Mazois, [Charles-] François
Lorient, Morbihan 1783 – 1826 Paris

Les ruines de Pompéi, par F. Mazois Architecte, Inspecteur Générale des Batiments Civils, Chevalier de L’Ordre Royal de La Légion d’Honneur. Première Partie [title in volume iii: Les Ruines de Pompéi, par F. Mazois… Et Continué par M. Gau, Auteur des Antiquités de La Nubie. Troisième Partie; title in volume iv: Les Ruines de Pompéi, par F. Mazois… Ouvrage continué par M. Gau, Architecte, Précédé d’Une Notice sur F. Mazois, par M. Le Cher Artaud, Membre De L’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, et De L’Explication de La Grande Mosaïque Découverte a Pompéi en 1831, par M. Quatremère de Quincy, Secrétaire Perpétuel de L’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles Lettres… Le Texte de la Quatrième Partie a été rédigé par M. Barré, Professeur de Philosophie. Quatrième Partie].

Paris, Imprimerie et Librairie de Firmin Didot (volumes iii–iv: Librairie De Firmin Didot Frères), 1812–1838

Four volumes, broadsheet folio (555 × 405 mm):

I: (32) ff. letterpress, signed π¹ (half-title, Première Partie) 2π¹ (title) (1)–30¹ and paginated (4) 1–59 (1), with engraved vignette on title-page and twelve vignettes printed with text (list pp.57–59); plus engraved title-page (lettered Les Ruines De Pompei Dessinées Et Mesurées Par F. Mazois Pendant Les Années mdcccix – mdcccx – mdcccxi Publiées A Paris En mdcccxii) and forty engraved plates (numbered i–ii, i–xxxviii), of which the last is double-page (list p.[60]).

II: (55) ff. letterpress, signed π¹ (half-title, Seconde Partie) ²π¹ (title) (1)–53¹ and paginated (4) 1–104 (2), with engraved vignette on title-page and twenty-two vignettes printed with the text (list pp.101–104); plus fifty-eight engraved plates (numbered i–iii, i–lv), of which two are folding (pls. xliv, xlviii).

III: (40) ff. letterpress, signed (1)–40¹ (including half-title, Troisième Partie; and title) and paginated (1)–79 (1), with engraved vignette on title-page and twelve vignettes printed with text (list pp.78–79); plus fifty-three numbered engraved plates (numerated i–l, ix bis, xiii bis, xiv bis), of which four double-page or folding (pls. iii, ix bis, xiv, xxiii), and eight coloured by hand (pls. xxi, xxvi, xxvii, xxxvi, xxxvii, xlv, xlvi, l). This copy contains a second impression of plate xiv bis in a previous state (where wrongly numerated xvi bis).

IV: (52) ff. letterpress, signed π¹ (half-title, Quatrième Partie) ²π¹ (title, dated 1838) a–c¹ (Notice sur F. Mazois) (1)–46¹ (47)¹ (Avis au Relieur) and paginated (4) i–vi 1–91 (3), with engraved vignette printed on title-page; plus folding lithographed map (Plan général de la ville de Pompeia, dated 1837) and fifty plates (numerated i–xlix, xlviii bis), of which three are double-page or folding (pls. xix, xxxvii, xlv), and nine are wholly or partly coloured by hand (pls. i, xxi–xxiii, xxvi, xxxix, xlii, xlviii bis, xlix).

Occasional foxing, particularly to tissue interleaves; otherwise in excellent state of preservation.

bound uniformly in contemporary russia leather, dyed purple, engraved ticket in upper corner of pastedown Gebunden bei Ph. Selenka in Wiesbaden (volumes i–iii).

Very fine copy of a scholarly and thorough archaeological study of Pompeii, intended by its author as the beginning of a series on Paestum, Herculaneum, and Pozzuoli.

After studying for a short time in the studio of the architect Charles Percier, Mazois had travelled to Italy in November 1808 with a fellow-student, Achille Leclère, winner of the 1808 Prix de Rome for architecture. Through the agency of Etienne-Chérubin Leconte (1762–1818), architect to Carolina Murat, Queen of Naples, Mazois was appointed dessi­nateur de son cabinet, and afterwards gained access to the excavations, still jealously controlled by the Naples Academy. From 1809 to 1811, he resided in the ruins, making hundreds of drawings. At the beginning of 1811, Mazois returned to Rome, where he apparently supervised the engraving of some of his drawings, and proceeded thence to Paris to prepare the text. Owing to political circumstances, Mazois could not return to Naples until 1816, and then his visit was restricted to a month; in 1818 he was able to remain for nearly a year; his final visit, in 1819, was again very brief.

A prospectus inviting subscriptions to the work was published in December 1812,¹ and the first fascicule appeared in January 1813, distributed by the booksellers M. Leclerc, Didot l’aîné, and Normand, on two papers: papier ordinaire and papier fin (i.e. vélin), each livrai­son priced respectively priced 20 and 30 francs.² Further fascicules, often containing fewer, or more, than the prom­ised six plates, appeared thereafter at irregular intervals. In 1824, they were gathered up, and issued as two volumes.

On New Year’s Eve, 1826, Mazois died of apoplexy, having completed just the first three fascicules of the projected third volume. His widow made his drawings available to Franz Christian Gau (1790–1853), and they were integrated into two further volumes. Gau wrote the text for the third volume, published in 1829; and Louis Barré was the principal author of the fourth volume, issued in January 1838.³ The completed work as advertised by Firmin Didot Frères was priced 700 francs (papier vélin 1000 francs).⁴

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The illustrations in the first three volumes were mostly drawn by Mazois⁵ and engraved by printmakers working in Italy, including Giovanni Battista Cipriani, Vincenzo Feoli, Carl Ludwig Frommel, Pietro Ruga, and Angelo Testa. The illustrations in the fourth volume were drawn by Gau, and by the Parisian draughtsmen André Giroux, J.N.L. Durand, or Frommel; the printmakers were mainly French, and included Jean Adam, Jean Baptiste Arnout, Louis Pierre Baltard de la Fresque, ‘Bigand’, ‘Bishop’, Thomas Boys, Louis Félix Butavand, Alexandre Charles Dormier, ‘Duvau’, ‘Fincke’, G. Hamilton, Charles Paul Landon, ‘Lemaitre’, ‘Lesnier’, ‘Millet’, ‘Normand’, I.ne Nyon, E. Olivier, ‘Réville’, ‘Sellier’, and A. Simonet. One of the hand-coloured plates (iii, pl. 46) is signed by the miniaturist Ferdinand Groubenthal (1792/1797–c. 1840).⁶ One of the few lithographs in (volume iv, pl. xlii) was printed by Gottfried Engelmann.⁷

This copy contains a leaf of dedication in volume i addressed ‘A sa Majesté La Reine Des Deux-Siciles’. The leaf is present also in the copy in the British Architectural Library, but is lacking in the Royal Academy Library copy: ‘If this was to Napoleon’s sister, Caroline, this dedication page may well have been omitted from sets of plates distributed after 1813, when she was evicted from Naples’ (opac of Royal Academy of Arts).

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A beautiful set, finely bound by Philipp Selenka of Wiesbaden

Our copy contains the engraved ticket of the bookbinder Philipp Selenka (1803–1850) of Wiesbaden, brother of Johann Jacob Selenka (1801–1871), Hofbuchbinder in Braunschweig.⁸

references Friedrich Furchheim, Bibliografia di Pompei, Ercolano e Stabia (second edition Naples 1891), pp.58–59 (‘On ne trouve que rarement des exemplaires de cet ouvrage très-estimé’); Fabia Borroni, ‘Il Cicognara’: bibliografia dell’archeologia classica e dell’arte italiana, ii/4 (Florence 1962), no. 7475; Pompei: travaux et envois des architectes français au xixe siècle, catalogue of an exhibition (Paris 1981), pp.31, 75, 291–292; L’immagine dell’antico fra settecento e ottocento. Libri di archeologia nella biblioteca Comunale dell’Archiginnasio, catalogue of an exhibition (Bologna 1983), pp.39–41; Laurentino García y García, Nova bibliotheca pompeiana (Rome 1998), pp.797–798 no. 9073; Early printed books 1478–1840: catalogue of the British Architectural Library, Early Imprints Collection (London & Munich 1999), iii, pp.1113–1115 no. 2092; Vito Castiglione Minischetti, Giovanni Dotoli, and Roger Musnik, Bibliographie du voyage français en Italie du Moyen Âge à 1914 (Fasano & Paris 2002), pp.374–375