4to. vi, 191 pp., 5 paginated plates at rear of which 1 is folding, 6 plates in text of which 3 are folding, Hebrew alphabet, Arabic alphabet of the priest Metoscita, Phoenician, Persian, Arabic, African, Turkic and Tatar alphabets published by Sigismond Fante and afterwards by Geoffroy Tory in 1526, half-title, 19th century full calf binding, title gilt on spine, gilt lines with embossed medallion in the centre of the covers, professional restoration of the binding, occasional spotting, otherwise copy in very good condition, Dufour & Roux, Maastricht, first edition, 1778.

Synopsis

Louis Poinsinet de Sivry was a versatile French linguist and literary scholar, philologist and dramatist. He was a member of the Société Royale des Sciences et Belles-Lettres in Lorraine and a specialist in Greco-Latin antiquity, annotating Horace, translating Anacreon Aristophanes, the Natural History of Pliny, and a numismatic work. He also had good scientific knowledge, particularly in physics: he composed two letters to the chemist Macquer on “the colours of Air phlogiston” and the decomposition of the light show.
The pages 187 to 191 reproduce several alphabets in Hebrew, Arabic after Metoscita, Persian and African Arabic after Sigismond Fante and Geoffroy Tory, Chaldean letters after S. Fante and G. Tory.
Bibliographic reference: Hilmy II, 126.