Holy See in Rome before writing it.

The second, a Cours abrégé de géographie historique, ancienne et moderne, et de la sphère (Neuchâtel, 1774), is an Enlightenment-era geography textbook from the celebrated Société Typographique de Neuchâtel. Written in a question-and-answer format, it surveys the geography of the ancient and modern world along with the fundamentals of the celestial and terrestrial sphere.

Soft tan boards, deckled pages, and beautiful honest age, ideal styled as a stack, displayed open, or layered into a vignette.

Condition: Honest age, with worn boards, toning, and fragile hand-sewn spines; sold as decorative antiques.