Histoire des philosophes modernes
Subtitle: avec leur portrait gravé dans le goût du crayon, d'apres les desseins des plus grands peintres
By: par M. Saverien ; publiée par François, graveur des desseins du Cabinet du Roi ...
Contributors: François, Jean Charles, 1717-1769; Brunet, Bernard, 1717?-1760
Publisher: De l'Imprimerie de Brunet, imprimeur de l'Academie françoise
Published: 1760
Place of publication: Paris
Language: fre
Subjects: Philosophers; Modern Philosophy; Scientists; History
Notes: Brunet appears as printer on v. 1 only.

Getty copy comprises v. 1-6 only. Publication date of v. 7-8 unknown.

Vol. 2-3 have t.p. date 1761. In v. 4 date altered from 1761 to 1764, in v. 5 from 1761 to 1766. Vol. 6 has date 1768.

T.p.'s of v. 3-6 have printed cancel slips over volume title.

Also published in 12mo. See Brunet, and "Catalogue des estampes nouvelles qui se trouvet chez François," p. 111, v. 1.

"Lettre de M. François, graveur, a M. Saverien, sur l'utilité du dessein & sur la gravure dans le goût du crayon," p. 107-111, v. 1.

Illustrations are soft-ground etchings (some etching and engraving) by Jean Charles François, mostly printed in sepia (some sanguine and black). They are after drawings by Jean-Jacques Bachelier, François Boucher, Deshay (i.e. Jean Baptiste Deshays?), Charles Eisen, Marie Catherine François, Jorat (i.e. Etienne Jeaurat?), Hans Holbein, Phillippe de La Hire, Jean-Baptiste Marie Pierre, Carle Vanloo.

Etchings include frontispieces and t.p.'s in each vol. as well as ports. Ports. are full page in first two vols. (save the last in v. 2), but separately printed insets (12.8 x 9 cm.) within larger borders that repeat in v. 3-6.

Etched allegories substituted for ports. when none were available to copy; see p. xvij, v. 6. Such an allegory of Shaftesbury appears in v. 2, but his port. nevertheless appears at end of v. 4.

Woodcut head- and tail-pieces, some signed S.P. Fournier. Additional etched head-pieces. Full-page etchings of putti appear in v. 3-5 on verso of last letterpress leaf of some articles, in place of woodcut ornaments that appear in such positions in v. 1-2. In v. 3 the putti are full-page, in v. 4 they are separately printed inserts within larger borders that repeat, in v. 5 they are printed without borders on separately mounted sheets.

Errata in v. 1-6.

Includes bibliographical footnotes.

Brunet V, 154

Second front free endpaper verso of v. 5 has 22 lines of reader's notes in French.

Second copy of port. of Wollaston bound at end of v. 3.

Binding, v. 1: mottled calfskin, spine gilt tooled with title on label, double gilt fillets on edges of boards, page edges red, ribbon place marker. Vols. 2-6 similar, but boards have triple gilt fillets along margins, spines have vol. nos. on second label, and bookplate of Earl of Normanton appears on front pastedowns.
Table of contents: title: t. 1. Histoire des metaphysiciens: Erasme, Hobbes, Nicole, Locke, Spinosa, Mallebranche, Bayle, Abbadie, Clarke, Collins; title: t. 2. Histoire des moralistes et des legislateurs: Montagne, Charron, Grotius, La Rochefoucault, Pufendorff, Cumberland, La Bruyere, Duguet, Wollaston, Shaftesbury; title: t. 3. Histoire des restaurateurs des sc̜iences, 1. pte.: Ramus, Bacon, Gassendi, Descartes, Pascal; title: t. 4. Histoire des restaurateurs des sciences, 2. pte.: Newton, Leibnitz, Halley, Bernoulli, Wolf; title: t. 5. Histoire des mathematiciens: Copernic, Viete, Tycho-Brahe, Galilée, Kepler, Fermat, Cassini, Hughens, La Hire, Varignon; title: t. 6. Histoire des phisiciens: Rohault, Boyle, Hartsoeker, Poliniere, Molieres, Desaguliers, s'Gravesande, Muschenbroek; title: t. 7. Histoire des chimistes et des cosmologistes: Paracelse, Lefevre, Kunckel, Burnet, Lémery, Homberg, Maillet, Woodward, Boerhaave; title: t. 8. Histoire des naturalistes: Agricola, Gesner, Aldrovande, Belon, Jonston, Lister, Plumier, Tournefort, Hales, Réaumur.